A3 printers for around £250 ?

[911newbie]

It's my B'day coming up and my darling wife has asked what I might like as a present. (The MkII 5D was rejected imediately...)

So might you Ladies and Gentlemen any advice for me about A3 printers around the £250 mark ?

I've looked at some very negative comments about the Epson R1900's thirst for ink.
The Canon Pixma IX5000 ?
Epson 1400 ?

Cheers
Chris

[agent006]

We've got a Pixma Pro9000 at work. It's a decent enough print (although over your budget). Colour matching was a nightmare though, had to get a custom profile done as it was nowhere near the colours on screen or from the presses.

[poah]

R1400 is a nice printer, the R1900 is only£50 though

[911newbie]

The Epson R1900 is about £300
for example - http://www.cameraworld.co.uk/ViewProdDetails.asp?p...
and gets some negative reviews on Amazon concerning it's thirst for expensive ink...

I like the immediacy of a print at home and the ability to send pictures to friends without having to upload large files to Photobox, plus their A3 prints are a tad pricy if it's not as nice a pciture as you thought...
I just wondered if it's possible to get a good A3 printer for under £300.

[poah]

all printers use a lot of ink these days sadly.

The main difference between the two printers is the ink. The 1400 uses claria dye ink with 5 colour 1 black carts and the R1900 uses K2 ultrachrome pigment ink with 2 blacks (one for matt and one for gloss)and 5 colour. The cost of ink between the two is insignificant as is the amount of ink in each cart, the permancy ratings for both are very high too. Th R1900 prints quicker than the 1400 but not a huge amount of difference between the two