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Author Topic: Spyder 5 question  (Read 5171 times)

kevs

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Spyder 5 question
« on: October 15, 2018, 08:06:24 pm »

Anyone use Spyder 5? I have 3 and wont work. They gave me coupon for 5 but it's 5 is now 3 years old. Should I wait?
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digitaldog

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #1 on: October 15, 2018, 08:07:41 pm »

http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=103094.msg845726#msg845726
The higher the reported dE, the worse the unit preformed. So you'll see two Spyder's (newest models) were 9.9 and 7.2 which is pretty awful. The X-rite products were 1.4 and as low as 0.8!
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kevs

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #2 on: October 15, 2018, 08:14:13 pm »

thanks Andrew:
i1 $209,  Color Munki $168,  Color Munki Smile $81  (BH photo)

How do that rate respectively? For one who does not print that much...ok Smile or Munki regular?

Buy now or wait for new version coming soon?
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digitaldog

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #3 on: October 15, 2018, 08:17:04 pm »

thanks Andrew:
i1 $209,  Color Munki $168,  Color Munki Smile $81  (BH photo)

How do that rate respectively? For one who does not print that much...ok Smile or Munki regular?

Buy now or wait for new version coming soon?
What's your goal for the calibration of the display, matching say a print?
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kevs

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #4 on: October 15, 2018, 09:36:29 pm »

No, Andrew, I just find it's a good paper weight to have a nice talking piece for conversation and company



No, I've read  you book..... ha ha.... I know you always veer for the most expensive option.... so maybe a stupid question.

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digitaldog

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #5 on: October 15, 2018, 11:19:43 pm »

No, Andrew, I just find it's a good paper weight to have a nice talking piece for conversation and company
Then for holding down paper, any of your choices should do the job.
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kevs

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #6 on: October 15, 2018, 11:26:42 pm »

Thanks... and be better than Spyder? Thanks Andrew! If you have those corresponding number to match each of those three choices to post it would be great for everyone to see.
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kpz

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #7 on: October 17, 2018, 12:50:09 pm »

http://forum.luminous-landscape.com/index.php?topic=103094.msg845726#msg845726
The higher the reported dE, the worse the unit preformed. So you'll see two Spyder's (newest models) were 9.9 and 7.2 which is pretty awful. The X-rite products were 1.4 and as low as 0.8!

Wow, I wish I had read this before I purchased a Spyder 5 a few days ago. It looks like I'll be returning it unopened for an X-rite colorimeter.

For those of us who are amateurs on a budget and just want prints to match the color on the screen, which of the options would you recommend? I have a relatively new MacBook running the latest OSX.
« Last Edit: October 17, 2018, 12:54:34 pm by kpz »
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kevs

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #8 on: October 17, 2018, 12:56:38 pm »

My question: would the bottom of the barrel X rite do as good  as Spyder 5.

I'd love Adrew to post data of results , numbers, which match, each X rite product, including the $80 one, and well as the Sypder result. Then all decide best on needs and budget in bank.
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digitaldog

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #9 on: October 17, 2018, 01:23:40 pm »

My question: would the bottom of the barrel X rite do as good  as Spyder 5.

I'd love Adrew to post data of results , numbers, which match, each X rite product, including the $80 one, and well as the Sypder result. Then all decide best on needs and budget in bank.
You get the products, I'll test them. As you can see, such tests were done in the past, the Spyder's failed pretty poorly while X-rite's correlated with a reference Spectrophotometer quite well. You think since then, something changed? Perhaps but that doesn't aid DataColor's awful results in the past so why take a chance today?
Now in terms of hardware, I'll speak about X-rite and one colorimeter that is found in 3 packages. It is IDENTICAL. The difference is the software packages used to drive the hardware. You're paying more for additional functionality in the software. Which is why I asked if matching a print to a display is the goal and got a somewhat snarky answer. Not everyone has this goal. Now why is the distinction important. Let's say you have a crippled software product that only provides 4 or 8 presets for white balance of the backlight. #3 is too warm, #4 is too cool. YOUR SCREWED. You paid for the same hardware but can't use it fully. Had you paid for the more expensive bundle, you'd have the ability to enter any CCT value, or x/y (should you wish to alter the color calibration of the green/magenta 'axis'.)
Does it make sense to me, that companies supply identical hardware but make you pay more to use it fully? Yes it does. But that's all marketing.
So, going full circle, if someone's goal is to match a display and print with as full control as possible, outside of a color reference display system like SpectraView, my recommendations is to get an X-rite i1 Display Pro package. Same hardware as the lesser expensive offerings but far more control over using that hardware. Oh, it's faster at measuring too, no big deal and yet another marketing created 'feature' (slow down the instrument expect for the top of the line product). Dumb. But then I don't run either X-rite or DataColor thankfully. But now some here know why I'd skip the Spyder based on it's colored history and go with the most expensive  :'(  package offered by X-rite.
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kpz

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #10 on: October 17, 2018, 02:15:34 pm »

Now in terms of hardware, I'll speak about X-rite and one colorimeter that is found in 3 packages. It is IDENTICAL. The difference is the software packages used to drive the hardware. You're paying more for additional functionality in the software. Which is why I asked if matching a print to a display is the goal and got a somewhat snarky answer. Not everyone has this goal. Now why is the distinction important. Let's say you have a crippled software product that only provides 4 or 8 presets for white balance of the backlight. #3 is too warm, #4 is too cool. YOUR SCREWED. You paid for the same hardware but can't use it fully. Had you paid for the more expensive bundle, you'd have the ability to enter any CCT value, or x/y (should you wish to alter the color calibration of the green/magenta 'axis'.)
Does it make sense to me, that companies supply identical hardware but make you pay more to use it fully? Yes it does. But that's all marketing.

What are the three X-rite products with identical hardware?

Would it make sense to buy the cheapest and then use a third-party software solution (say DisplayCAL) to do the calibration?
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kevs

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #11 on: October 17, 2018, 02:22:28 pm »

Thanks Andrew!  I thought.. same word I was thinking snarky in question, do you want to say match a print.. of course what else is there to do but match a print!

I apologize, as you are the king of color, so we are fortunate to have you hear at all.

That said, you are saying the cheapie $80 smile hardware is the same puck as the $200 i1 , its the software that makes the difference?

Now for the struggling college student, (not me), but others who are: How does the smile software compare to the Spyder 5?  Would you go Smile over Spyder 5 if those were only two choices?  Or you may say neither, they are just paper weights both and worthless.

Honestly I've been happy with Sypder 3, but I'm all ears here, just sponging off your great knowledge.  I'm not saying that sarcastically, I've bought your books in the past..  We all appreciate your input on this forum. Best,
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kevs

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #12 on: October 17, 2018, 02:23:16 pm »

These are the 3, I listed them above:

1 $209,  Color Munki $168,  Color Munki Smile $81  (BH photo)
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kpz

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #13 on: October 17, 2018, 02:28:10 pm »

Kevs, I do not think it is true that those three all use the same hardware. See this link for a discussion, for instance:
http://www.colourspace.xyz/datacolor-vs-x-rite-best-screen-calibrators/

What does appear to be true is that the ColorMunki Display uses the same hardware as i1 Display Pro but is software-limited.
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digitaldog

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #14 on: October 17, 2018, 02:31:17 pm »

What are the three X-rite products with identical hardware?

Would it make sense to buy the cheapest and then use a third-party software solution (say DisplayCAL) to do the calibration?
The one's that look like this fellow in shape/size (and yes, you can use 3rd party software if it fits your needs and supports the hardware).
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kevs

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #15 on: October 17, 2018, 02:31:27 pm »

ok K nice article.
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GWGill

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #16 on: October 17, 2018, 11:09:25 pm »

ok K nice article.
Not such a good article. Straight of the bat they make a mistake ("ColorMunki Smile vs Spyder5Express"), in equating the ColorMunki Smile with the i1 Display 2 which it physically resembles. It may look the same, but from my testing it has different filters, and appears to be much less sensitive to the different display technologies than the i1 Display 2.

In some simple checks on a couple of displays I have near by (2016 MacBook Pro & CRT display) my i1 Display Pro (using appropriate display calibrations) and ColorMunki Smile had comparable errors when compared to a reference JETI 1211, and note that the Smile doesn't have specific device type calibrations for these two displays!

Without more thorough testing it's not really possible to say exactly  how good or bad a Smile is, but it seems very much closer to an i1 Display Pro than the i1 Display 2 it resembles. (And my guess is that this would be because it makes use of very similar filters to those used in the i1 Display Pro.  The Spyder's are still using their original filter technology of composing 7 simpler filter responses together so that they resemble the standard observer curves, while X-Rite seems to have leapfrogged them by switched to using carefully tuned multi-layer thin film filters. Real world accuracy of instruments often comes down to how well the manufacturing and calibration process works though.)

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kevs

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #17 on: October 18, 2018, 12:28:43 am »

Nice post GW.  Have you tried Sypder yourself? It always seemed pretty good to me, (I had Spyder 3)  matching monitor to prints, but I'm not super pro.
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GWGill

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #18 on: October 18, 2018, 07:32:45 am »

Have you tried Sypder yourself? It always seemed pretty good to me, (I had Spyder 3)  matching monitor to prints, but I'm not super pro.
Sure - I've written drivers for the Spyder 2, 3, 4 & 5. The 4 & 5 have almost identical hardware, but from the two samples I have, the 5 seemed about twice as accurate, putting it a bit close to the i1 Display Pro in terms of accuracy. My guess as why that is, is that they improved their calibration process to more accurately measure each devices spectral sensitivities. The i1 Display Pro still seems to have an edge in terms of speed (i.e. light captured), filter accuracy (i.e. similarity to the standard observer) and factory calibration accuracy.
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digitaldog

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Re: Spyder 5 question
« Reply #19 on: October 18, 2018, 09:14:47 am »

The next area to examine is unit to unit consistency and that’s more difficult depending on the number of samples one has access to. One would hope these instruments are easy to manufacture in a consistent manner.
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