Digital BW, The Print

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y..., Robert Morrison <rmorrison@p...> 
wrote:
 
> If you want to produce great BW prints...why are you wasting your time
> talking about the 2200/2100?  The prints from these printers will be
> incredibly expensive to make (because of ink cost) and will be inferior to
> what you can produce from the current quad options for a lot less money 
with
> an older printer at least with respect to metamerism and lightfastness and
> probably also with respect to print quality. 

IF your aim is only to make B&W prints, I agree. The 2200 still shows some 
metamerism (far, far less than the last generation or printers). With the Gray 
Balancer, even the best ICC profile, that's not going away. I can get very 
neutral prints across the tonal scale with a good profile but it's not 100% and I 
still have metamerism issues, none of which would happen with a true black 
inkset. 

If you want to print color of course, the 2200 is very nice and you'll get 
acceptable B&W with some work. But there is no question that if B&W is all 
you care about, there are better solutions. Epson is fully aware of this. If you 
uses want to see a true B&W printer (one that has no color inks). Tell Epson 
as much and as often as you can. Photographers think that Epson should 
produce such a printer but remember that in the big picture, Epson isn't going 
to sell thousands upon thousands of B&W only printers. The more customers 
that make it clear that they would purchase such a printer, the more likely 
you'll see one. 

In other words, having a true B&W printer from Epson is NOT a technological 
problem. It's one of cost to put such a product to market.