Epson Stylus Pro 9600 - size and general query.

[Mike Earussi]

That's good to know. I'll have to start saving my empty 9600 ink cartridges to refill with HD ink.

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

There is another format stupidity with the 7600/9600, A3/A2 are popular formats in Europe with one length of 420mm , just short of 17", but the printer only supports borderless printing for 16" or 20", but most of the papers are offered as 17" rolls. I'm attaching in some cases a strip of paper with about 3" x 10" with removable tape to the paper I'm going to print on - to widen it - to cheat the printer to believe it is running a 20" paper, set the driver to borderless printing and format the print with Qimage such that it just fits onto 17" - borderless. The printer checks the paper width after loading, but not anymore during printing, it checks the right edge and might report a scewed paper if it is not feeding correctly but is not checking the other edge in that case. This is a cheaty work around for the firmware problem with the dimensions, that should work as well for the 42"/44" problem, roll paper is typically sold as 42" material, add a 2"x10" stripe to widen up the width and format and print 42" borderless.
When it comes to 3rd party consumables there a several different modes possible,
- you may just use genuine inks/cartridges and papers by Epson, or Canon, or HP, use the supplied icm-profiles and don't bother to test /experiment with other materials, these materials are tuned to give the best performance in combination
- you may use 3rd party papers with genuine inks, major paper suppliers provide profiles for their papers,
- you may use 3rd party cartridges which claim to offer the same color rendering as the genuine inks, so no need to change your profiles or
- you experiment with 3rd party inks and refill your cartridges, you may use inks which are not specifically made for your printer, and with your 3rd party papers you need to get specifically made profiles.
I don't know which type of papers you typically use, when it comes to glossy materials it is getting difficult to find the best ink/paper combination, inks behave differently in regards to bronzing, gloss differential between colors, between more and less saturated areas and vs. the paper surface. you only can say that these effects got less prominent with the various Ultrachrome updates - to K3 and K3 HD. So most - I would assume almost all - 3rd party inks offered would run technically on a 7600, but the look at the end may not please you.

 

[Mike Earussi]

Borderless printing always creates over spray inside the printer. To absorb that over spray the printer has sponges placed inside at specific intervals along the printing track. That interval is what determines what width of paper the printer will allow borderless printing. If you fool the printer into thinking you are printing 44" paper when you're actually printing 42" then that over spray gets sprayed on the machine printing track instead of being absorbed by the strategically placed sponges. That over spray must then be cleaned up by you or it will gum up the inside of the machine. It will also stain the back of any 44" paper you later use.

As clever as your work-around is I would not care to have to clean up the inside of my printer every time I used it. YMMV

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

yes, you are right with the overspray in principle, I let the printer believe to run 20" paper borderless, but adjust the image width in Qimage (or other programs) to 17" +- so I can easily get to the actual paper edge with minimal overspray, it's not more than to compensate for a very slight paper skew which might happen, so the actual cleaning need is minimal - just a quick wipe. Different paper rolls come with slightly varying width - by a millimeter or so, I can compensate for that and make a note of that within the tube.

 

[guymark]

Well I have bought the printer and although it seems to need a clean if it hasn't been used for more than a day or so, it works well and I am happy with the purchase.

Just in case others are interested, EPSON do not do drivers for the 9600 for operating systems that came after XP - however some have found that Vista drivers work well but I downloaded from here http://download.epson-europe.com/pub/download/312/ and you need to select epson31239eu.zip - it is from a trusted site though so should not cause too much angst.

The fellow I purchased it from has a mixture of original Epson ink and some from "999 inks" which although seems to work I think I am going to switch to ALL of them running refillable cartridges and InkTecs Powerchrome ink which seems to have been reviewed VERY favourably on this site.

I was tempted to get the K3 inks which are even more durable HOWEVER they use the vivid ink set and I read an article that Epson spent some time trying to make it work on the 9600 but decided against it. Now that may just be to encourage people to buy a new machine - but it seems that the ink from InkTec is so closely matched to the oem, that most people do not feel the need for a new profile.

I suppose my only slight niggle with this printer (and it is slight bearing in mind it only cost £295) is that the Photo black set on non-glossy paper is a bit "dark grey" and (from what I gather), the matte black alternative doesn't dry properly on glossy media. I have at least found a way to switch between the two without wasting a vast amount of ink which if anyone is interested is here:- http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/swapping-the-black-ink-on-the-epson-7600-and-9600/

The only modification I would FURTHER add to this clever trick is that if you change the blacks over BEFORE you need to (and/or are printing non critical work / proofs / cheap temporary signage etc) then there will only be ONE print which will have a change of hue as the previous type of ink finally gets used up and the "new" ink starts coming through the pipes.

The official method wastes a huge amount of black ink AND apparently 20ml or so of EACH of the colour inks for (in my opinion) no genuine reason at all. The modified method above wastes only 20-25ml of black and my variation on it - where you change ahead of time, knowing you have several LARGE prints heavy with black before the inks switch over - should reduce wastage to - at most - around 5ml to reprint the last item poster / sign.

The best price I have found for ink if £45+vat per litre - though if I order 7 or 8 litres from them and the refillable cartridges, they will give me 5% off. Not much but it all helps. If anyone knows of a cheaper supplier of InkTec ink in the UK then I would be very interested please.

Going to have a go at making a motorised "take up spool" over the next few weeks. The idea is to just have a length of gutter downpipe over an aluminium tube and use a home brew sugru (equal mix of silicone sealant and cornflour) to mount the aluminium centrally in the gutter pipe. Not yet sure on the motor yet but the idea is to have a motor which has some sort of "slipping clutch" so that the paper isn't pulled too hard - and neither does the motor sit and overheat due to being stalled. Trying to find a way of doing this crudely but simply.

If it works (and it may very well not) I will post pics and assembly details if anyone wants one for themselves. The idea is to make something cheap, reliable and easily clamped or bolted onto the printer stand.

Of course if anyone has already done this, then a link would be very welcome. I tried a few searches but didn't find anything.

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

It's nice to hear that you got the printer up and running. I'm not sure that the Inktec Powerchrome K3 inks are particularly better in any sense than lots of other inks on the market in that pricing range, I found that the glossy black shows a pretty strong metallic sheen in reflecting light, more than other inks. If you go for the price you'll find quite some good offers on aliexpress from China. Pigment inks on glossy papers is a difficult matter, you have a bronzing effect of darker colors, you have a gloss difference between printed and unprinted areas and you may have gloss differences between different colors. A coating, a lacquer will remedy most of that.
I did some ink testing for a R800, I found that HD inks for the P800 inks by Vermont inks and precisioncolors are performing very well, I found some inks pretty bad, only usable on matte paper, and I'm currently using some inks from China, but you have performance differences as well with inks from there, just don't believe any promises and claims that the XYZ ink is the best on the earth.
Epson most likely did not introduce the K3 inks on this old printer model for marketing reasons, so that customers had a reason/were forced to upgrade their hardware if they wanted to use the newer inks.
Yes, I have my 7600 running on W10 with the Vista 64bit drivers, that works with no problems except that the driver disappeared after some patch updates, as well after installing the latest Creator's update recently, it's probably because the driver is not verified by MS. The driver reinstalls again with the next system start.
You can use a low torque motor or some friction e.g. via a belt for your pick up roller.

 

[guymark]

Thank you, I will have a look at Aliexpress again. I did have a look but possibly because I was too narrow in my search (epson pigment ink stylus 9600) I only found "wrong results" - eg: dye ink OR inks which were around the same price of £45 / $55.

I looked at the Lyson inks which seem to have good favour on this board but their prices were considerably higher - around £80 per litre IIRC.

I guessed that K3 might not have been introduced to the 9600 due - as you say - to marketing issues but I am wary of buying the ink in case I cannot get the vivid inks to profile properly. My first choice for ink would otherwise have been the Power Chrome K3 simply as (all other things and claims being equal), it is more durable and has a better gamut than the K2 range.

Your comment on Glossy material made me think somewhat about the Photo Black - v - Matte Black option with this printer. It has arrived with photo black installed and I was going to go with that for the refillable cartridge on the basis that occasionally I would like to be able to produce a glossy print - HOWEVER as I know that the spray lacquer I have is both exceptionally cheap and VERY effective, I am wondering if it might be best to use the much "blacker black" achieved with the matte black ink - and simply spray a couple of coats of lacquer over anything I want a "semi gloss" on.

I will play around today I think with some matte prints and see if I can get a suitable semi-gloss finish on them with the lacquer - I think for me, that would be the best solution as the photo black on matte papers is a little weak.

I dare not meddle with Windows 10 - I have heard too many stories of people losing data, having drivers uninstalled and even programs uninstalling. If need be, I will just keep an "offline" PC running Windows 7 for the indefinite future just for printing. Take USB stick to it, copy over print files and print.

As always, thank you for your thoughts!

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

look for something like 'Epson k3 ink' or 'Epson P800 ink' or 'Ultrachrome vivid ink' or similar at Aliexpress. You can contact suppliers to change the contents of sets - e.g. to replace a blue with another bottle of cyan or replace the light light gray with another yellow. I so far did not have problems - any - to create profiles with such inks in my printers e.g. with vivid inks on the 7600, I'm running i1Profiler or Profile Maker previously. And be cautious about claims that 3rd party inks are colorwise identical with manufacturer's inks. There was a discussion here on the forum about Epson profiles, Epson itself in the U.S. admitted at one time that their profiles were tuned and not the most accurate ones - there was an internet ink to that. Do profiles so that you are happy with them.

 

[guymark]

Ok, that has given me some serious thinking to do!

I have found a company that does profiles for £16 or enhanced ones for £25 which I am perfectly happy to pay, I was going to try to make a profile myself but as my scanner is not a supported one.

I did look at iprofiler but it was my impression that it was an "add on" module for some software that ran into thousands of pounds. I am not a professional printer - just an enthusiastic amateur so for me, paying £25 to send someone a printout for them to scan in and process seemed like a sensible compromise. I found another highly rated profiler but again - I would need to start off with a new scanner and $100 for the software it would seem.

I think if I just stump up the £16 or £25 for a professionally made one with matte paper (90% of my use I would guess), then with luck I should have ink that hangs around for a while and (by all accounts) an improved colour gamut from the K3 inks due to them being "vivid".

I just wasn't sure that the vivid colours of the K3 series would work but as you have the 7600 which is basically the same machine / ink / printhead as the 9600 then if K3 inks are working on that, I guess I should just take the plunge and get K3.

As a digression, one advantage of the HP Designjet is that it has a re-profiling system built into the printer - it just prints out a set of graduated colour bars - and then scans them back in under two different types of light - by alternately switching one of two (I guess) LEDs. While I appreciate it may not offer the precision and adjustability of a photoshop profile, for wide format novices like me, it is enough to "get you going" with a reasonable colour balance

I have just looked through Aliexpress and I found these inks - which at half a litre each should last me a while (and virtually no saving on carriage in "doubling up"). While I realise any purchase is MY risk and MY responsibility, I would value your thoughts as to whether this looks like a reasonable purchase. The others on there - after import fees and VAT are not going to be much cheaper (as far as I can see) than buying them in the UK. A tinyurl link is https://tinyurl.com/kw3cwaz

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

there are plenty ink companies in China , I'm not familiar with the company in your link. Overall I cannot report bad products or bad service via Aliexpress, lots of European ink resellers get their bulk from there as well. Some inks look better than others, as decribed above by some visual (and personal) criteria, the last ink I got and probably would buy again is by a company Aomya, look them up, and narrow down your search by 'K3' or 'vivid' or 'P800' or some other keywords.
Those companies typically have to 2 types of offers - small ink sets - less than 1 litre like 8x100ml or 6x125ml or similar, and postage of those is included in the price in lots of cases or is pretty low, that's shipments via the postal/parcel services, via an interim stop in the EU in lots of cases, that's offers suitable for your testing , small 7600/9600 cartridges take 110ml . And larger shipments like 8x500ml or 4x1l or else are shipped by a parcel service with a much higher shipping rate. I even in some cases ordered 2 sets of 8x100ml instead of 1 set with 8x250ml which made the total order much cheaper. But I got good service and products as well by companies like Marrutt, octoinkjet or precisioncolors, I'm testing this and that and checking around quite a lot.
'Vivid' was an update of the magenta ink by Epson, I'm not sure they changed as well the gamut of the other colors. Yes, it expands the gamut somewhat which is visible in the gamut display of a profile but I question that you see that in a print, probably only in direct comparison with other printouts and an image which actually contains those saturated colors in that color range.
I1Profiler is a product family , I'm using the I1Publish version, a package which I shot as a bargain at Ebay for 30% of the original price.
Other people report good experience with the X-Rite ColorMunki profiling package, more priced to the consumer level. And you may use another software package ArgyllCMS which is freeware, there is another pretty detailed thread running here about that package. It works together with the Spectro of the ColorMunki package. Some people are interested in doing profiles themselves, they test and change inks and papers more frequently, and others stick to their standard set of consumables and just get a few profiles made. Some ink and paper suppliers provide free profiles for their product range and popular printers. Software packages using a scanner are niche products, it would work basically with any scanner, but you need a reference color target. I cannot judge the quality of such profiles, I gave it up long time ago.