Digital BW, The Print

And just on the off chance that anyone form Epson reads this stuff: what I think 
everyone (OK, maybe just me) would really love is a 12 color Ultrachrome 
printer: the 8 inks currently in the 4000; plus 3 more varying density grayscale 
inks; plus a gloss optimizer coating like the R800.  This would seem to me to 
be a simple case of Business 101: sell the razor blades, not the razors.  A 12 
color printer would cost a lot more than current models, but couldn't possibly 
cost as much as 2 printers (one w color inks and one w. grayscale), so a lot of 
(serious) people would gobble them up.  Then Epson can charge us double 
the price for each grayscale ink cartridge as compared to the color ones.  OR, 
users who have no need for grayscale capability could configure it to hold 
extra C, M and Y for double printing speed.  Or whatever.  Epson currently 
seems to be in the business of selling the razors rather than the blades: make 
great printers, but let other companies (MIS, Lyson, Colorbyte,  Septone, 
whoever else) get rich selling the blades.

(And while I'm at it: as interesting as the forthcoming Epson digital rangefinder 
sounds, I'd rather see Epson's R&D $ go toward printers and inks, and buy my 
cameras elsewhere).

Ah, if I only had several million dollars and control over a multinational 
corporation....

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Scott Graham" <
gebilwil@n...> wrote:
> I've seen a beautiful B&W print from the 4000.  Don't know how it was 
printed, other than 
> that is used the std driver.
> 
> From what Epson has told me I expect to make great B&W "as shipped".
>