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Author Topic: When Calibrate Colors does your Z3x00 mixes color on the patches?  (Read 2817 times)

SergeyT

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My prints on z3200 come out nowhere near of what I see in CS3 soft proof. The Yellow is rather Orange to Brown. I used both HP Everyday Pigment  Ink Satin and HP Matt Litho-realistic so far with almost identical unacceptable results.

Driver:
Correct paper type
Application Managed Colors, Best, Max Details, etc.
GE ON (for satin)

CS3 :
Photoshop Manages Colors
Source: ProPhoto RGB
Printer: Either HP Everyday Satin or HP Matt Litho (according to the paper loaded)
Rendering intent: either Perceptual or RelCol - makes no difference as far as I can tell.

Both papers: Align Heads, Calibrate Color
Created a profile for HP Matt Litho from Color center. Compared the profile with the canned HP Matt Litho. My profile twice smaller then the HP's one. Reds , Blues and Cyan are perfect match;  Yellow and Greens are half the way vs HP.

Have printed Diagnostic pages on both papers.
Compared to the colors on the Calibrate Color sheet.
All the colors close to perfect match except for the Yellow.

The Yellow on the Diagnostic Pages (on each paper is similar) is pure.
The Yellow on the Calibrate Color pages (on each paper is similar) is Brownish Orange. Looks like a mix of Yellow with either Red.
All other colors on the Calibrate Color pages are perfect match to the colors on Diagnostic page prints.
HP tells me that it is supposed to be that way...I do not trust them, since on the very first Calibrate Color print the Yellow patches are definitely pure Yellow and match to the Yellow on the Diag Print pages. Then something went wrong and no more Yellow on the Calibrate Color patches or on Profile target patches.


Question, does your Z mix colors when printing the Calibrate Color page or does it use pure un-mixed colors as they come from the cartridges?
What could be the cause of my problem with the Yellow being Brownish-Orange?
Any help is appreciated.

SergeyT.


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tived

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When Calibrate Colors does your Z3x00 mixes color on the patches?
« Reply #1 on: March 04, 2009, 11:11:58 pm »

Hi SergeyT,

I don't know if this applies to you, but I have had awful results with the Everyday satin, but I have since calibrated it manually with an iOne Pro and iMatch 3.6.2 software using the 918 patch and it was a huge improvement, I now have skin colors that looks like what is on my screen, instead of those blue/cool almost grey looking skin colors I had before. I wouldn't recommend this paper for then proofing or as we do, use it for large poster prints for our display windows, looks great from a distance, but it is not for pixelpeepers.

Like I said, it may not apply to you, but it sure made a difference to me.

best of luck

Henrik

PS I am using a Z3100
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SergeyT

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When Calibrate Colors does your Z3x00 mixes color on the patches?
« Reply #2 on: March 04, 2009, 11:20:43 pm »

Hi Henrik,

 Thank you for the reply.
 I have the same issue on two papers and on matt it even worse.
 Since I do not get the right Yellow even on the Calibrate Color page , which is made in a fully automated way with no human interention (no place for my error) I would like to know what I have to expect there on the patches: a color as it is in the cartridges or a mix of colors from different cartridges? That would give me a good starting point in troubleshooting.

SergeyT.
« Last Edit: March 04, 2009, 11:21:12 pm by SergeyT »
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tived

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When Calibrate Colors does your Z3x00 mixes color on the patches?
« Reply #3 on: March 04, 2009, 11:30:34 pm »

SergeyT,

I am not quite sure what to tell you, I can send you the profile that I have just made and you can see if it will help you

Henrik

PS: I am not sure if I am allowed to send this as an attachment here
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neil snape

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When Calibrate Colors does your Z3x00 mixes color on the patches?
« Reply #4 on: March 05, 2009, 09:52:36 am »

Now I have no real idea of what is going on here.
Since you did the calibration a few days ago and it was yellow, then that rules out that you plugged the magenta or orange into the yellow ink bay doesn't it?

Is an ink supply tube broken?
I think you'll have to call HP tech support as the only reasons that there could be are a corrupted firmware, or some signaling to the print heads causing this. Calibrations are initiated on either the host computer or on the front panel. All the calibration though is proprietary and onboard run under a Unix op sys. If something is broken there HP will have to find it, as it is not something that your host computer is responsible for.

I have never seen this before on the 3100 nor the 3200. I have matte litho and a lot of other papers and have not had anything but correct results. No amount of profiling will fix this , and alignments shouldn't have to be done on many papers including the ones your calibrating.
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SergeyT

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When Calibrate Colors does your Z3x00 mixes color on the patches?
« Reply #5 on: March 05, 2009, 11:40:42 am »

Thank you for your reply Neil, much appreciated!
No I have not touched anything inside the printer since I have assembled it. And I do realize that no profiling will help here.
I work with HP on that but they seem to take it easy and trying to say that it is supposed to be that way.  
Will keep this thread up to date on the future development.
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neil snape

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When Calibrate Colors does your Z3x00 mixes color on the patches?
« Reply #6 on: March 05, 2009, 11:47:14 am »

No no no it's not supposed to be like that. I have litho here and the calibration yellow patches are certainly yellow not rust or orangey yellow.
Something is amuck and your photo of the calibrations helps. HP should realise that as soon as they see it.
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kers

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When Calibrate Colors does your Z3x00 mixes color on the patches?
« Reply #7 on: March 05, 2009, 12:21:44 pm »

Hello Sergey,

I just noticed the print head in the z3x00 is Yellow-Magenta-' maybe there is a leak in between?

I had that problem with green/blue- it took me some time to figure it out.

just a thought

Pieter Kers


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Pieter Kers
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neil snape

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When Calibrate Colors does your Z3x00 mixes color on the patches?
« Reply #8 on: March 05, 2009, 01:01:54 pm »

Yes this is what I thought it may be in the supply to the head, or in the head itself. That would explain the sudden change in bleed to the pure yellow.

I'm just printing now and had a supposed paper jam. Frustrated with the false errors. What you cannot do with this printer is hold the paper flat coming out of the printer otherwise it triggers a paper jam thus wasting the print and requiring  multiple restarts.
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SergeyT

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When Calibrate Colors does your Z3x00 mixes color on the patches?
« Reply #9 on: March 05, 2009, 01:34:55 pm »

Thanks for the valuable replies Everyone!

HP have seen this and other images I sent to them so far. Said they do not see a problem. And after some additional e-mail exchanges have kindly agreed to continue the investigation.
How do I go about the potential Y-M Head problem? Should I ask HP to send me a replacement? I recall I have had Head Cleaning done in the Printer for it, then removed it and cleaned with a tissue as HP told me to. No changes.

Thank you,
SergeyT.
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Ernst Dinkla

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When Calibrate Colors does your Z3x00 mixes color on the patches?
« Reply #10 on: March 06, 2009, 04:17:26 am »

Quote from: SergeyT
Thanks for the valuable replies Everyone!

HP have seen this and other images I sent to them so far. Said they do not see a problem. And after some additional e-mail exchanges have kindly agreed to continue the investigation.
How do I go about the potential Y-M Head problem? Should I ask HP to send me a replacement? I recall I have had Head Cleaning done in the Printer for it, then removed it and cleaned with a tissue as HP told me to. No changes.

Thank you,
SergeyT.


Replace that head and send the old one + the target printed + a message to HP, would be my advice. If the head is still in warranty you should get a replacement head but I wouldn't wait a week with a head price of 60$.

On Epsons sometimes heavy cleaning and blocked capping station sponges could result in one head pumping ink into another head so you got similar results but that could be solved. Not likely to happen on a Z model with their simple but excellent head capping system. On some Epson head assemblies the internal barrier could leak too and the same symptoms showed, it meant a total head replacement.



Ernst Dinkla

Try: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Wide_Inkjet_Printers/


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SergeyT

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When Calibrate Colors does your Z3x00 mixes color on the patches?
« Reply #11 on: March 19, 2009, 10:20:45 pm »

Has replaced the Magenta-Yellow Printhead. That did the trick. The pure Yellow is back on the Calibrate Color targets. The prints come out the way I expect them to.
HP Support was great after I made it through Tier-1 and 1.5

Thanks everyone for sharing ideas and hints!
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