I LOVE LOVE LOVE my Epson R1800 printer! It is a wide format printer, and prints paper as wide a 13" wide.
The print quality is fabulous, and I use it as my photo printer. It's being run through its paces this week as I prepare for a weekend retreat.
It has 8 separate inks, each in its own cartridge: Magenta, yellow, cyan, matte black, photo black, true blue, true red, and a gloss optimizer. Each cartridge is ~$12-$15 each (the optimizer comes in two pack for that). After a year of use (I would say medium demand- perhaps about 100 8 1/2x11 sheets of photos on "Best Photo" setting?), I have just completed a complete replacement of all of the cartridges. Fortunately, it was done in stages, so I really didn't notice a significant cash drain. Cyan went first (after 6-8 months?), followed a couple months later by Magenta and yellow, then the two blacks, and I just replaced true blue and the gloss. True red is sitting at just above 10% remaining (it's low, but I haven't gotten a replacement warning yet).
I will warn you that the replacement cartridges are not available (yet) at Office Max or Staples. I need to schlep up to CompUSA or my local Microcenter for them. Not a huge deal, just a more thought-out trip.
For me (YMMV), the print quality makes the cost worth it, and the fine control I have over my photos. I do my own photo editing, and print out the pics I need in the size I need for my layout (sketched and planned beforehand)- that helps with economy. I send my 4x6 photo needs to my local photo finisher. For the most part, I use 8 1/2x11 paper (CompUSA glossy paper is actually pretty good), but I have a stash of Super B (13"x19") paper for my wide format stuff- 12" photos for layouts or printing digital pages. Warning- the Super B paper is where I got sticker shock, particularly the semigloss photo paper- so that's saved solely for the wide format stuff and not for routine photo printing.
The printer was about $450 (we got ours from NewEgg last year). I would watch the ads- the printer is not so much put on sale, but many times our stores will add a bonus gift card or something to it.
Probably more info than you needed, but hey, maybe it's helpful!

Kim