Epson EcoTank ET-2800 prints the wrong colors

The checks in more detail

the page prints a grid for black and the three colors, and a gap or faint section in a block tells you which color is blocked, since a missing cyan makes everything red, a missing magenta green and a missing yellow blue. Run a print head cleaning once, print the check again, and if it is still incomplete, wait a few hours before another cleaning, because cleaning uses ink and the waste ink pad, and time softens a dried plug better than repeats do.

Check the tanks. The ET-2800 shows ink levels through windows at the front, and Epson says to keep ink above the lower line in every tank, because a tank that has run very low can pull air into the supply and starve the print head of that color. If any tank is low, refill it to the upper line with the correct Epson bottle; the bottles are keyed so they fit only the right color.

After refilling, run a nozzle check again. Make sure the cap on each tank is closed firmly, since ink evaporates through an open one. Settings matter too. Open the print dialog and confirm that color is chosen, that the paper type matches the sheet in the tray, because the color profile follows it, and that photo enhancement is off. Print a simple test page to see whether the problem is in one document.

Nozzles dry out when a printer sits for weeks, so print a short color page every week or two to keep them clear. Update the driver and the firmware through Epson's software. If the nozzle check is perfect and the colors are still wrong, the issue is in the document or the profile. If cleaning does not clear a block after several rounds and a day, contact Epson with the model number, since a pad or head issue may need service.

On the ET-2800, a color that is wrong across the whole page, rather than banded, points to the ink tank for that color or the settings, and the first check is the ink levels in the tanks, which you can see through the window at the front. A tank that was topped up with the wrong bottle, which happens when the colors are mixed up, gives a tint that does not clear, and Epson warns to use only the bottle that matches each tank color.

Run a nozzle check, then a print head cleaning; do not run more than a few cleanings in a row, because each one uses ink. In the driver, make sure Color Correction is set to what you want and that you have not chosen a paper type, like glossy, that changes how the colors print. Print the same page from another program to see whether the fault belongs to the file.

The ET-2800 has four ink tanks and no scanner feeder, and it is a compact home printer whose colors drift if one tank runs low without the printer saying so. Look at each tank through the window: a magenta tank near its lower line gives a green-tinted photo, and a cyan tank that is low gives a warm, reddish one. Refill the color that is low, run one head cleaning and print the nozzle check to see whether all four colors print.