Epson P5000 - Borderless 7x10 inch cards ??

[Sbromley]

I print borderless 7x10 inch scored greeting cards (fold after printing to 7x5) with a Canon Pro-100.

Would like to switch to Epson P5000 for higher quality.

Will the Epson support borderless printing on 10 inch wide paper that's only 7 inches long? From reading the manual, the minimum supported length is 10 inches.

On the Canon I "fake it out" by telling the print driver the paper is 10x12, one of the borderless sizes it supports. This works great, it just spits out the 7" paper at the end of the print process.

Can I fake out the Epson in a similar way?

Thanks,
Steve

[Garnick]

Good morning Steve,

Since I've always worked with the wider ProGraphic printers, P7000 now for instance, my first thought was that the P5000 would not accommodate borderless printing on sheet materials.  However, since I wasn't certain about that I decided to take a peek at the specs.  Unfortunately for you, I was correct.  It would seem that all of the "P" series printers allow borderless printing on roll materials only.  As I recall, The ProGraphic printers have never offered borderless printing on sheet materials of any size, but I may be mistaken.  Please see the specs below.  You will notice there is no mention of borderless printing for the P5000 on sheet materials. 

Sheet Media Handling:
Thickness:
up to 1.5 mm (0.059")
Single Sheet, Top-loading:
Single Sheet, Top-loading: 17" x 22"
Paper Cassette Mulitple sheets up to 0.35 mm (0.014") thick, capacity varies by media, 250 sheet maximum on plain paper
Left/Right Margins:
3 mm each side; 6 mm or 0.24" total
Top/Bottom Margins:
3 mm each side

Roll Media Handling:
Single Roll-to-Roll / Top-loading Roll:
17" wide up to 0.05 mm thick
Media Core:
2" standard core, 3" adapters
Media Thickness:
0.08 to 0.5 mm (0.02") thick
Roll Cutting:
High-speed internal rotary cutter; auto or manual6
Minimum Auto Cut Length:
5.0" plus top/bottom margin
Top/Bottom Margins:
varies by media 15, 3, 20, 35 or 0 when using borderless cut
Left/Right Margins:
3 mm each side; 0.24" total; or 0" at supported BorderFree® widths
Roll Paper Remaining:
printable barcode tracking system

I hope this helps, and have a great day 

Gary

[Mark D Segal]

Depending on the size of the sheet (A3, A4, Super A3, US C  permitted) you can do borderless left and right with the SC-P5000, but would need to do some cutting, and perhaps composite a couple of these cards on a compliant sheet size to minimize paper waste.

[Sbromley]

Thanks Gary and Mark, for the quick responses!

Mark - good idea on the post-print cutting.  For small-scale jobs it could work.  Unfortunately it would be difficult for us to accommodate given the volume of cards.  Currently we use pre-scored 7x10 cards from Red River. 

I was hoping to "go big" with a pro-level Epson printer for greeting cards, that could also double as a fine-art photo printer.

Looks like the P800 is my only Epson path. 

My concern with the P800 is paper feed.  Before I got the Canon Pro-100 I had an Epson 3800, which had feed issues with the card stock. 

Does anyone have experience with the Epson P800, is the paper feed mechanism improved relative to the 3800? 

Thanks again,
Steve

[Mark D Segal]

The paper feed mechanism of the SC-P800 is quite different from that of the 3880/3800. For heavy card stock you would most likely be using the Front Fine Art feed, which can be a bit finicky until you get accustomed to it; but I've had good experience with it once accustomed - hardly ever misfeeds. I'm not sure how borderless would work on a P-800 with a user-determined custom size such as 7*10 inches. I would recommend discussing it with Epson tech support before buying one. You may also wish to find out whether the printing speeds would be suitable for your work volume.

[Mark D Segal]

Have you considered looking at the Canon Pro-1000? Very high quality printer. You'd need to check on the driver specs for your needs.

[Garnick]

Depending on the size of the sheet (A3, A4, Super A3, US C  permitted) you can do borderless left and right with the SC-P5000, but would need to do some cutting, and perhaps composite a couple of these cards on a compliant sheet size to minimize paper waste.

Hi Mark,

Once again I should have let the expert reply first.  I was sitting with Mr. MacPro early this morning and thought I would do some searching for Steve and send along my findings.  I probably should have read your review first and simply pointed Steve in that direction, instead of including Specs that make no mention of Borderless printing on sheet materials for the P5000.  That seems rather irresponsible of Epson in my opinion.  But, it is what it is.

Gary

[Wayne Fox]

instead of including Specs that make no mention of Borderless printing on sheet materials for the P5000. 

specs are pretty straight forward.  Cut sheet it states minimum border sizes.  Roll paper it explicitly states possible with cut option. Whey would they need to state it doesn’t print borderless sheets when they just stated sheets have minimum border sizes? sort of stating the obvious.

This is standard for all Epson professional grade printers. Only desktop printers have paper feed mechanisms that can handle borderless top and bottom. Is there really enough demand for this feature to expand and enhance the paper feed mechanism to handle it (and increase the cost)?  Seems 99% of those using the printers are sending roll paper through it.

[Mark D Segal]

Then I'm in the 1%. I don't like futzing with roll paper, dealing with curl, settings, blah-blah, unless I'm doing a pano or something that makes it inevitable. I think it's easier to use a Rotatrim than to do kludges with the driver, but then again I'm not in the high volume print business; it's one at a time and forever how long it takes. I wonder how much of a big deal it would be for Epson to pack the SC-P5000 driver with 4-sided borderless for the same selected sizes they provide left-right borderless. They already provide the second maintenance tank for the left-right overspill, so doesn't seem the hardware would need any adaptation.

[Wayne Fox]

Then I'm in the 1%.

yep.  most of the people who hang out at LuLa are.

[Mark D Segal]

Hi Wayne - you've heard the expression that great minds think alike and fools seldom differ.  :-)

[Garnick]

specs are pretty straight forward.  Cut sheet it states minimum border sizes.  Roll paper it explicitly states possible with cut option. Whey would they need to state it doesn’t print borderless sheets when they just stated sheets have minimum border sizes? sort of stating the obvious.

This is standard for all Epson professional grade printers. Only desktop printers have paper feed mechanisms that can handle borderless top and bottom. Is there really enough demand for this feature to expand and enhance the paper feed mechanism to handle it (and increase the cost)?  Seems 99% of those using the printers are sending roll paper through it.

Hi Wayne,

If I'm printing a 24x36 on the P7000 my customer actually wants a 24x36, which of course means "borderless".  They do not want to have a 3mm border or any size border for that matter.  Unless I am misreading the specs, that cannot be achieved on sheet paper, only roll.  And yes, I do print on roll materials, a lot.  Most of which do have borders to trim, since not all image sizes conform to the borderless paper sizes.  You are very aware of all that I have written, so I'm not sure why you would indicate that the specs are all inclusive, when they make no mention of borderless printing on sheet material, only roll.  I believe the OP was asking for information about the possibility of printing borderless on card stock.  3mm is very close to 1/8", which is hardly borderless, but perhaps for some it's close enough.

And by the way Wayne, have you installed the latest Firmware update for the P9000?  If so, any issues?

Gary   

[Garnick]

Depending on the size of the sheet (A3, A4, Super A3, US C  permitted) you can do borderless left and right with the SC-P5000, but would need to do some cutting, and perhaps composite a couple of these cards on a compliant sheet size to minimize paper waste.

Hi Mark,

Again it's early morning and the java hasn't done its job yet, so I may be interpreting this reply incorrectly.  Wayne has mentioned that the "specs are pretty straight forward".  I agree, they are just that.  In which case there would seem to be no way of printing borderless on sheet material with the P5000.  Yes, it does state a 3mm "margin" on each side, so why would Epson make any reference to borderless printing when they have already mentioned a minimum 3mm margin?  Good question, definitely.  Since we are taking the specs as written, it would indicate that indeed borderless printing is not possible on sheet materials.  That is exactly what I have been referring to all along.  I'm very tempted to read your review, just to find out what sort of magic is required in order to achieve a borderless print.  However, I imagine Steve has already done that, so I'll leave the rest up to him.

I've always enjoyed turning that quote around somewhat - "Like minds think alike, and others beg to differ".  Seems to me that's what this forum is all about.  Is that not correct?

BREAKING NEWS - Perhaps good news for Steve.  My almost daily email from Epson just arrived.  "Save up to $600 on the P5000, Standard Edition". 

Gary   

 

[Mark D Segal]

Hi Mark,

Again it's early morning and the java hasn't done its job yet, so I may be interpreting this reply incorrectly.  Wayne has mentioned that the "specs are pretty straight forward".  I agree, they are just that.  In which case there would seem to be no way of printing borderless on sheet material with the P5000.  Yes, it does state a 3mm "margin" on each side, so why would Epson make any reference to borderless printing when they have already mentioned a minimum 3mm margin?  Good question, definitely.  Since we are taking the specs as written, it would indicate that indeed borderless printing is not possible on sheet materials.  That is exactly what I have been referring to all along.  I'm very tempted to read your review, just to find out what sort of magic is required in order to achieve a borderless print.  However, I imagine Steve has already done that, so I'll leave the rest up to him.

I've always enjoyed turning that quote around somewhat - "Like minds think alike, and others beg to differ".  Seems to me that's what this forum is all about.  Is that not correct?

Gary

Hi Gary,

Not interested in reading specs. The only operational thing that matters is what the printer driver allows one to set-up, so my response was based on available driver settings which I rechecked before responding to him, and this for the Mac version of the driver, but should be the same on Windows.

[Garnick]

Hi Gary,

Not interested in reading specs. The only operational thing that matters is what the printer driver allows one to set-up, so my response was based on available driver settings which I rechecked before responding to him, and this for the Mac version of the driver, but should be the same on Windows.

I agree completely Mark, but if all one has is the specs, one would be hard pressed to interpret them as meaning that borderless printing on sheet materials is indeed possible on the P5000.  Of course that's what this forum is all about, and that's all I was trying to say - the "specs" are inconclusive according to your experience.  Often the minutia of a topic becomes the topic, and then it strays from the intended meaning.

Gary   

[Mark D Segal]

Oh sure, I agree the specs should be complete enough to describe the printer's basic capabilities, of which I would think borderless printing capability on sheets is one. It would even be in the company's interest to make sure people know and understand what the product can do without having to download the driver and work through it. But c'est la vie.

[Garnick]

Oh sure, I agree the specs should be complete enough to describe the printer's basic capabilities, of which I would think borderless printing capability on sheets is one. It would even be in the company's interest to make sure people know and understand what the product can do without having to download the driver and work through it. But c'est la vie.

I think perhaps we can put this one to bed, unless Steve has further questions.

Gary

[Wayne Fox]

so I'm not sure why you would indicate that the specs are all inclusive, when they make no mention of borderless printing on sheet material, only roll.

And by the way Wayne, have you installed the latest Firmware update for the P9000?  If so, any issues?

Gary

I guess to me the specs are all inclusive.  They tell you what the printer will do, so anything other than that is not supported. That's how i read them anyway.

I think you can get around this on sheet paper on the sides, but the printer has no way to grip the paper to keep it in place on top and bottom without using a small border.

yes I've installed the firmware update.  Went smoothly and I see no difference the machine at all, so not sure what was changed.