Mea Culpa:
After a long tech support call, I was still having difficulty with registration and they were still on the line trying to help me when I had a slow burn moment and realized that I had been reading the key number wrong. I was worried about confusing Os and 0s, and even entered both in case I had it wrong, but I overlooked the 1 for I substitution. The number had a I1 combination, which in the serif font it was printed in I read as two letter Is. The silly missing serif in the number 1 was the cause of all my grief. Ugh!
Dumb mistake #2:
Since I had read all the posts about how critical it is to update a new Z3100s firmware, I tried updating my new machine. I downloaded the most recent firmware for the 44" model and attempted to upload it to the printer. I got an unable to update message that remained on the display. Only later did I realize that I had the standard firmware, not the firmware for the PS model. My call this morning about the APS installation confirmed that there have been NO firmware updates for the Postscript/APS model. In the end, a power down cleared the errror message and there seems to be no issue with my failed attempt, although the woman who helped me at HP tech support sounded like it easily could have been a major issue if my luck had gone the other way. Here's to dumb luck!
Regarding the APS:
Now that it is running, the APS seems like a pretty customizable, high powered application with a very friendly interface. The monitor calibration and printer profiling couldn't have been easier (except perhaps the fact that it tells me my 17" MacBook Pro can't hit Gama 1.
. I'm also really impressed with the difference in the vividness of the APS pattern vs. the standard printer profiling pattern. The standard pattern has a rather orangish red and a magenta, but the APS one has many nice, vivid patches in the middle of the red spectrum. I will be making some more demanding test prints soon, but for now I am feeling much more excited about my new purchase today than at this time yesterday. On to more printing . . .
-Ron