PIXMA iP5000 printed my first Direct-to-DVD

[Kenyada]

WOW! It was worth everything that got me to this point.
Many thanks to everyone involved for the instructions, the
CD-R tray, the registry tips. It's been quite a journey, but it's
also been a unique learning experience, not to mention the
feeling of empowerment from going up against the big guys
(Canon. Philips, Big Business in general) and WINNING

 

[drc023]

Can you post a picture of the cd? Could you also give us tips on anything to watch out for when making the tray? I'm looking forward to making one of these.

 

[zakezuke]

Can you post a picture of the cd? Could you also give us tips on anything to watch out for when making the tray? I'm looking forward to making one of these.

I would reccomend if you can't get a hold of a Canon tray get a hold of an Epson one.... unless parts now is actually stocking the Canon trays. One can E-bay an epson tray for under $15 and one needs to only cut the nose and the sides by 2mm and add three white bits to the front. Having a center lug is very nice and worth a small fee, though in all fairness the lug holder on the epson tray does fail after about 500 uses... but is still a slight improvement over printing on a cardboard tray.

On the otherhand, I can see where one wouldn't want to spend any money on a retangular piece of plastic.

The offical dimentions are
Width=131mm
Length=239mm

-Outside thickness-.100 in. = 2.54 mm
-Inside thickness-.045 in. = 1.143mm

 

[Kenyada]

Can you post a picture of the cd? Could you also give us tips on anything to watch out for when making the tray? I'm looking forward to making one of these.

I think it was Clint Eastwood (in a Dirty Harry movie) who once stated, "A man's gotta know his limitations." With that in mind, I did not even attempt to fabricate a tray. I bought one from a seller on EBay. I'm an engineer, and I know enough about tolerances, exact measurements, and the nature of cutting stuff to fit things that have already been engineered. The tray was $20. I put a value on my time that dwarfs $20 an hour. Besides, though the tray is only a retangular piece of plastic, it is a well-engineered piece of plastic. And nothing short of a direct open flame will render it useless. My recommendation is to purchase the CD tray. But be sure to follow the preliminary instructions carfefully. The tray will outlive your printer and it's worth much. much more than $20.

I'll post a photo as soon as I famailiarize myself with the photo posting FAQ. I marvel at folks like Grandad35 who can post a photo instruction sequence so effortlessly. So stay tuned, I'm workin' on it

 

[Kenyada]

Can you post a picture of the cd? Could you also give us tips on anything to watch out for when making the tray? I'm looking forward to making one of these.

I ordered my CD-R Tray and 100 blank DVDs at the same time, but I received the Tray first. So there I was, with my iP5000 ready with Tray and DVD printing software... but no blank DVDs. It was Saturday morning. The DVDs would not arrive until Monday. After a moment of pondering my fate, I found myself in my car, headed for BestBuy. I found a 25-disc pack of printable (all white) DVDs, and though it didn't really meet my requirements, I bought it for $30 (plus tax)

I could hardly wait to get home to print my first disc. I picked out my "Wolf" DVD, copied the graphic from Amazon, and imported it into my software, Acoustica CD Label Maker. I set the blank DVD into the tray, where it was held in place at the hub.

Acoustica's drop-down menu includes iP5000. I hit the print button and the disc tray slides into the printer until it is no longer visible. [It's the first time I'm seeing the tray disappear and, quite the skeptic, I'm hoping it will work]

I heard the printer doing its thing, and soon the tray begins to slowly emerge from the printer, much like a photo.

I removed the tray from the printer with the DVD still attached

I wanted to show you a comparison to the original DVD released by Columbia Pictures. It is a shiny disc with no graphic and only "widescreen" printed on the hub. The other side of the disc is "Full Screen" (remember those?)

OK, Now for Lessons Learned...

All printable (white top) DVDs are not alike. In haste - and finding no other type at the store - I purchased the type that has a clear acrylic hub. The problem is that the printer was programed to print right up to the HOLE. The portion of ink that printed on the clear acrylic hub had to be wiped off in order to avoid smearing.

The discs that I ordered online from Meritline.com clearly stated:
100 Pack Ritek RiData G05 8X DVD-R 102-287-100 1
White Inkjet Hub Printable Blank Media for General Use DVDR Disc
(DRD-47-8X-RDIW50N2), $0.36 Each

And note the price. I paid $35.99 for 100 discs. [Remember, in the store I paid $30 for 25 discs]

If I had it to do over, I would have imported the graphic into Photoshop and used the cloning device to erase the actors' names from the top, since the shape of the disc did not permit me to include their full names. But I'm happy with my first effort. It was my first direct-to-dvd print experience, but already I'm thinking about photo albums that I produce with ProShow Gold. The photo and text labels will be so much better.

 

[Nifty]

Richard, Great post! Thanks for all the detail and images. I hope the image posting worked easily for you. FYI, I edited your last image link to work (the name had spaces in it).

 

[Kenyada]

Richard, Great post! Thanks for all the detail and images. I hope the image posting worked easily for you. FYI, I edited your last image link to work (the name had spaces in it).

Thanks, Rob. Yeah, the image posting went well until that last one

 

[JKing]

After seeing this post I started searching for the instructions.
I can confirm that the instructions for a cardboard DVD tray does work on the PIXMA IP6000D.
I don't have any printable DVD's (And my Photo Cyan print head is half clogged) but I was able to print on a plain white CD. It looked good but wiped off.
Thanks for bringing to my attention that this is possible.

J