Epson 7900 / 9900 Printer

[pindman]

After joining Michael on the LL Antarctica trip, I wanted to make large prints of the incredible imagery.  I purchased an Epson 9900 and am not sorry.  I've not had any of the problems that I've read about on the forum, although Julian from Spectraflow helped set it up.   I agree with everything Michael said about the fantastic image quality.  I'm using Harman FBAl, and the black and white images are at least as good (if not better) than my silver prints on Ilford and Agfa papers.  The color prints are spectacular.

I usually use rolls, but loading single sheets is easy and reliable.

There's one problem with the 9900 that I've made Epson aware of, but anyone else having this problem should also bug them.  The pinch roller leaves indentations in the paper in just several minutes when using the Harman FbAl paper.  Although it was previously necessary to remove the paper from the printer if leaving it overnight, even less than 5 minutes in the roller will leave marks.  It is not unusual to need 15 minutes between prints, and I'm not willing to remove and reload paper for every print.  My workaround is to manually push the cut button, and cut off the bottom 1 1/2 inches immediately before hitting the print button.  It's a trade off.  Don't loose as much ink when switching blacks, but loose a bit of paper (or tons of time reloading).  I'd be interested in hearing others' experience with the Harman FB Al.

Despite this glitch, the 9900 is phenomenal!

Paul

[Schewe]

The pinch roller leaves indentations in the paper in just several minutes when using the Harman FbAl paper.  Although it was previously necessary to remove the paper from the printer if leaving it overnight, even less than 5 minutes in the roller will leave marks.

The vacuum paper transport system prevents the paper from coming into contact with any rollers on the face of the print. The downside is that it does take a lot of vacuum to transport the paper. So, at the end of a print after it's been cut, you can push the platen release button which will take the tension off the paper...when you are ready to print push the platen release button to engage the platen...

Also, since you are not using an Epson paper I presume you are using a suggested alternative media setting? You may need to make fine tune adjustments for how strong the vacuum is for your paper...

[pindman]

The vacuum paper transport system prevents the paper from coming into contact with any rollers on the face of the print. The downside is that it does take a lot of vacuum to transport the paper. So, at the end of a print after it's been cut, you can push the platen release button which will take the tension off the paper...when you are ready to print push the platen release button to engage the platen...

Also, since you are not using an Epson paper I presume you are using a suggested alternative media setting? You may need to make fine tune adjustments for how strong the vacuum is for your paper...

Hi Jeff,

I assume you've recovered from the trip!

The only problem with pushing the platen release button is that it automatically unloads the roll.  That's OK if I'm not going to make another print for awhile, but not if I'm going to make a number of prints an hour.  And yes, I've tried the different media settings.  Still get the marks if I leave if for even a few minutes.

Thanks.

Paul

[JohnB304]

Hello,

Pardon this noobs questions and feel free to direct me to a better thread, but I'm the owner of a brand new 7900 and I'm in way over my head.

I've been using an R2880, my first inkjet printer, for about a month. I LOVE the results, but it was costing a fortune in ink. I shoot dance studios, sports teams, seniors, weddings, etc... and plan on using the printer for all my needs. My r2880 had a paper tray and I thought the 7900 would also, but it seems to only accept one sheet at a time which is about worthless for my needs, or am I missing something? With my R2880 I was using bulk packs of 500 letter size paper. I have a few 10" x 100' rolls of paper but can't figure out how to make a borderless 10" wide prints (I keep getting 8x10's with 2"s of scrap on the side and still need to be cut on all 4 sides). Is it possible to print 10" wide x 8" deep images without any special oversize cropping (or even with) for every image? I've fiddled with all the driver settings without luck.  I was referred to Qimage but it's not made for a mac.

Basically, I need to figure out a fast, efficient method to bang out prints.

On the good side, the few prints I've made are spectacular. The R2880's are incredible and hard to improve upon, but I've made the same image from a wet lab, the R2880 and the 7900's look the best with punchier color and warmer, more natural flesh tones.

Consider me the newest ink addict.

Quick edit: I realize this is more of an art forum but the knowledge runs deep so I thought I'd ask.

John

[Guigui]

My r2880 had a paper tray and I thought the 7900 would also, but it seems to only accept one sheet at a time which is about worthless for my needs, or am I missing something?

You're right, you can only load one sheet at a time.

With my R2880 I was using bulk packs of 500 letter size paper. I have a few 10" x 100' rolls of paper but can't figure out how to make a borderless 10" wide prints (I keep getting 8x10's with 2"s of scrap on the side and still need to be cut on all 4 sides). Is it possible to print 10" wide x 8" deep images without any special oversize cropping (or even with) for every image? I've fiddled with all the driver settings without luck.  I was referred to Qimage but it's not made for a mac.

Borderless printing isn't supported by the 8''x10'' size. However, have you tried to set the user defined size as 10'' wide and 8'' high and let the printer driver "auto expand" the image to make it borderless ?

[JohnB304]

You're right, you can only load one sheet at a time.



Borderless printing isn't supported by the 8''x10'' size. However, have you tried to set the user defined size as 10'' wide and 8'' high and let the printer driver "auto expand" the image to make it borderless ?

I've tried that but  it didn't work. I'm going to fiddle with it more tomorrow, apparently I have to set the paper size as being smaller than 8x10 and make the print oversize or something like that ... regardless, I'm committed now so I'll need to figure it out and hopefully create an action that will make it easy. The irony is I'd like to trade this one for the 17" 4880 replacement if such a printer existed. Thanks for the reply!