Epson 4900: HFA PR Satin & OSX Lion

[John Caldwell]

I'm considering buying the 4900, principally for cut-sheet work as our Z3200 doesn't really excel in dealing with sheet media. Can anyone offer experience in printing on Photo Rag Satin with the 4900? This paper is important to me and it's used quite a bit with our 3800, giving results that I hope to achieve, or even improve upon, with the 4900. If you are printing on PR Satin, have you used the canned profile made available by Hahnemuhle or have you generated a custom profile? Are you specifying in the Epson driver Velvet Fine Art media at 1440 ,as suggested by the paper manufacturer, or some other setting?

Our intent would due to print from LR3 and LR4 in the context of OSX Lion by way of Ethernet, rather than by USB. I see there have been mixed experiences with the 4900 in this environment. Any comments would be appreciated.

Many thanks,

John Caldwell

[Farmer]

I haven't used that media, but if it's working well in a 3880 it shouldn't present any particular issues in a 4900.

Regarding LR3 and LR4 and OS X Lion and 4900 and ethernet - zero problems.

[John Caldwell]

Thank you for your kind reply, Farmer. My concern related to the 4900 containing a new ink set vs. the 3800 inks, and whether there would be some unexpected interaction with the PR Satin's rather unusual surface. I probably should have mentioned that I was simply never able to get a good print from our HP Z3200 on this paper, for what ever reason, so I was a little shy about moving to a new machine.

Thank you for your comments, and I'm glad that LR printing to your 4900 is working in Lion. If I may, are you networked or usb-connected?

Many thanks,

John Caldwell

[Farmer]

The inkset is different in terms of colour, but they're the same Epson pigment aqueous inks in general terms, so again I wouldn't expect any issues in that respect.

99% of the time any printer I'm using is connected via ethernet, be it Mac or Windows.  It does work just fine with USB, too, though.

[Nora_nor]

there was a thread recently about this photo rag satin
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=63910.0 (fixed the link)

[John Caldwell]

Fair enough, Farmer. I've decided to get the 4900 and will chime back in after trying the PR Satin. Thanks Nora_nor, for this link. Can't read it, myself, but am interested in any take away points offered.

John Caldwell

[Nora_nor]

You know what, I posted a totally wrong  link, did not check shat I pasted, it was supposed to be a link here to another recent thread here! Sorry!

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=63910.0 sorry

I have two sheets to try, and a new 4900 and I am anxious to try it myself

I am thinking black and white myself, not too dark. (with the black and white modus)

Nora

[John Caldwell]

Living with the 4900 for a few days now, principally doing PK work on Canson Baryta and Epson Exhibition Fiber - all good results. The rear paper feed, used for heavy sheet media, requires "help", but that's another story.

The Hahnnemüle Photo Rag Satin (canned) ICC profile calls out PK for the 4900, rather than MK. I've been printing on the Epson 9900 recently, and here the Hahnemüle profile calls for MK, as you would expect. I've ignored the PK spec, and have printed using the 4900 Hahnemüle PR Satin PK profile, but with MK ink and the Velvet Fine Art (media selection) driver settings. The results seem ok, and the results with PK ink were off.

Any ideas why, other than typo, Hahnemüle would list PK ink for PR Satin paper in the Epson 4900 download section? Any thoughts about getting a better profile for the 4900/PR Satin MK combo?

Many thanks,

John Caldwell