For most intents and purposes the 1280 is a newer version of the 1520. It is 6 color rather than the 1520's 4 color.
Chipped refers to the cartridges. Nonchipped use just plain cartridges, nothing special about them. Chipped Epsons use cartridges with a small electronic chip on the front or back of each cartridge.
Nonchipped keep track of how much ink is left by remembering inside the printer itself. Remove the cartridge and put it back into this or another printer, it thinks it's a new full cartridge and resets the counters.
Chipped keep track by saving that information on the chip that is on the cartridge. Remove the cartridge and put it back into this or another printer, and it knows what the count is. (In both cases, the ink level is an estimate based on the number of times the nozzles fired and how many cleanings were done).
Nonchipped must have a physical reset procedure done to make the printer think you've removed and replaced the cartridges, as it'll think they are empty even though you have a CIS connected. It's fairly simple without removing the cartridges.
Chipped CIS normally come with autoreset or always full 3rd party chips on the cartridges. Either they reset automatically at some point, or when the printer decides it's empty you turn the printer off for a minute and back on again.
Pros and cons:
Chipped CIS are a bit more expensive due to the cost of the 3rd party chips. The 1280, if connected via parallel port, can save a bit by using OEM Epson chips and resetting them via a free program called SSC Service Utility.
Chipped Epsons tend to be newer and that has both pros and cons: usually faster, but also smaller nozzles which could mean more sensitive to clogging with third party pigmented and/or dye sub inks. If you turn the DPI up to max, though, a newer Epson will be slower.
In my observations, a 720dpi 4 color from an Epson 1520 and a 2880dpi 6 color from an Epson 1280 are virtually indistinguishable. If you are that close to someone's Tshirt, you'd better know them pretty well. ;') Seriously, the weave of the cloth presents a basic limit on how much resolution is visible.
A 6 color will use more ink on a given image than 4 color, because the 6 color has two lighter shades of cyan and magenta. So where a 4 color would lay down a few dots of cyan and magenta to get a light shade, a 6 color will lay down more dots of the light cyan and light magenta. It probably uses about 25% more ink, although the cost per print is on the order of a few pennies per print. The advantage is if you plan on printing photos, too, as where the 6 colors really show a difference is faces and skies.
Refill cost on a 4 color is lower. For a 6 color printer, you are buying 50% more ink so of course it costs 1.5x more to refill.
The short list:
1520 Larger nozzles, possibly fewer clog problems Lower initial cost for both the printer and the CIS Lower refill cost Slower Used (I refurb the ones I sell) Great for heat transfers, fine for large photo prints onto watercolor or other fine art papers (hides the dots) Straight through paper path on one of the rear feed for very thick fine art papers and inkjet canvas Manual paper feed knob
1280 Fantastic photo prints on anything but glossy A bit faster printing New and refurb available Costs a little more per print Costs 1.5x as much to refill Costs more for both the printer and CIS
Both can take roll paper, roll adapters not included.
Here are some details of what I do when I refurbish a printer: Refurbishing inkjet printers
I always have some used Epsons that are in the process, too.
I make bulk bottles that provide a constant pressure to the print heads. The 1520 has been specifically identified as a printer that is very sensitive to this, I found there is about a 3/4 inch narrow range in which it is virtually troublefree. From indications here and on other lists, I suspect the 1280 and many other Epsons have an unrecognized problem with ink height.
If the top level of the ink in the bottles is too low, the ink is very slowly siphoned back from the heads. So the first print you make after sitting overnight may show banding. One cleaning cycle or even just one print later, it's fine until you let it sit for a day or so. How many of you here ruined the first transfer of the day until you learned to print one on plain paper first? I recall there are several here who say they -always- run a cleaning cycle before printing the first time on any day. A cleaning cycle uses a surprisingly large amount of ink.
If the top level of the ink in the bottles is too high, the ink is very slowly siphoned into the heads and leaks out the nozzles. Drops of ink on the head then cause banding, again one cleaning cycle and it's fine. If the drops collected are large enough, you may get a few drops of ink randomly on the page. Again, it may only affect the first print after the printer sits for a day or more. Sound familiar, anyone?
I ran my 1520 for months and rarely had to run a cleaning cycle as long as I kept the level of the ink in the bottles within that height range. At first I just kept moving the bottles up as the ink ran out, setting them on more and more books, then pulling the books out when I refilled. A couple of times it sat for 5 days and a nozzle check and print was still perfect.
Then I thought about it for a while and came up with a couple of ways to fix the ink height problem. One involves using the large bagged cartridges from an Epson 3000 (those buggers are spendy!) where the level of the ink (and therefore pressure) only changes about 1/2 inch from full to nearly empty. I'm worried that someone's going to overfill them and cause a huge inkflow into the printer.
So I've settled on a different design. Not necessarily better than using the 3000 tanks, but you can't really overfill and the pressure regulation is even better. Click here to read more about my thoughts on problems and their solutions with CIS/CFS/BFS or whatever you call a bulk ink system.
If you would like to encourage me to continue writing tutorials of this nature, you may donate an amount of your choice via PayPal. Credit Card donations don't require a PayPal account.
Thanks, Alien Steve Home