If the printer cannot create good ICC profiles and you have to use a kludge to make manual profiles, how can you give this a good review?
I know Neil knows what he's doing, so for the life of me, I don't know why he and I are getting such different results on our Z9dr 44 inch units. It's like we are describing two different printer models! My problem areas have to do with inconsistent roll handling of fine art media. My printer unit is losing the feed at times when coming in and out of the "parked" position with thicker/stiffer media, no problems with RC media, and Roll 1 and Roll 2 positions also have somewhat different probabilities for losing role position as their roll feeding paths are physically different. Roll 1 position has an inverted curve roll feed path while Roll 2 is almost a straight through path. I am currently working with HP support to try to resolve my roll handling issues, but I'm also beginning to find workarounds as well, so ultimately I will cope with these roll handling deficiencies if they can't be fully resolved only because the print quality is really impressive. Hard for me to totally reject a printer when I can get amazing image quality from it.
I also have no problems printing a true "no color adjust mode" target from Adobe Color Printer Utility. And like Neil, I'm using Mac Mojave (last update before Catalina), so it's hard to say why Neil was unable to make a no color adjust workflow perform correctly while it is working properly for me. To be fair, I did have some inconsistent results with no color adjust mode using Qimage One's no color adjust feature. Sometimes worked, sometimes didn't, but that may be some sort of sticky/not sticky software setting issue with Q1. I don't know for sure. I also gave up using Q1 on the Z9 because it had a small but unacceptable scaling error that it doesn't have when sending the same file to my Z3200, Canon, or Epson printers. Q1 software team thus lays the blame for the error on the HP Z9 driver, but Adobe software (e.g., both PSCC and Adobe Acrobat reader) scales images perfectly to the Z9, so I rather suspect HP would likewise lay the blame for the scaling problem on Q1.
Also, I ran a demo of ImagePrint Red which relies on the HP driver as well. Again, scaling to the Z9 was perfect.
As for color gamut and profiling issues: I always start my custom profiling efforts with an initial profile built using the venerable TC918 color target because it's really easy to spot whether the TC918 visually ordered array of colors got color managed or not. I am able to make excellent ICC profiles for the Z9 stepping outside of the HP spectrophotometer/internal profile generation pathway, using only the HP color calibration step to get a proper baseline for building the custom profile. That said, the Z9 spectrophotometer-generated 464 patch ICC profiles are not poor by any means. Indeed, both Mark Linquist and I have been amazed at how good they are using just 464 patches. I'm finding it really hard to do better, and at this point, I'm finding less and less incentive to try.
Mark L. and I both agree that it's probably because the Z9 ink ramps are so well linearized to begin with, that HP can get away with a much smaller patch count than most color management experts would consider enough patches for an outstanding profile.
I also looked hard for any differences in how HP Z9 runs neutral gray patches in full color mode compared to the Z3200 which has always had a fantastic reputation for B&W output. I was worried that the Z9 giving up the light gray ink channel would get compensated by blending color inks into the screening pattern, or that the overall smoothness would come up short. Neither concern happened. Looking at the grayscale output when printing if full color mode, it appears HP has not deviated from full GCR approach it began with the Z3200. Under high magnification, I can only see gray dots printed in neutral color patches. I see no color dots showing up anywhere. The dual nozzle "pixel control" technology does indeed give the Z9 back in quality what otherwise might have been lost by elimination of LM, LC, and LG inks. And the visual perception when looking at the prints is that they are sharper and smoother overall compared to the Z3200, albeit the Z3200 was so good, that the benefit is subtle. But my point is the Z9 definitely didn't go backwards in image quality. Neutral B&W printing in full color mode is every bit as impressive as what I get on my Z3200PS. Thus, again, it mystifies me why Neil and I seem to be describing machines with very different apparent output behaviors. I swear - I Really do have the Z9+ dual role with vertical trimmer model in my studio today, i.e the same one as Neil
One last point: I haven't tested MK media settings to any appreciable extent, but I have gone through all the PK media settings exhaustively, looking at how they impact the ink loads and consequently the color gamut and smoothness of the ICC profile. It turns out that even though there are several PK media choices, HP programmed only two different ink ramps for PK media. It's probably the same situation for MK media, but I haven't checked yet. The large number of default media presets thus really exist only to correspond to HP branded media. Mostly, they modify other mechanical properties like media thickness (normal or thick), star wheel position (up, center, down), and dry time. Because these mechanical/physical properties are all user addressable when creating a custom preset and are subject to empirical enduser testing anyway when using non HP branded media, whereas ink ramps are not noted and not adjustable by the enduser, knowing which presets invoke which ink load is very important for maximum quality output! I had to test the various choices to figure this out. It was time consuming and frustrating because so many media choice settings produced identical output! I was beginning to think certain settings were just getting stuck and not changing, but retracing my steps produced same results. Only two ink ramps exist for PK media. I doubt many HP sales reps know this stuff given how many different HP printers they have to demo to prospective customers.
My gamut volume measurements proved that these two unique inking tables are a very important consideration for endusers looking for max color gamut on third party media. Only the higher ink load should be chosen on the Z9. The Z9 manual doesn't reveal which setting is which, AFAIK, and the naming conventions don't provide solid clues. For example, the generic "Fine Art Photo Pearl (more ink)" media setting invokes the higher ink load so "more ink" is a clue, yet rather bewilderingly, the more specific-sounding "Photo Baryte paper" setting whose name conjures up memories of the high Dmax darkroom papers of an earlier era uses the lesser ink load. Thus, if using a third party paper like Hahnemuhle Photo Rag Baryta, it would seem logical to choose the fine art "Photo Baryte paper" setting, but you'd be wrong! Go figure.
cheers,
Mark
