Digital BW, The Print

Hi Steve,

> So, for those of us who are not as deeply into the technology as many
> on the list, what is the "bottom line" here.  Is there any real
> advantage to sending files to the Epson driver at precisely 360 dpi.

That depends on what your printer is.  The printers that print max ~44",
like the desktop printers claim to upsample to 720.  It's only the large
format printers (max print length ~88") that are 360.

It also depends on what driver you are using.  For the Piezo driver, no,
just send it what ever PPI you get, and do not resample when you resize.
Either way, (Epson or Piezo), you should still scan at the optical
resolution of your scanner.

Now, for the Epson driver, I would simply suggest testing it out on your
own, as the results may vary from printer to printer, and even image to
image.  There appear the be three things you can do:

1) resize without resampling, and send the data to the printer driver and
let it resample.

2) resize and resample (PS resample algorithm of your choice) to 720 for
desktop printer, and send 720 to the print driver.

3) resize without resampling, and resample using one of the aftermarket
resamplers to resample to 720...they may even resize for you as well.

I don't print B&W using the Epson driver, so I have no idea how good/bad it
is, but I would be interested in what you, or anyone else, who prints with
the Epson driver, finds out if you do run some tests.

Regards,

Austin