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Epson Stylus Pro 7000/9000 - 2000
Epson Stylus Pro 7500/9500 - 2000
Epson Stylus Pro 10000 - 2001
Epson Stylus Pro 7600/9600 - 2002
Epson Stylus Pro 10600 - 2002
Epson Stylus Pro 7800/9800 - 2005
Epson Stylus Pro 7880/9880 - 2007
Epson Stylus Pro 11880 - 2007
Epson Stylus Pro 7900/9900 - 2009
Epson Stylus Pro 7890/9890 - 2010
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There has not been serious competition for Epson in this market segment, wide format - water based inkjet for art/photography, up to 2006. In 2006 both Canon and HP launched their new pigment ink inkjet printers systems for that market, HP added one upgrade since on the 12 ink models and more on the 8 ink models, Canon upgraded the 12 ink models roughly twice and introduced some generations 6 and 8 ink models next to this range. HP might not be in the 12 inks race anymore anno 2015 but still sells the Z3200-PS and fast 8 ink models. Consider something else; both HP and Canon see this market as an extension to their sign and CAD printers market where they compete heavily, both are big in the total printing market after purchasing several companies over the last 15 years. Epson had no real market share in that segment but sold inkjet head technology to partners that were active in that market. Roland, Mutoh, Mimaki, and more. Epson also delivered heads to the dry minilab manufacturers like Noritsu and FujiFilm. With real competition in the art/photography market segment, that already had some signs of saturation, Epson decided to enter both the sign and dry minilab market with complete printer systems and by that going into competition with the two giants and several of its inkjet head purchasers. I can imagine that lots of engineers were involved in that move while declining sales in the art/photography market did not call for new printer models in that segment, inkjet technology already meeting image quality demands. Whether the Epson move into that wider market delivered is another question, there have been many jobs cut. Of course the economy in this period was not healthy either. Epson is just one of several piëzo head manufacturers in the sign market and thermal heads entered that market again with the HP Latex printer models.
The next steps in inkjet technology will aim at printing speed. Page wide heads have been used in dry minilab printers and label printers to widths of approx. 17" so far. Either piëzo or thermal inkjet heads. It looks like thermal heads in page wide arrays above that size have an advantage in their way lower production price per nozzle. Substitution of failing nozzles during print runs is an advantage too of high density nozzle heads, hard to achieve that with piëzo head technology. HP and Canon (Océ) have several models of roll to roll (web) page wide inkjet head printers in that market, already competing with offset printing. After Memjet (dye), HP introduced A4 page wide office printers (pigment) that are very successful in the market. In 2014 Epson announced a model like that too but it was way more expensive, unclear whether it is distributed yet. To get an idea about page wide inkjet heads and their capacity + image quality for web printing in competitione with offset printing:
http://whattheythink.com/articles/72283-hp-high-definition-nozzle-architecture/Canon (Océ/Memjet) and HP have some page wide, wide format models more or less as prototypes as I understand it, more CAD market aimed. It has to be seen whether this art/photography market segment needs page wide inkjet heads. I guess reliability and image quality in intermittent use is a first priority and Epson should address the former in its 360 nozzles per channel heads first, give it the same reliability the 3880 head (180 nozzles per channel) has. Epson seems to have learned something about the longevity of its inkjet inks and changed the yellow ink in the P600-P800 model accordingly. It is possible that the thermal head competition for Epson piëzo heads is less fierce in this segment of the market than in any other inkjet market and Epson has goodwill in this market. However if page wide heads become the norm then Epson will have a hard time to compete on printer price. Maybe something in between dry minilab and the 4900/ipf5100 market could get page wide heads as a first trial, possibly with less ink channels and using dye inks like Claria or Vivera (dye). I actually do not see the 4900 replaced with a similar new model and it was the last one appearing of the x900 range. The 3880 - P800 range is capable enough, if not one than two of them. Canon's iPF5100 has not been upgraded since 2007?, HP never had a similar sized pigment printer in this market, the older HP Designjet 130 etc dye models did not get a successor either. Looks like a small market segment.
For the future of page wide head wide formats in the sign printing industry:
http://www.fespa.com/news/features/what-is-the-potential-for-single-pass-digital-heads.htmlis as unsure.
Met vriendelijke groet, Ernst
http://www.pigment-print.com/spectralplots/spectrumviz_1.htmDecember 2014 update, 700+ inkjet media white spectral plots