Digital BW, The Print

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y..., "Julian Thomas" 
<julianthomas@t...> wrote:
> Martin,
> I think a lot of the problems with piezo are down to the printer. I 
have had
> one 'bad' 1160. Which clogged, needed loads of care and was 
eventually
> replaced under warranty. I now have two 1160s that work flawlessly. 
One
> printer has just printed 25 exhibition prints (A3+), 35 portfolio 
prints
> (A3), 25 sheets A3+ of business cards, 25 A4 press prints (glossy), 
plus
> work prints. Without a  single clog. 

I didn't mean to imply that Piezo always clogs but from my 
experience, your experience and that of many others it is somthing 
that occurs and is to my mind a problem.

I can't really look at it as a printer problem since the inks were 
presumably designed for the printers and not the other way around. 
Most ilkely the inks were designed for the 3000 which is not the same 
as the 1160 or 1200. The fact that it works great in some or most 
examples of a particular model of printer and it does not work well 
other examples of the same model is not very reassuring. Obviously 
Epson isn't going to solve this, so it is up to ConeTech and from the 
evidence to date on MIS it can be done.

> Europe, piezo inks are very expensive. Could you talk more about the
> difference between Piezo and FIS with the piezo driver?

Taking the three prints out just now and putting them up in my 
regular viewing location I cannot tell which is which without without 
checking the labels on the back. The difference between the Piezo ink 
and the Full Spectrum ink with the Piezo driver is much less than the 
difference between say Ilford Gallerie and Oriental Seagul silver 
papers if that helps.

You should contact Bernd for more info on this.

> I'm getting a number
> of people in Spain (hi Jose!) looking at my prints and wondering 
which way
> to jump. I'm advising to go with Piezo first as an out of the box 
solution,
> and then to try FIS with the piezo driver. The profiles and 
software of
> piezo are important for beginners IMO. Also  I believe that people 
thinking
> of buying a system need to see the prints and should be wary of 
making
> decisions based on 'list-talk'. When I show prints ot people, I 
always try
> and show more than one paper (yesterday I showed WT and Photorag - 
the
> difference between the two is large IMO).
> Like Jerry, I think that the piezo demo print is a bad one, and 
Som. En is a
> bad paper to use for a demo - it must be the 'warmest'  paper 
around for
> piezo.

Buying into this sight unseen is a major problem. I bought my Piezo 
in spite of the sample print. Perhaps the best way to go is a path 
that keeps options open in both directions. Someone starting out 
could buy a Piezo cartridge system for the 1160 and see how they like 
it. When they upgrade to a CIS they could then continue with the 
Piezo inks or give the MIS FS a try.

Martin



(snip)