Is my Epson 2200 DOA?

I have made thousands of prints over the last seven years so if this printer is gone to that big ink jet castle in the sky, I wont complain. Here's what it does:

When it tries to print, the head does its normal side to side prep moves and then pauses as normal before the sheet would feed. But then the machine emits a loud SQRAWK type sound - almost like grinding metal, but not quite - then it stops and the lights start flashing - sometimes the power, paper and all the ink lights - other times just the ink light, and so on. After looking in the manual, I thought maybe some small object had fallen into the roll feed opening but that does not seem to be the case.

Any thoughts? With a week left in Epson's rebate program, I may need to make a quick decision. - Mel W