Epson WorkForce Pro WF-C8690 A3 Color MFP With PCL/PostScript - Review 2022

The Epson WorkForce Pro WF-C8690 ($1499.99) is a high-volume wide-format all-in-one (AIO) designed for midrange to heavy apply in medium- to big-size offices and workgroups. Information technology's fast, highly expandable, and supports super-high-chapters ink cartridges. Add to those perks its reasonable purchase price and competitive running costs, and it'south like shooting fish in a barrel to crown it our Editors' Choice for high-end broad-format printers.

Clear a Path, Make Room

The WF-C8690, which is the sibling to the unmarried-office WorkForce Pro WF-C8190, supports not merely the more common tabloid-size (11 by 17 inches) wide-format paper; information technology too prints larger super-tabloid-size (thirteen-past-19-inch) pages. The larger the pages your machine tin churn out, the bigger the machine itself must be, of course. The WF-C8690, for instance, measures 22.five past 24.1 past 34.1 inches (HWD) with its trays extended and weighs a whopping 101 pounds, which is slightly smaller, nevertheless more 20 pounds heavier, than its predecessor, the WorkForce Pro WF-8590. Obviously, information technology will require its own defended sturdy stand or countertop and at least 2 people to wrestle it there.

Over the by few years we've reviewed several lower-book, much lower-priced broad-format AIOs from Brother, Epson, and HP, but very few high-volume machines similar in specs and price to the WF-C8690, which means, of course, that there are very few machines in our database to compare information technology to. Epson's own WorkForce ET-16500 EcoTank Wide-Format All-in-One Supertank Printer, one of that giant printer maker's bulk-ink models that uses bottled ink rather than cartridges, past comparison, is several inches shorter and weighs 50 pounds less than the WF-C8690. Information technology too supports the super-tabloid format, only its maximum monthly duty cycle is 55,000 pages less than that of this lusty big brother.

Out-of-the-box paper handling consists of one 250-canvass drawer that holds paper upward to tabloid-size, and an 80-canvas multipurpose tray on the dorsum that holds up to super-tabloid-size sheets. If that'southward non enough paper (or input sources), you can expand it upwards to 1,830 sheets from 4 sources, with up to three 500-sheet add-on drawers ($425-list each). Epson besides offers a combination chiffonier/printer stand for $250. HP'southward impress-only tabloid-size PageWide Pro 750dw, on the other mitt, has a default newspaper input capacity of 650 sheets, expandable to (with 2 2,000-sheet trays) 4,650 sheets, and the Epson ET-16500 holds 502 sheets and is non expandable.

The l-sheet automated document feeder (ADF) supports single-laissez passer auto-duplexing, pregnant that it scans both sides of two-sided pages simultaneously, but the ET-16500's 35-sheet ADF supports only manual duplexing. With its 75,000-page monthly duty cycle (5,000 pages monthly recommended), the WF-C8690's volume rating is more than three times higher than the ET-16500's and several other consumer-grade broad-format machines, and the same as the HP 750dw's.

In addition to the standard Epson printer and scanner drivers, the WF-C8690, as its cumbersome full name implies, comes with additional drivers for both HP PCL (Printer Command Linguistic communication) 5 and PCL 6, as well equally Adobe PostScript 3. And the printer itself emulates both HP PCL and Adobe PostScript page description languages (PDLs), for compatibility with loftier-end printing presses and prepress imaging equipment used in desktop publishing and graphics design applications.

Most enterprises don't require these PDLs for everyday printing and copying, just support for all three of them ensures the diverse talents throughout your organization access to the features that best run into their needs, though. With the PostScript drivers installed, for example, your certificate and graphics blueprint departments tin use the PostScript emulation to impress composites for proofing—before sending final document files out to the print shop for loftier-volume print runs.

Yous can configure and monitor the AIO, too as set up and initiate walk-up tasks, such as making copies or scanning to a network drive or deject site, from the WF-C8690's spacious and well-laid out control panel. The panel consists of a scattering of buttons, condition LEDs, and a number pad, all anchored by a 5-inch color touch screen.

In addition to the control panel, you lot can also monitor, configure, and substantially manage all settings and controls from a born secure (HTTPS) web server that resides in the WF-8690's retention. Like most business printers and AIOs, yous connect to this ane locally or over the internet with your browser via an IP accost. In fact, some aspects of monitoring and configuration, such equally viewing reports, managing contacts, and setting security options, are easier from the web portal than the command panel.

Connecting and Securing the WF-C8690

Similar its predecessor, the WF-8590, the WF-C8690 supports merely about every connection interface or protocol bachelor (except Bluetooth), starting with the basics, Wi-Fi, Ethernet (upwards to 1,000 Base-T), and connecting directly to a PC via USB 3.0, too as the two pop peer-to-peer network protocols: Wi-Fi Direct and about-field advice (NFC). Those concluding two enable your team to connect their smartphones or tablets to the printer without either information technology or the mobile devices beingness role of your local area network or existence connected to an intermediary router. NFC is a touch-to-connect protocol that lets you print from or scan to your mobile device by only touching it to a hotspot on the printer, in this instance, to the left of the impact screen, below the power push.

Additional connectivity options for printing emails and attachments, printing remotely, and support for Apple iOS and Android mobile platforms, as well as printing from and scanning to diverse cloud sites, are available through a set of mobile apps (which include Epson Electronic mail Impress, Epson iPrint Mobile App, and Epson Remote Print) chosen Epson Connect. Third-party mobile printing and scanning is bachelor through Apple AirPrint, Google Cloud Print, and Amazon's Fire OS. And, if none of these will get the job done you can ever rough it by printing from or scanning to a USB pollex bulldoze via the port located on the left-front end of the chassis.

High-volume AIOs like this one are designed to be accessed by multiple users, which, in busy office environments, could exist up to 25 (or perhaps even more) individuals printing, scanning, copying, and faxing documents of varying levels of importance and sensitivity—all on your centralized, readily accessible printer. The WF-C8690 lets you secure documents with personal identification numbers (PINs). Often called Secure Print, about competing multiuser AIOs come with this security characteristic.

The User Access Control lockout feature lets yous deny admission to users and/or groups to specific features, such equally printing color documents or making multiple copies, or even accessing the printer at all. When used in conjunction with the comprehensive reports available through the spider web portal (or printable from the control panel), the power to secure impress jobs backside PINs and limit admission will assistance you keep the WF-C8690 secure.

Where Fast Begins

Equally I said nigh the WF-C8690's impress-only sibling, the WF-C8190, Epson's 24 pages-per-minute (ppm) rating is, for high-volume machines like this, the speed at which fast printing begins. The HP PageWide 750dw, for example, is rated at 35ppm, and I've seen much higher-end Epson inkjet printers churn out two-sided pages at 100ipm (images per minute, where both page side counts as an prototype). Proceed in listen, too, that the following test results are comprised from printing alphabetic character-size pages. Tabloid pages (which are precisely twice the size area-wise equally letter-size media) with roughly an equal percentage of ink coverage, should take about twice equally long to print, and super-tabloid pages a bit longer still.

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I tested the WF-C8690 over Ethernet from our standard Intel Core i5 testbed PC running Windows x Professional. When printing my 12-page Microsoft Discussion monochrome text certificate, I timed it at an impressive 28.3ppm, which is faster than its 24ppm rating and almost 2ppm faster than the WF-C8190 print-only model, simply vii.2ppm slower than the HP 750dw. (The Epson ET-16500 was so far behind on this test that making a comparing here wouldn't provide any value.)

To keep testing, I printed several PDFs, Microsoft Excel spreadsheets with full-page graphics, and a few full-folio colorful PowerPoint handouts with night solid fills and backgrounds. Then, I combined the scores from printing the previous 12-page text document with the results from printing these more circuitous color document pages. Here, the WF-C8690 managed a highly respectable xviii.8ppm, which is historically among the highest scores I've seen from a machine churning our entire suite of test documents.

PrecisionCore Impress Quality

All of today'south WorkForce printers and AIOs deploy Epson'due south PrecisionCore printhead engineering. Amidst the several impress speed and output quality tweaks, PrecisionCore relies on printheads with ink chips populated with significantly more than and smaller, tightly condensed ink nozzles that apply ink to paper with greater accuracy than traditional printheads. Co-ordinate to Epson (and my ain experience reviewing PrecisionCore printers over the years), this results in greater detail and more authentic, vibrant colors.

The WF-C8690 renders almost-laser-quality, well-shaped, and highly legible text more bonny plenty for most internal and external documents. And the several charts, graphs, and other graphics I printed were mostly spot on, with solid fills, evenly flowing gradients, and well-delineated borders and hairlines. The few ink distribution flaws I institute were noticeable only when I started searching for them. Except for desktop publishers, graphics designers, or printer reviewers, the recipients of your printer'due south output will virtually likely intendance more near the content than the intricacies of the machine that produced information technology.

PrecisionCore machines, while not photograph printers, practice a great chore of printing color-rich and detailed photos, in this case up to xiii by 19 inches. However, different its WF-8590 predecessor, the WF-C8690 can't print borderless photos and pages, though nigh of Epson's lower-finish inkjets tin can. The previous model'southward ability to print, or bleed, to the very edge of the paper, is an advantage over its laser and HP PageWide competitors. However, the inability to impress borderless is a limitation of laser and PageWide technologies—they merely can't do information technology. Inkjet printers, on the other hand, don't have that limitation. Epson must have had another reason for restricting the WF-C8690's output this mode.

Relatively Inexpensive Ink

The WF-C8690's running costs, its per-page cost of the ink required to continue it printing and copying, is comparable with the per-page cost of midrange to high-book laser printers, which is relatively reasonable, but not the best y'all can do nowadays. When you lot use Epson'due south highest yield—11,500 monochrome pages and 8,000 color prints—ink cartridges for this AIO, depending on where you buy your consumables, each black page should run you about 1.6 cents and each color folio nearly 6.7 cents. That'due south slightly college than the HP 750dw's 1.1 cent monochrome and 5.vi cents colour, which can add upward significantly the more you print and copy.

However, some of the wide-format, lower-volume models discussed here take press costs twice equally high and higher. If yous demand a high-volume printer that can churn out wide-format pages, especially super-tabloid, comparably, the WF-C8690's running costs aren't bad.

Features Run into Performance

My just real complaint about the WF-C8690 is that its default complement of paper capacity is a mere 330 sheets, which, given the size of its ink cartridges and its volume ratings, seems like a lopsided mismatch designed to sell add together-on paper trays. I'm also not happy well-nigh the missing borderless-printing ability. Otherwise, like its predecessor, this is an impressive, feature-rich and built-to-perform broad-format laser alternative. The WF-C8690 prints well and fast enough for well-nigh environments, and it's characteristic-rich. Its back up for a wide range of media allows your organization to design and impress several different types of documents. The Epson WorkForce Pro WF-C8190 is a logical replacement for its predecessor equally our current pinnacle option for loftier-finish broad-format printers.