Digital BW, The Print

howdy all those curious about the 2000P and MIS inks/Paul's curves..!

if you are thinking about devoting this printer to b&w, go for it!!!
I use it and am very happy with the results..!

anyone taking part in Tom O'Connell's monthly exchanges has seen my
prints over the last year... and while the comment pages have been
pretty quiet lately, I would love to hear some feedback from those
with opinions and the inclination to share!

I have little interest in mastering curve creation, so I simply
downloaded many of Paul's curves that seemed plausible and started
printing stepwedges...

I work on a mac and found success with the following setup:

curves - vmPR1290_c1, vmPR1290_nc1 (my favorite), and vmPR1290_w1
curves for the Epson 1290

inks - I started with the Variable Mix set, and that worked great! but
then played with some of the Ultratones and found the perfect balance
of punchy smoothness with the UT/Eboni in the K, C, LC and Y
positions, with the VM(S) in the M and LM positions. 

I hand fill these into the empty cartridges for the 1280 I get from
MIS. then reset chips from the OEM color ink cartridges.

paper - many work well, but my favorites are Hahnemuhle Photo Rag and
Epson Velvet Fine Art.

my current printer includes the scrounged parts from two previous
2000Ps! which brings me to the drawbacks. CLEANING CYCLES!!! unless
you decided to go with a continous feed system (I will soon), the chip
resetting and the cleaning cycles from the handfilled carts will push
the little robot beyond its limits..!

taking out and replacing cartridges so often also increases the risk
of damaging the little pins that read the info from the chip. if you
have any skill at all taking things apart, replacing a print head or
even just the little tab of pins is possible with some time and
effort. this is where ebay comes in handy... I've seen people selling
pretty beat up machines, but so long as they guarantee they've made a
test print, then you know the parts are useful! and of course
refurbished ones come with 90 warranty from Epson, for when I didn't
feel like taking anything apart..!

I print nearly every day, so your usage will play a big part.

hope this rambly pile of words answers some questions.

Tom

P.S. monitor calibration is necessary before you go judging the prints..!