Epson WorkForce 840 All-in-One Printer

Pros: + Installation and set-up is very easy
+ Quality of the scanned images was excellent
+ Printing speed is very fast
+ Style and quality is good
+ Adjustable tilting color touch pad is superb

Cons: - It is a pretty noisy printer the mechanism for advancing the pages sounds like something from a steel mill

Summary: As a busy tech-savvy family, we were looking for a printer that was fast, reliable, affordable, and could deal solidly with a wide-range of printing tasks like scanning, printing photos and reports, and had the built-in ability to print to both sides of a sheet of paper. Our hope was that we could co-locate the new Epson WorkForce 840 so that everyone in our family could have easy access to it. Finally, because we use a variety of operating systems (several versions of Windows, as well as Mac OS X) we wanted a printer that could work with all of them. These were are needs going into the purchase.

We chose the standard shipping option when we bought the Epson WorkForce 840 from Amazon, and surprisingly the printer arrived in just a few days. Setup was extremely easy. We setup the printer in the living room, ran the installation CD, and when prompted, attached the printer to a laptop via a usb cable (couldn't believe Epson didn't send a usb cable along). The new printer immediately found our encrypted wireless network, then asked us for the key to access that network. Next, we repeated the process by inserting the install CD into each of the remaining laptops and work stations in our home... each install was quick and painless. Immediately our whole family was able to access and use the new printer.

We followed the installation with a thorough review of all of the settings for the printer. This is easily accomplished by using the Printer Settings feature available by right-clicking the new printer tray icon. After we updated our settings we proceeded with the Nozzle Check, Head Cleaning, and Print Head Alignment (these features are also available by right-clicking the printer icon in the system tray, beside the clock). Finally we ran a series of features' tests. We printed text documents, pdf documents, web pages, emails, and jpgs -- all of which looked great. We also scanned several photos at a variety of resolutions, and scanned a few text only documents. The quality of the scanned images was excellent, and produced crisp, clear, vibrant color in the digital images created. For our purposes 300 dpi seemed like the right setting, as it offered beautiful images yet kept the file size reasonable. Of course you can set this value much, much higher if you like. As a copier, the 840 is quick and very handy. We did not test the fax capability of this printer.

In general, we found the Epson WorkForce 840 to be extremely easy to set up and use. It's feature set is wonderful. We particularly like the double-sided printing and scanning. Likewise, the two paper trays hold a total of 500 sheets, making the task of refilling the paper trays a far less frequent process. Compared to other printers we have owned, this one is neither the quietest, nor the loudest; it's a bit noisy, but not disturbingly so -- but with prints this fast, you'll hardly notice. The style and quality of the printer itself is good. That is to say, this is a nice-looking printer with great lines and a well-thought-out design. The adjustable tilting color touch pad on the printer is superb: it looks great, responds well to touches, and only illuminates the options presently available, making it a breeze to use.

Overall, we are thrilled with our new Epson WorkForce 840. It does everything we need (and more), and does it well. We have owned many printers over the years. This is by far the most full-featured, highest quality printer we have ever owned. Finally, we paid less than $200 for this printer, including shipping! We could not be happier with our purchase, and could not recommend the Epson WorkForce 840 more highly. It was the perfect solution for us.

Updated on Aug 25, 2011

*** P.S. If you will buy this printer I suggest you have compare prices before you decide at: www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B004H3XKR6?ie=UTF8&ref_=dp_olp_new&condition=new#?ie=UTF8&tag=***************&********=ur2&camp=1789&creative=390957

Updated on Oct 8, 2011

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I suggest you have to compare prices before you decide at: http://beam.to/WorkForce840