By Justin Yu
Source: Cnet

The Epson TX800FW produces impressive colour prints, photos and text documents, and it outpaces the competition in almost all of our speed tests. We're impressed by its performance, but hesitate to recommend this printer based on the poor build quality and error-prone software.

The Epson TX800FW printer is a multifunctional printer that can also copy, scan and fax documents. The AU$399 device is faster than other inkjet printers, and we like the large LCD screen and the built-in CD drive, but it's severely marred by buggy software and flimsy components. We spent more time taking apart the paper trays, fixing paper jams, and reinstalling drivers than actually using the printer. If you can actually get the printer to work on a consistent basis, the TX800FW can produce fast, well-formed photo prints. For the sake of your sanity, we recommend investing in a more dependable multifunction printer, such as the Canon Pixma MX700 or the HP Photosmart C8180.

Design and features
The TX800FW is part of Epson's new line of all-in-one devices including the Stylus Photo TX700W and the design reflects a new, sleek style. The chassis has rounded edges and a glossy black finish. Also, it's fairly small for an all-in-one; with all the trays closed, the printer actually shares similar dimensions to the Canon Pixma MX700, coming in at 18.2cm high by 41.2cm wide by 35.6cm deep and weighing 10.8 kilograms.

A flatbed scanner hides underneath the TX800FW's top-loading, 30-page auto-document feeder for the copier and fax machine. The large 3.5-inch LCD sits prominently on the front of the printer with hinges on either side that control the angle of the screen. Only two buttons fill the rest of the space on the panel: "Power" and "CD eject". A CD/DVD tray, a unique printer feature, pops out from below the paper trays when you press the eject button and you can use it for copying images onto a blank CD or printing your own custom labels. The separate output and input trays rest below the display, and two memory card slots as well as a PictBridge port round out the front of the control centre.

The trays that feed paper into the printer are the main source of our gripe with the TX800FW. First, the plastic that Epson uses for the folding output tray is so thin that they bounce around at the slightest touch. We get that Epson wants to make the accessories collapsible to save space, but cutting corners on flimsy materials certainly throws speed bumps in the user experience. We can't comment precisely on how the trays will hold up to months or years of constant use, but even they already feel like they're about to snap in half.

In addition, you have to push the output tray all the way back into the device to pull out the input tray below it. The main paper tray holds 120 sheets of paper, and a separate, smaller tray for photo paper slides loosely across the top. Both trays suffer from serious design flaws: instead of designating fixed slots for the standard paper sizes (A4, Letter and so on), the main tray has a series of confusing notch marks with several markings of the same size. Epson makes it harder by forcing you to line up the tab with the notch marks, which takes time and precision since the tabs can move freely anywhere along the slider. If you're even slightly off, the printer will pick up several sheets of paper at a time, jam and freeze your job. We much prefer the HP Photosmart C8180, another printer with dual-paper feed trays that makes refilling easy with several pre-assigned size slots.

We also encountered issues with the software drivers included in the box. After experiencing severe banding after printing just a few photos, we aligned the print head and things seemed to be working until an unexplained error popped up on the screen prompting us to power down the printer and restart. We followed Epson's instructions and even tried searching for an updated driver, but still experienced the same intermittent errors. We also reinstalled the driver several times, restarted and power cycled the printer and our desktop with no success. The random errors disrupted our work flow - we almost spent more time behind the printer freeing up jams than actually testing the device.

These design issues are especially unfortunate because the TX800FW actually has some impressive features. When it works properly, it can streamline your printing work by eliminating the need for a physical computer to act as the liaison. You can perform most functions directly through the printer. For example, you can plug your xD, Memory Stick, Compact Flash or Secure Digital card directly into the front media reader and edit your photos on the large 7.8-inch touchscreen. Granted, you can only crop, rotate and enlarge, but amateur photographers will be thankful for the automated fix options.

Creative types can also take advantage of the robust personalisation options, including custom colouring books, passport and ID photo sheets, photo index sheets, greeting cards, and still movie clips. All of these options are also easy to use with the ArcSoft Print Creations software included in the package. There's also a convenient option to print out blank college-ruled or wide-ruled lined paper.

Performance
In terms of output speed, the Epson TX800FW sits in direct competition with the Canon Pixma MX700. We also put it up against several other all-in-one printers in the same price range, but the TX800FW's scores blow theirs out of the water. For example, while the Kodak ESP 5 took its time printing a sheet of colour graphics at a blistering 2.21 pages per minute, the TX800FW flew across the finish line, finishing our test at almost three times the speed at 6.06 pages per minute. And even though the MX700 puts up a good fight in the text and colour scanning qualifiers, it's no match for Epson in the Photo speed test, which came in at more than double the pages per minute. The TX800FW is without question one of the speediest printers we've tested, when it's working. In our evaluation, the Epson ruined its early finish with a handful of mechanical failures that took more time to fix than the testing itself.