New Printer/Scanner

I love the multifunction printer, scanner, copier, fax thingies. I love being able to make copies, color copies, print and scan with only one thing taking up space in my small office. I loved our HP PSC 750. But alas, the HP PSC 75o completely gave up the ghost on scanning (it would only give errors when I tried) and the death of the scanner made the printer unreliable too.

So, it was off to research the latest Multifunctions from HP and Epson (we are down on Lexmark because we bought one and had two of them malfunction before we bought the PSC 750). CNET recommended the Epson Stylus CX6600 in this review . So, we went with the Epson even though we have been fans of the HP Deskjet line since the days were called a Deskjet without a number and the Deskjet 500 and we were pretty happy with the PSC 750 even though it only lasted about two years.

We loaded it up and brought it home from Fry's. I was a bit dissappointed for two reasons:
1. The Kodak glossy photo paper does not work with this printer. Red and yellow colors show cracking on the Kodak paper. It's fine on the Epson photo paper, but photos on the Epson paper I have tried don't look as saturated as the Kodak paper.
2. The state of the art doesn't seem to have advanced much in 2 years since the PSC 750. The Espson is about the same speed, does things with similar quality and has similar capabilities at about the same price. Aren't we supposed to be advancing in the computer field?

I am hoping for a little lower cost per page because of less expensive Epson ink and individual cartridges. I am also hoping for less fading, but in just two years I haven't had a chance to be bothered by fading, so that is a theoretical benefit only at this point.

The Epson does have slots for photo cards, so that is a nice advance on my old printer (especially since our computer has no memory card slots). But I was hoping for more speed, same or better quality at the same money as two years ago. According to reviews, the HP's at the $150 price point have really slow printing for photos (8 minutes for an 8x10!). So, to get more speed than I have now in an HP I would have to go to the 300 price point. Not appealing right now.