At your family’s home office, the Epson EcoTank ET-2850 All-in-One Printer is leading the drive for environmentally friendly ink solutions. The EcoTank ET-2850, which boasts a novel cartridge-free ink technology and remarkable performance in a neat, appealing packaging, claims to “beyond your vision” in terms of total value and print quality. It’s a great all-in-one printer that is user-friendly for the whole family and far more intelligent than older inkjet models. It fits perfectly into our list of the top printers.
Setting up the Epson EcoTank ET-2850 All-in-One Printer
The conventional tedium of setting up your printer is a thing of the past thanks to the benefits of mobile technology. I only needed to connect the ET-2850 in, download the Epson Smart Panel app, push the power button on the printer, and follow the on-screen instructions after unpacking it. If your computer has a CD drive, Epson also supplies a Windows installation DVD. Yet, in my experience, using a smartphone is just simpler.)
Epson’s new printer series stands out in this regard since installation includes physically filling the ink tanks yourself, just like a true technician. (Don’t be alarmed; it’s simpler than you imagine.) Although this procedure may take a little longer than changing out conventional ink cartridges, it is surprisingly enjoyable due to the fact that you can physically watch the ink reservoirs fill up one at a time as you go. (Just be sure to use the appropriate ink and reservoir.) After that, all that’s left to do is connect to WiFi, wait for the ten-minute “ink initialization” process to be finished, adjust the printer head alignment, update the firmware, and that’s about it. In little than 30 minutes, I had everything set up. Like me, you’ll want to download everything on your desktop as well if you use Windows.
Black ink has a greater reservoir than the other colors, which explains why refill bottles cost $20 rather than $13. Moreover, Epson’s website offers a three-pack of cyan, magenta, and yellow ink bottles for $39 (opens in new tab). (More about ink prices below.)
You can print images, papers, ID cards, borderless copies, and a ton more with the Epson Smart Panel app(opens in new tab), which has a handy carousel on the configurable interface. (The software works with iOS as well, so iPhone users aren’t out of luck.) While I gathered press materials for forthcoming projects throughout my testing, it was simple to scan and print papers immediately from my Samsung Galaxy Note 20 Ultra.
A fax option is noticeably missing, but with each passing tax season, that practice is getting more out of date.
Design and usability of Epson EcoTank ET-2850 All-in-One Printer
The Epson EcoTank ET-2850 sports a 1.4-inch LCD panel for menu navigation, which is accomplished by pushing the soft-touch keys to the right of the screen, similar to other more recent all-in-one printers. A slightly bigger 2.7-inch color touchscreen with a 45-degree tilt is available on the $250 HP OfficeJet Pro 9015e. Although most printer functions are accessible directly from a phone or laptop, you shouldn’t have to tinker with the Epson’s little screen very frequently if you don’t want to.
There is only one host USB port and one AC adapter port on the printer’s back. Although I admire the simplicity of its design, a USB memory connection or SD card slot would be helpful for quick file transfers, especially given that less expensive printers like the OfficeJet Pro 9015e provide such connectivity. It’s simple to overlook the 100-sheet dual-sided document feeder, which is accessed through a rear panel that’s hidden. The glass scanning area is located beneath the main lid, and there is an extensible output tray on the front. Overall, it’s a neat, foldable product that is straightforward to manage and easy on the eyes.
Although I don’t think it’s really required, Epson does a good job with the aesthetics here. They could even be able to make it in the field of color photography or something.
Most of my testing was done on my phone using the Epson Smart Panel app, which is dead simple to use and has a carousel-style menu for navigating.
Printing rates for the Epson EcoTank ET-2850 All-in-One Printer
With its (relatively) tiny 100-sheet input tray filled with regular printing paper, the Epson EcoTank ET-2850 competes well for simple productivity tasks. It took about twice as long to print my 5-page black-and-white text document (6.8 ppm) than it did the OfficeJet Pro 9015e (13.4 ppm), but the OfficeJet Pro 9015e was designed specifically to handle office tasks.
When it comes to mixing text and color graphics, the Epson EcoTank ET-2850 was as sluggish. In 1 minute and 21 seconds, or 3.7 pages per minute, it printed out my 5-page test paper. It produced two-sided prints in duplexer mode at a pitiful 6.3 mp in black and white, which is far slower than the OfficeJet Pro 9015e’s 10 ppm.
In brief, go to laser printers if quick printing are a key necessity for your daily work.
Copy and scan rates for the Epson EcoTank ET-2850 All-in-One Printer
A family-friendly all-in-one should be able to produce copies quickly, and the EcoTank ET-2850 does so with a passing mark. In contrast to the HP OfficeJet Pro 9015e, it took 22.6 seconds to scan and print a single multicolored text document (11 seconds for monochrome copies) (6 and 5.5 seconds, respectively).
The EcoTank ET-2850 replicated the cover of Time magazine in 36 seconds without any custom settings; in High Quality mode (adjustable through the LCD panel), that print time soared to 2 minutes and 25 seconds. This is comparable to the HP OfficeJet Pro 9015e, which, when using Picture mode, duplicated the identical magazine cover in 1 minute and 40 seconds.
Print quality of the Epson EcoTank ET-2850 All-In-One Printer
Overall, I was ecstatic with the print quality of the Epson EcoTank ET-2850. Both color and black-and-white pages had text that was sufficiently sharp and clear; in my test prints, it was simple enough to pick out all the little details. Also, scanned photographs looked good, especially when printed on better photo paper. (Colorful photographs printed on ordinary office paper may smear or fade.)
Epson is well-known for its photographic skills, and the ET-2850, with its highest print resolution of 4800 x 1200, especially shines in this area. I increased the quality settings to “high” and printed out a range of glossy photographs, including some outdoor shots (4000 x 3000), a portrait of my silly face (2736 x 2736), and a high-res wallpaper of some faraway galaxy, to test the ET-2850’s pixel-pushing capabilities (5120 x 2880).
I could clearly distinguish the individual hairs in my scraggly beard, the TV’s reflection on the swimming goggles I’m wearing, and even the pores on my nose in the portrait photo (which took more than five minutes to finish printing).
Verdict
The Epson EcoTank ET-2850 All-in-One Printer will appeal to most families seeking for an all-in-one printer that produces high-quality color photographs. A lot of productivity is packed into a very small box, and the Epson Smart Panel software makes handling weekly office tasks a breeze. Although the HP OfficeJet Pro 9015e is obviously bigger and noisier than the Epson ET-2850 and has slower printing, scanning, and copying capabilities, if you’re never in a rush with your printing assignments, you should enjoy the overall quality Epson has to offer.
