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Author Topic: False Economy  (Read 3750 times)

Kenneth Sky

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False Economy
« on: October 27, 2006, 03:56:51 pm »

I was in a very large Toronto retailer today and the saleperson noted that the reason they are not carrying HP printers and are not promoting Canon ipF5000 has to do with their printing heads. Because they are heated they wear out faster than Epson - in the case of Canon after 750 ml. of ink. This has not been factored into the cost of producing prints in any of the reviews or blogs I have seen. While she was at it the salesperson stated that the new HP printers produce a tacky print that takes 48 hours to dry and evaluate. The Canon printer has a few firmware glitches. Does any of this resonate with people who have hands on experience? Is it worth waiting for the Epson 3800?
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Tim Ernst

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False Economy
« Reply #1 on: October 27, 2006, 04:59:41 pm »

The prints from my 9180 are dry as they exit just like those from the Epson 4800 and your sales person was mistaken (and all inkjet prints need to sit overnight before you make accurate custom profiles as the ink does change a bit with time, but this has nothing to do with the actual ink being "tacky" or wet or whatever, this most certainly includes the Epsons) - you must keep in mind that you were talking with a salesperson who I assume sells Epson and not HP or Canon. Grain of salt, of course...
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michael

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« Reply #2 on: October 27, 2006, 06:32:08 pm »

There is a special circle in hell just for stupid misinformed camera store sales people.

Michael
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serf

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« Reply #3 on: October 27, 2006, 06:52:07 pm »

From the review at

http://luminous-landscape.com/reviews/prin...n-ipf5000.shtml :
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Heads

The heads (two of them) on the iPF 5000 are user interchangeable. The ones on the Epson 4800 aren't. This is a good news / bad news situation. Whereas the heads on the Epson are designed to last effectively for the life of the printer (however long that may be), the Canon heads are intended to eventually require replacement, at a cost of approximately $600 per head (there are two).

This is not as serious an issue as would first appear. According to available information, results from their W series printers, which were released last year, and which use the same head technology as the iPF 5000, show that average head life works out to be approximately 11,500 A3 sized prints (11X17"), with 20% ink coverage per color. How long it will take to make some 11,000 prints will obviously vary by individual. I make an average of 50 – 75 11X17" and 13X19" prints monthly. Assuming worst case, say 100 prints / month, that works out to 110 months – some 9 years. Since I expect the printer to essentially be obsolete in three years at most, and even assuming that the 11,000 odd print number is optimistic, it still means that for all but the heaviest commercial users head replacement cost will simply be a non-issue.

I was curious about whether or not Canon's printer heads changed characteristics as they aged. I have been assured that this was not the case. Apparently the only part that is subject to wearing out is the heater associated with each nozzle. These eventually cease to function, but when they do it is a binary situation. They either work, or they don't. Since the printer automatically bypasses problematic nozzles, it's only when enough of them have failed that the head reports that it needs to be replaced, which, as we've seen, will likely not be for a long time.
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No idea what firmware issue she was talking about.
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tonywh

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« Reply #4 on: October 27, 2006, 06:55:39 pm »

thats interesing 750ml of ink, so I have 4 canon printers that dont work now, the one we printed 120 sheets of yesterday should have not been working for the last 18 months. Its salesmans gibberish. If they stocked or got better commission on HP or Canon they would be telling you similar yarn about epson printers. I dont know about wide format but on HP A4 printers the heads come with the cartridges, so would only be used for the content of the cartridge. I must assume he is talking about narrow format because in wide format 750mls is less than a set of cartridges. Having had endless problems with epson print heads clogging and never a glitch with canons I wonder why the emphasis is on print heads.

tony
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David White

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« Reply #5 on: October 28, 2006, 01:29:38 am »

I guess my printer heads must be worn out because I've run through most of the starter cartridges supplied with the printer.  Do you know how to tell when a salesman is lying?  His lips are moving.
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David White

neil snape

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« Reply #6 on: October 28, 2006, 04:31:23 am »

20% coverage isn't very much I'm afraid.
All the manufacturers know the reality of print head expected life. All have incorporated methods to increase life around these known facts. Each needs different technology to do this with different methods of achieving results for user expectations.

Heads have more than reasons of reduced output or permanent clogs. If your media has a curl, if it is too thick, a folded corner etc all will cause a head strike. Reduced output is on a curve that will increase with time. New heads after purge and some run time are good for some time indeed. Yet when they start to populate the grid of reduced nozzles, or even permanent clogs, they will have proportional effects on image quality. They don't die all of a sudden. And you may not notice the degradation of image quality either.

Canon's method of nozzle checking is very basic, what HP was using on the 5000 printers many years ago. The actual measurement of real flow is done on both the HP 9180 and Z printers. The mapping and scheduling of maintenance is a tech wonder.  It is new, will improve but the effort to make this  solution that is valuable for users.

While on it 600$ x2 for print heads is greatly inflated. On top of that without a calibration system , good luck in ever getting or keeping your repeatability up to snuff.
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Kenneth Sky

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« Reply #7 on: October 28, 2006, 11:20:34 am »

I guess what I'm looking to find is a direct comparison of the output of the new generation (9 to 12 carts) of 17" printers. Although there are some extensive reviews of individual printers I haven't seen anyone put the same file into all of them to compare the output (of course on the same paper to reduce the variables)
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