bmeddings
Newbie
Posts: 6
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« on: June 14, 2009, 06:26:03 PM » |
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One member of my family is thinking seriously about getting a 24" wide printer.
Can anyone offer comments about the relative pro's and con's of the CANON iPF6100, EPSON 7900 and the HP Z3200 ?
Are there discernible differences in the B & W output ?
Thanks for any advice.
Basil
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Pmerutka
Newbie
Posts: 1
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« Reply #1 on: July 01, 2009, 02:31:10 PM » |
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I've been to separate presentations put on by the three manufacturers to demonstrate their capabilities. I truely believe that at that level of printer, it is more of a matter of personal preference than capabilities. All three manufactures printers will produce beautiful output.
It's similar to asking which DSLR takes better pictures Nikon, Canon, Fuji, or Sony. It depends just as much on the user and his/her ability to utilize the features and capabilities.
Also remember that it's not just the printer, but also the paper that will effect the final output.
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Terry-M
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« Reply #2 on: July 01, 2009, 06:39:44 PM » |
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I know little about large format printers but from what I have read on the Q Yahoo group and here, is that HP users seem to have to go through loops to overcome HP's driver oddities, or are they bugs.  There seems to have been few problems with the other 2 manufacturers. Terry. |
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Ernst Dinkla
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« Reply #3 on: July 02, 2009, 07:46:40 AM » |
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I know little about large format printers but from what I have read on the Q Yahoo group and here, is that HP users seem to have to go through loops to overcome HP's driver oddities, or are they bugs. There seems to have been few problems with the other 2 manufacturers. Terry. The HP drivers have some oddities (mainly in cooperation with Qimage though) but after some driver and firmware upgrades I do not see them as a reason to avoid the HP models. The advantages of the HP Z models are: an absolute lower ink waste if compared to the Epson models and to a lesser degree to the Canon models. Best fade resistance of all pigment inks. Best B&W print result. Integrated spectrometer for calibration and profiling included in the price and on the Z3200 with improved profile creation software . Cheap and easily replaceable heads that still last a long time. Mine over two years now without replacement. Together with the Canon no clog issues like the Epsons have. In general little maintenance is needed. Latest Z3200 firmware includes a bar code printed on the roll used that indicates what is left on the roll (Canon alike) and more accounting features. To get an overall view of wide format printer issues you better check the following forum and the list I moderate: http://luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?s=9bec964dd5de1b7ed90ed44cadc0b497&showforum=6met vriendelijke groeten, Ernst Dinkla Try: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Wide_Inkjet_Printers/ |
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Fred A
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« Reply #4 on: July 02, 2009, 09:46:21 AM » |
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Ernst,
I think what Terry is pointing out are issues that HP as yet hasn't resolved.
One, no banner mode to allow the user to make panos and extra large prints that exceed the driver limitations.
Two, and even more important, the propensity of the Z series to rescale prints and reposition prints on the paper *after* Qimage has sent the correct printing information.
There was another issue, whose details escape me at the moment, but it had to do with Qimage remembering the driver settings when exiting or when saving a printer setup.
I think the driver allowed some settings to be saved and sone were altered by the HP software which messed up the saving of the settings.
To the best of my recollection, Qimage conforms to certain accepted standards, be they Windows or drivers or email etc.
When the manufacturer of an item decides to run his product outside of the standards, there will be compromise, but certainly no blame on Qimage.
Best to you.
Fred
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Ernst Dinkla
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« Reply #5 on: July 02, 2009, 11:57:22 AM » |
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Ernst,
I think what Terry is pointing out are issues that HP as yet hasn't resolved.
One, no banner mode to allow the user to make panos and extra large prints that exceed the driver limitations.
Two, and even more important, the propensity of the Z series to rescale prints and reposition prints on the paper *after* Qimage has sent the correct printing information.
There was another issue, whose details escape me at the moment, but it had to do with Qimage remembering the driver settings when exiting or when saving a printer setup.
I think the driver allowed some settings to be saved and sone were altered by the HP software which messed up the saving of the settings.
To the best of my recollection, Qimage conforms to certain accepted standards, be they Windows or drivers or email etc.
When the manufacturer of an item decides to run his product outside of the standards, there will be compromise, but certainly no blame on Qimage.
Best to you.
Fred
Fred, The Banner mode was an issue with the plain Z3100 model as it limited the total length to be printed to 2.75-3.25 meter depending on the firmware/driver versions. The optional HPGL driver allows far longer lengths for that model. It wasn't and still isn't clear to me what lengths the Z3100-PS model could print. The Z3200-PS model that I have now has no length limitations with the PCL3 driver. I was the first to mention this length issue here and on other forums. But it is no issue anymore for someone buying a new Z3200. Not with Qimage and not with another application that doesn't know the Poster/Tiles/Banner detour to print longer lengths than the driver allows. I have not encountered that second issue. There was an issue with the driver going back to its default size setting that can be annoying but I have written down more than once how that can be avoided. Same for the shorter length than roll width issue. In both cases Qimage adapts to what the driver gives in information and one becomes aware of that flaw at that stage. As written I have not seen a print that was wasted because the driver does it in the end differently to the data it gave Qimage. Few of the printer driver settings are reloaded again if one recalls a job in Qimage. That is correct. There are ways to counter that, the Z models have a job log and one can repeat the job there too. The HP printing shortcuts can recall what the Qimage recall can't do on the HP driver. But I find this the major issue left with the Z models + Qimage because it takes away one of the best Qimage features. At the time the issues were discovered (often by me) I asked Mike what was going on. Not having a clue who could be blamed. Mike's explanation that HP didn't go by the Windows rules was good enough for me. I have no knowledge at that level so I'm not going to point fingers. met vriendelijke groeten, Ernst Dinkla Try: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Wide_Inkjet_Printers/ |
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admin
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« Reply #6 on: July 02, 2009, 02:09:40 PM » |
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Both the B9180 and Z3100 drivers have been updated recently and the new drivers are not compatible with old jobs and old saved setups from a year ago (or even a few months ago). So if you load an old job, Qimage tries to restore the old driver settings into the new driver and some take, some won't. For printer setups, the solution is easy: just use "Help", "Reset Printer Settings", restart Qimage and set the driver up manually (without loading any prior saved setups) and then save over your old setup file(s) with the new settings. For jobs, it's a bit more difficult because when you load the job, the printer settings are loaded automatically and if it's an old job, the printer driver setup may not be compatible with the current driver you are using and that may foul up the driver. Not really much you can do about that since HP made the new driver incompatible with the old. Of course Qimage is the only program that will make this problem surface because no other printing software allows you to recall saved driver settings. Can't have the problem if you don't have the feature.  Mike |
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Ernst Dinkla
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« Reply #7 on: July 02, 2009, 09:04:54 PM » |
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Both the B9180 and Z3100 drivers have been updated recently and the new drivers are not compatible with old jobs and old saved setups from a year ago (or even a few months ago). So if you load an old job, Qimage tries to restore the old driver settings into the new driver and some take, some won't. For printer setups, the solution is easy: just use "Help", "Reset Printer Settings", restart Qimage and set the driver up manually (without loading any prior saved setups) and then save over your old setup file(s) with the new settings. For jobs, it's a bit more difficult because when you load the job, the printer settings are loaded automatically and if it's an old job, the printer driver setup may not be compatible with the current driver you are using and that may foul up the driver. Not really much you can do about that since HP made the new driver incompatible with the old. Of course Qimage is the only program that will make this problem surface because no other printing software allows you to recall saved driver settings. Can't have the problem if you don't have the feature. Mike Mike, The Z3100 printer driver custom size settings never were restored with a Qimage recall. Not within firmware/driver version periods, not in periods overlapping more versions. That has been my experience. With the Epson drivers Qimage picks up the actual sizes, with the HP you have to give the custom size a name and save that and Qimage will restore it based on the name but that name may carry other sizes meanwhile. If you print a lot of different custom sizes this method of saving them with a specific name isn't working well and there were problems with the quantity of custom sizes possible + driver upgrades didn't install with more custom sizes saved. Why Qimage looks for the naming instead of the actual sizes in the HP driver is something I do not understand. Restoring the HP driver settings with a Qimage recall is a risky business anyway so I check the log file, restore Qimage's settings and then check the printer driver settings to see what is correct and what not. met vriendelijke groeten, Ernst Dinkla Try: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Wide_Inkjet_Printers/ |
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admin
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« Reply #8 on: July 03, 2009, 02:51:39 PM » |
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Mike,
The Z3100 printer driver custom size settings never were restored with a Qimage recall. Not within firmware/driver version periods, not in periods overlapping more versions. That has been my experience. With the Epson drivers Qimage picks up the actual sizes, with the HP you have to give the custom size a name and save that and Qimage will restore it based on the name but that name may carry other sizes meanwhile. If you print a lot of different custom sizes this method of saving them with a specific name isn't working well and there were problems with the quantity of custom sizes possible + driver upgrades didn't install with more custom sizes saved. Why Qimage looks for the naming instead of the actual sizes in the HP driver is something I do not understand. Restoring the HP driver settings with a Qimage recall is a risky business anyway so I check the log file, restore Qimage's settings and then check the printer driver settings to see what is correct and what not.
How do you know you aren't restoring old settings? Every time you load Qimage, it restores the settings that were in effect the last time you ran Qimage. So when you update the driver, if the new driver isn't compatible, old settings are loaded and you are stuck in a loop until you tell Qimage to reset printer settings. If you reset printer settings, the next time it loads, it simply uses the NEW driver settings instead of loading the old. Problem is, once old settings are loaded into the new/incompatible driver, the new driver will start fouling up and it will not run properly until reset. Bottom line: if you've updated your driver and the new driver's settings image isn't compatible with the old, and you haven't used "Help", "Reset printer settings", you are loading old settings every time you start Qimage whether you use recall or not. Qimage doesn't care about the name, size, or anything else. That's all up to the driver. Qimage simply requests a full dump of driver capabilities and settings. When Qimage asks the driver to supply an image of its settings, Qimage takes that image and saves it. When restored, that image is simply fed back to the driver. If the driver gives Qimage garbage or doesn't reload the image properly, then it's garbage you'll get when you restore. Anything you see that doesn't restore properly is a driver bug, plain and simple! Honestly, the Z3100 and B9180 drivers are buggy drivers. They are the only two printers that ever have an issue reloading their own saved settings and it's a known problem with those drivers and the Z3100 has always had a bug involving not being able to restore certain sizes if you've saved more than a few inside the driver. Ensuring you don't load old/incompatible settings will help, but cannot correct bugs that are within the driver. If you follow the instructions to ensure you aren't loading old settings, that's about all you can do. Beyond that, if you notice a problem with certain sizes/names not restoring properly, there are only two possibilities: (1) the driver didn't save that data in its settings image or (2) the driver didn't restore what you saved properly. The real moral of the story here is that saving/restoring printer settings is equivalent to asking the driver to supply an image (binary file) of its settings. Qimage cannot even read/decipher most of what is in that file nor does it care what is in that file. It's proprietary: only the driver (that version of the driver) can understand it. When you recall those settings, that binary image is simply fed back into the driver. The good thing about that is that no matter what fancy new features a driver may offer, Qimage can load/restore them. BUT it's up to the driver to implement it properly in that binary image so that it is exported/imported properly. If it isn't working properly, it means the code that the driver uses to export or import that binary settings image isn't working properly. Mike |
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Ernst Dinkla
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« Reply #9 on: July 03, 2009, 04:21:40 PM » |
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Mike, I think we are not talking about the same issue. It isn't about launching Qimage and the driver not showing the last printer driver settings that were available when Qimage was closed. That works for me all the time except maybe when a new driver version has been installed (March in the Z3100 case) or when Qimage wasn't properly closed or what I describe later on. If that happens I start Qimage at its defaults. Nor am I suggesting that the issue I describe is a Qimage flaw but not knowing how Qimage collects the data of the driver settings I tried to explain what I experience. The experience I describe is that with a recall from the log file the printer driver print page sizes are not restored with whatever version used. With one exception: if the custom size is saved with a name that still exists when I do the log recall and when that name still represents the right sizes. As you describe that Qimage just calls the stored image of the settings then the flaw must be that HP driver stores the custom sizes by name and not by the actual size description. Not a smart solution given the other issues: limited number of custom size names possible and updating the driver has to be done with the custom sizes removed. Reason why I use one custom size name per Z printer that I save again and again with different sizes. Nice for the next Qimage session and easy on the HP driver issues sketched but not right for log job recalls. When Qimage restores the last session's driver settings when it is started again it will look for the last log job I presume and when that job used a custom size it will restore that too as the HP driver requests the user to save a custom size with a name and that will still be available with the right size description when Qimage is started again. I hardly ever use another application to print from so there's little chance that that name gets another size description in between Qimage sessions. Epson drivers allow you to use a temporary custom size setting and doesn't ask to save it with a name. A Qimage job log recall brings the right size back despite the "temporary" character of the size setting. So I think the Epson driver saves the size as well but on their actual size description. It worked all the time with the 9000's and the 10000 I had. I'm used to the HP driver oddities, there are some tricks and I have no surprises anymore. Qimage's log recall isn't 100% available as a result of the HP driver settings description and that is a pity. met vriendelijke groeten, Ernst Dinkla Try: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Wide_Inkjet_Printers/ |
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Sunnyk
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« Reply #10 on: July 08, 2009, 11:00:16 PM » |
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Mike thanks for the new forum.
I have a z3100 and for the most part i can work around the weirdness and compatibility issues. I saw here where Ernst has told of a updated driver and firmware, and I am very reticent to load them. The last firmware upgrade fried the hard drive and the printer and now that my warranty is gone and I didn't have the funds to extend it I just don't know that it will benefit me enough to warrant the chance of a major issue as before. I have just come from a month long trip and the printer performed flawlessly. so unless someone can convince me it is worth the gamble here I stand.
As a side note I don't know what I would do without a product like Qimage.
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Keith
Newbie
Posts: 17
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« Reply #11 on: July 29, 2009, 01:51:46 AM » |
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Hi Guys, and thank you Mike for the great work you have been doing on Qimage. I'm a quite a serious amateur and luckily can justify much of my photograph expenses with my work. I take pictures of renovation work I do, and print them out for portfolios that go a long way to help selling jobs and making decisions with clients. I also do architectural work and print now large format with a new HPZ3200 - 44". I mainly want to say that so far the printer has surprised me with how well it has fired up and printed out great quality using Windows Vista, Photoshop CS3 and anything I've done with Qimage. The first thing I did was load up the new firmware, a very smooth process and all has been stable with no issues on basic work. One other comment I would add to the above notes are that the accounting aspect of this printer's software is first rate. It calculates to the penny what each print costs based on ink used and paper type. This software will easily open up the data in Excel or even email the info to you from time to time if you want. A very professional piece of equipment and not to hard to get up and running. Regards, Keith
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