Epson 9600: is it hassle-free ?

[QT Luong]

Due to the lack of control of working in an open-loop with the Lighjet, I am considering getting my own 9600. I've looked at one for a while, however my experience with the smaller Epsons (not used for actual production of prints for sale) has been so frustrating, with endless banding, clogging problems, that I was until now reluctant to take on the supplementary task of operating and maintaining my printer. However, I got the feeling that the production-grade Epsons (4000,7600,9600) are totally different machines that perform much more reliably without needing
too much maintainance. Is it the case that they can be operated hassle-free ?

[Eric Leppanen]

I assume you have already read this....

www.outbackphoto.com/printinginsights/pi013/Epson9600.html (http://www.outbackphoto.com/printinginsights/pi013/Epson9600.html)

[Scott Fleming]

I'm in exactly the same place as you. Have you read Allain Briot's diary on Out Back Photo? I've read some of it and 'hassle free' is not a word I would use in describing the large Epson printers. As problematical as fighting with the lab can be ... fighting with printers still seems worse to me.

[Kosta]

A friend of mine recently picked up an HP 130C after attending PMA. He also had some large format scans done while he was there. So far, his favorite scanner was one by Creo (slightly out of my price range).

Anyway, he's still working on the learning curve, but has told me that the results of printing from the Creo scans are simply stellar.

He recently picked up an Epson 4990 scanner to perform comparisons. He sent me a tif file which contains a 1/8" square to compare the Creo to the Epson. Again he's working on the learning curve, but there was a huge difference in quality (that I hope to compensate for in photoshop to some degree - I simply cannot afford a $10K scanner like the Creo).

Anyway, have you considered an HP130C? I do not know how the price/features compare to the Epson 9600.

[Kirk Gittings]

In terms of production for my business.....Once I got past the very steep learning curve, my color management under control and some experience under my belt, my 4000 has become a great production machine with no hassles so far that were not created by my mistakes or ignorance. I use the Imageprint RIP which has its own learning curve also but great benefits. All in all it took me about 6 months of hard work and long hours to get up to speed, but now I am so thankful that I took this path. I am so much more productive and profitable than I was doing traditional color printing. There is no comparison. A friend of mine has a service bureau with two 9600's that he runs 24/7 printing art and they are very reliable. When I need bigger prints I take my files to him. My files plug right into his machines with very the appropriate soft proofing and very little tweaking. In all seriousness this is great technology for the price.

[Kosta]

Nevermind the previous, I see the 9600 prints 44" wide prints (the HP130C goes to 24" wide).

[Henry Ambrose]

I don't own any of the big Epsons but several friends have owned all the models mentioned and the main problem I see is from under use. I think they're better and more reliable when used everyday. Sitting for a couple of weeks is bad. Especially all the smaller Epson printers WILL give you trouble if you let them sit unused for too long.

[QT Luong]

It would have been difficult to miss Alain Briot's entry. It is the first google result for "Epson 9600". However, this is just one man's experience, and I wanted to hear from others as well.

[Paul Kierstead]

I don't use a 9600 (I use a 2200) but everything I have read says that it is the same w.r.t. to clogging: Use it or clog. Regular use of the 2200 and it never clogs. Let it sit for a while it reliably clogs *although* I have found keeping the humidity up (I think 42% is recommended or something) seems to help a lot, though you certainly can't keep the humidity that high in the winter around here. At the basic level, all the epsons put some relatively chunky ink (same forumulation) that is optimized for fast drying through very small holes. It will tend to cause trouble.

Colour management is a whole different issue of course, but this is there with any digital workflow.

[Keith S. Walklet]

QT,

When you say "open loop", is it because you don't have your own Lightjet? Few of us do! I know with Calypso (who prints my Lightjets) they use Bill Atkinson's profiles to close the color management loop so that what you see on your calibrated monitor is what you get.

Every technology has its pros and cons otherwise we'd all use exactly the same thing! ;-)

The 9600 comes close to perfection, but it has its own issues. Most are avoidable with proper care by the operator and maintaining an ideal operational environment.

Issues include:

"Bronzing" of the blacks due to the different reflectance values (which is not as noticable when under plex).
"Ditches in paper left under tension in the platen too long. (These appear as a subtle 3-inch or so crease which disappears if the image is dry mounted) and can be avoided by releasing the paper between prints.
"Paper flakes" with textured art paper that fall off after printing. (I brush my sheets before running them to loosen any flakes)
"Low abrasion resistance" of the printed surface (Ilfochrome isn't any better! but Lightjets gelatin surface seems slightly more durable). Careful handling avoids this issue.
Charlie Cramer's article in View Camera mentions the difference in blacks between the HP and Epson, but the HP is only a 24 inch paper path (so far!).
Banding has not been an issue since I started printing at 1440 dpi. It has virtually disappeared since I started doing all my Photoshop work in 16 bit, too. In fact, I can't remember the last image where I had to deal with banding.

That's it. My 9600 produces excellent prints with very accurate color (I downloaded Bill Atkinson's profiles) and thus far, it has proved very reliable. I have at least half a dozen friends that have them and run them VERY hard. I am thrilled to have my own printer and the ability to do test after test to fine tune an image to its best interpretation.

[Keith S. Walklet]

Oh yeah, one more thing. I travel a lot and my machine sits idle while I am gone. I can see why they probably work best when used consistently, but mine doesn't exhibit any erratic behavior when I fire it up after a long absence. I do keep it turned on all the time (very minimal power usage).

[Bruce Watson]

I use a 7600 - the 9600's a twin in all but carriage length and printer stand. All the essential parts are the same - head, motors, paper handling system, etc.

First off, I suggest that you disabuse yourself of the notion of anything mechanical being "hassle-free" because it's not going to happen. The big Epsons are reasonably close, however.

They will clog, there will be some issues with various media, but you should expect that. What you want, is race car performance - you want great Dmax, wide gamut, perfect ink lay down, no banding, etc. To get that performance, you have to tune the system. You'll have to climb some learning curves to learn how to use various substrates. You'll have to climb some learning curves to learn how to get the most out of your driver/RIP. You'll have to climb some learning curves in color management (getting a really good ICC profile, and how to work with it in your driver/RIP of choice). Finally, you'll have to climb some learning curves in the care and feeding of the printer also.

But really, it's just not that hard. If you are willing to work with it, and except the limitations, the big Epson printers are just a joy to use. And there's a huge amount to be said for being able to proof on the machine that does the final prints - no more surprises. A huge plus in my book.

You might try asking this question over at the Yahoo Epson Wide Format (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EpsonWideFormat) group. That's 4100 people with the big Epson printers. This group is a pretty good resource. The archives contain a blizzard of information; I just wish searching the archives were easier.

[QT Luong]

Keith, indeed, "open loop" refers to the fact that it is impractical for me to go to many proofing cycles because I do not have the printer at home. Color management doesn't work so well for me. Despite all the respect I have for Bill Atkinson, the Calypso lighjet has a number of issues, one of the most irritating being hue shifts, most noticeably in the blues turning magenta. I have also found difficult to evaluate the brighness of the print based on the monitor view (before someone starts blaming my monitor, note that it is a Sony Artisan, my third one to be precise).

[chris jordan]

I own a 9600, and have run more than a mile of paper through it. Althought I wouldn't rate it as totally hassle-free (is there anything that is hassle free?), it is a remarkably well designed and reliable piece of technology, and when things do go wrong, the fixes are easy and well thought through. I'll give you a list of things that typically go wrong:
--Runs out of paper during a print (my fault for not checking how much paper is left). Requires a reboot and reprint.
--A mark on the paper when it is left in the printer overnight; simple fix: Release the paper lever between prints;
--Jet clogs (resulting in banding; can occur in the middle of a print, but rarely): are infrequent and are solved by doing a simple head cleaning, which is a mouse click in the Epson tools software. Having a tabletop fountain next to the printer (purchased at bedbath&beyond.com) solves the clogging almost completely-- it increases the humidity just enough to eliminate clogs.
--Printer runs out of ink in the middle of a print: If you catch it fast enough (within a few minutes) you can change the ink and there is no noticable problem with the print.
--Various crashes caused by wrong paper setting, wrong paper size, loading the paper the wrong way, etc.: Requires a reboot and usually that print gets wasted.
--Bronzing in highlights: Solved by varous methods, the best of which is to face-mount the prints on plexiglass. The various sprays (Lyson, etc.) also solve bronzing completely.

Whatever the complaints are by other 9600 owners, I think it's the best color printing device currently available at any price, and it's kind of amazing to consider that it costs less than 1/100th the price of a LightJet. It also gives you the luxury of doing your own proofing, inexpensively and instantaneously.

And, by the way, I print exclusively on Epson Premium Semimatte Paper with Bill Atkinson's profiles (available for free on Epson's website), using the original Epson drivers. I have never used a RIP, and for my purposes do not need one. For B&W, however, a RIP is mandatory.

~cj

www.chrisjordan.com

[Andre Noble]

Epson's can be unclogged easily if you take the time. I use a technique involving the tubing and spray gun trigger apparatus of a windex cleaning bottle, and hot water, windex.

But given a choice, I'd rather have a lightjet print.

[Paddy Quinn]

"I have never used a RIP, and for my purposes do not need one. For B&W, however, a RIP is mandatory. "

If it works as well on the 9600 as it does on he 2200/4000 all you need is the "free" (or at least cheap) Quadtone RIP - it's a little limited, but I have found it does a much better job with B&W prints than the Imageprint RIP when I have compared images printed with both on the above wo printers (both in terms of tone/neutrality and also in terms of dots/smoothness).

(one difference is that the Imageprint RIP uses some LtM in making the warm tone prints which has a tendancy to show under certain lighting conditions. The Quadtone RIP has certain profiles which only use K and Lk and relies on their "natural" warmth to make the warmer toned prints - thus avoiding the Magenta "undertone")

There is also a newer - somewhat cheaper - B&W only "RIP" (whose name I have forgotten ofhand) . I haven't had a chance to test it, but a colleague showed me some test prints which looked very good.

[Scott Fleming]

Why do most people think they have to do this alone?

If it's important enough isn't it worth hiring a consultant?

Do we expect to fix our own cars ... replace our AC in the house ... build our own swimming pools ... educate our children .... diagnose and cure complex health problems .... defend ourselves in a lawsuit?

If I ever decide to do my own printing I'm going to hire someone to teach me how to do it.

[Keith S. Walklet]

>>Keith, indeed, "open loop" refers to the fact that it is impractical for me to go to many proofing cycles because I do not have the printer at home.

I completely sympathize. It was an even easier decision for me to make based on that rationale, since there are no Lightjets down the street from my home in Idaho. I remember when I got my first Epson Stylus 700 EX which I used to make proofs before printing a Lightjet. Again, Bill was kind enough to generate a custom profile for my printer (this was before he could write a single profile that covered every machine made). The print quality was phenomenal and I wished they could just figure out a way to do the same thing with a wide format printer. It took a few years, but the 9600 is the printer I wished for. It is SOOOOO nice to tweak an image and run a full size proof.

>>Color management doesn't work so well for me. Despite all the respect I have for Bill Atkinson, the Calypso lighjet has a number of issues, one of the most irritating being hue shifts, most noticeably in the blues turning magenta.

Hmmm... Are you sure you're not double profiling? The only time I experienced any shifts of that nature were due to my operator error. I also understand that Bill refined the profile the latest profile (3-8-05) is much more accurate, though I haven't personally tested the results.

>>I have also found difficult to evaluate the brighness of the print based on the monitor view (before someone starts blaming my monitor, note that it is a Sony Artisan, my third one to be precise).

Sounds like you will be much happier to have your own, whatever it is. The Epson 4000 solved many of the issues identified in the 7600/9600 series, so one has to wonder when the next generation of those printers will appear. I have no idea where Epson is in the product development cycle, but the introduction of the HP technology can only help speed things up a bit. Regardless, I'm am VERY happy with my printer and do a little dance every time I send a file for output. It is mind boggling to think how quickly such high quality was achieved.

[Don Boyd]

QT,
Not to repeat what so many others have said, but my 7600 has been phenomenal. I use a small room air conditioner to keep the Tucson summer heat from drying out the heads which has been my only problem beyond operator error. It does have some idiosynchracies that when learned are avoidable (i.e. never leave the locking arm down on paper when not in use unless you want an indentation across the paper).

If you find yourself in the Tucson area you would be welcome to bring some files and come and play with mine.

[Michael Gordon]

Mr. Jordan said it perfectly: is anything hassle free?

I own both the Epson 7600 (2.25 years) and HP Designjet 130 (about three months), and neither is or has been hassle free and both have requisite learning curves. I haven't owned the DJ130 long enough for this statement to be totally viable, but I believe it may be more hassle-free in the long run than the Epson. The long term issue with the Epson is more frequent head clogs and the need for more frequent head alignments . Moreover, my long-term frustration over the Epson UC/media issues of bronzing, gloss differential, and outgassing were enough to make me run, not walk, to an alternative. I returned to Fuji CA matte prints via the LJ, and now am making prints on the DJ130 that rival or exceed Fuji CA matte prints (albeit with the associated poor water resistance of swellable papers).

Labs have their issues with Chromira's and Lightjet's (they aren't hassle free either); the hassles simply go with the territory in owning and maintaining a wide format printer.

[Paul Butzi]

I've had my 9600 for just over a year now.

When I first got it, I had one problem where the printer would hang intermittently. Epson sent out a rep to my site, the rep replaced some electronics, and since then the thing has chugged along merrily, without even the slightest hiccup. Note that the rep on site visit was under warranty and cost me nothing.

I print primarily on Epson Premium Luster. Despite the claims that you just can't print B&W without using a rip, that's exactly what I do for most of my printing. I looked carefully at the output generated using the colorbyte imageprint rip for black and white and thought that a) the rip looked like a pain in the butt to use, b) the output was no better than what I am getting doing toning using curves, c) my current monochrome workflow allows me considerably more flexibility in toning than the rip does, and d) the rip is priced outrageously (half the cost of my printer!).

I've never had head clog problems. In fact, I think in the space of a year, I've printed nozzle checks perhaps 3 times and found a clogged nozzle; said clog being cleared by running a cleaning cycle.

Good profiling is a must. Atkinson's free profiles for the 7600/9600 and Epson media are excellent. The Atkinson profile for Epson Premium luster produces a dead neutral grey scale on my 9600.

Nothing is hassle-free. Lightjet output is not hassle free. An Epson 9600 is not hassle free - others have noted the issues: bronzing/differential gloss, outgassing from glossy/semigloss/luster media, and metamerism. Those issues are vastly reduced by switching to a matte paper - something I'm in the middle of doing.

On the obvious color issues - color gamut, etc. I simply can't comment cogently.

One simple way for you to see how you feel about the output is to simply get someone to accept a file from you, crank out a print, and send the print to you.

I understand your issues with the smaller consumer level epson printers, but I do feel that the 9600 is fundamentally a different beast, and that you won't see the same problems you saw with the consumer level printers.

[Michael Gordon]

Paul said: On the obvious color issues - color gamut, etc. I simply can't comment cogently.

As for gamut, the Epson is incredibly wide, a bit more so than the Lightjet, and slightly more so than the Designjet 130.

[Keith S. Walklet]

As for head clogging, I only had the problem crop up once in the 2 plus years I've been running my 9600 and I traced it to another bad habit of mine.

I would release the platen tension lever to prevent creases in the paper, but I'd leave the paper engaged in the print roller path. There is a fan that switches on when you engage the paper that shuts off when you lock down the platen. By leaving the paper engaged but not under tension, the fan would run continously. This caused the heads to dry out and I had to run a few cleaning cycles to get them back in order. Since then, I always pull the paper out of the rollers when I disengage the platen so the fan doesn't come on.

I've been surprised that in spite of my VERY dry environment that there haven't been more difficulties of this type and wonder if my leaving the printer on all the time helped prevent problems.

[Michael Gordon]

Keith: I do everything the same as you and live in a climate (coastal So. Calif.) that must be regularly more humid than yours , yet after 2.25 years of use, my 7600 has more frequent clogs and requires more frequent power cleanings to clear AND now requires more frequent head alignments for banding-free prints (I *always* do a nozzle check and alignment before doing any consequential printing). One thing: I've run a fair amount of Photorag through the printer, and I'm aware that I might possibly have an accumulation of cotton fiber in and around the head assembly which might be causing the clogs.

[Richard Fenner]

Chris

Could you clarify something for me. In this thread, you said "Bronzing in highlights: Solved by varous methods, the best of which is to face-mount the prints on plexiglass". However, last year you said "...you intend to face-mount your prints on Plexi (which cannot be done with inkjet prints)" and earlier this year you said "If you like face-mounting prints on plexi, then the Chromira is the way to go-- you can't do that with the Epson prints". Have you recently discovered something?

Also, could you (or anyone!) describe simply what face-mounting is (to someone who has never mounted a print) - so I know what I'm visualising when people refer to it.

Thanks.

[Keith S. Walklet]

Michael,

I would suspect that the rag paper would contribute to problems. I run Premium Luster 99 percent of the time.

I personally miss the moisture, but am pleased that the 9600 is happy with its high desert environment. You can literally watch stuff wither before your eyes here. A bottle of honey becomes a brick of honey in no time at all. Snow is like styrofoam beads.

And QT, I was reminded of earlier problems with Lightjet prints where certain blues going magenta. I called it the LAB bug since it was a problem with the rendering of certain light blue values in the LAB colorspace. It seemed to be a LINOCOLOR issue exacerbated by the 2nd profile Bill wrote for the Lightjet. It proved troublesome when I first got into this. But since I've been scanning into RGB colorspace and Bill redid the profiles, I've not run across the problem since. For some files, there was no way to eliminate the problem without rescanning. My early bouts with accidental double profiles also went away when Photoshop made it possible to see which color space the file was in. All that seems so long ago...

[julian_4860]

One thing you might try is getting stuff printed on a chromira. The profile is near as dammit adobe RGB, no need to send a file tagged with a different profile. I'm getting pretty good matches to my inkjet prints. Gamut is bigger than a lightjet, there is an apparent increase in sharpness too

[Jim Becia]

QT,

I have had the Epson 9600 for about two years now and mine is virtually hassle free. An occasional head cleaning, but other wise, just fine. I'm no expert on printing, yet, I find my results as good as any photos I've had printed with Laserlight or Photocraft. I purchased the 9600 to control costs and inventory, and it does it extremely well. I print mainly on Epson Luster. And, yes, there is a slight bronzing problem on a rare print, but other than that, I think it's a great printer. I'm currently preparing for my upcoming art fair season and I've been getting my inventory ready for the last month or so without so much as a hiccup. No complaints on the 9600 from me. Jim