I had an Epsom CX5200. After the first black cartdidge change the print quality deteriorated drastically. I eventually got some quality back when the yellow ran out. I changed all 3 colour cartridges, as the other 2 were low, and now it won't print a thing! I tried all the cleaning operations but no joy.
Searching the web, it seems to be a common thing with Epsoms. They don't like not being used and the print heads dry up and block. I've found a maintenance manual for them and it's a major surgery operation to get at them so I've dumped it and bought an HP C4180 yesterday for about �100. I had an HP before and it never gave me any print problems but its software seemed to be heavy on memory and crash my system, but that was back in the days of Win '95 so I'm giving them another go.
So be warned. Magazine tests don't take in to account long-term performance. So even though it was a great printer to start with, �70 worth of colour cartridges later and it's now scrap - and so are the cartridges.