Re: Dried out print heads
I leave it on and I do print more often, but I occasionally have clogged nozzles. So, if I need to print something serious I let it do a clean first. It's running non-original ink (I don't buy a printer unless non-original ink is available) and as it's HP I've disabled firmware updates (because that's how they introduce new "problems" with non-HP cartridges).
I would have used a colour laser printer, but mine prints and scans doublesided A3 so it's worth the hassle, and when cleaned it does a good job as well, with no real banding to speak of. A3 colour lasers are still painfully expensive, not worth it for the bit of printing I do at home.
About Epson, though, as far as I can tell their EcoTank range inks are actually priced sensibly. You pay a bit more for the printer, but it they had a decent A3 multifunction I would have bought that instead and use original ink - EcoTank inks were (last time I looked) comparable in price to non-original and in that case I would have had no problem staying with original inks.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
