[Leica] the future happened yesterday

[dorysrus at mindspring.com (Don Dory)]

Daniel,
You are asking about the HP 7960 and the Epson R800. Both these printers
have a maximum width of 81/2 inches, the Epson will go 44 inches and I
believe the HP will go to 11. The HP retails in the US for $229, prints
color in the standard HP good way, and does a really good imitation RC
B&W print down to the feeling that the image is in the paper.  One catch
with the HP is that you only get that result with all HP materials.
Heavy matte papers at this time are not available from HP.

The Epson R800 retails for $399, much less if shopped, and has a wider
color gamut than any other ink jet out today. In fairness, the HP has a
somewhat larger Dmax number.  The R800 will print on pretty much
anything including cardboard as you can feed material through in a
straight path with no bends.

Print cost will of course vary with substrate and image. I printed 50
something 8X10's on my R800 before I had to replace my black cartridge.
The content was portraits with about 50% totally black background.
Epson cartridge costs are in the $13 range.  For the HP you will need
the photo black cartridge and its price is in the $30 range.  Email B.D.
for his experience on prints per cartridge but he is on record as saying
costs were high.

I just finished an experiment with Arches archival matte paper and some
Somerset watercolor paper.  The R800 sent out some truly lovely B&W
images with no curve changes.  For these images I did convert from RGB
to B&W in PS.  From the ink usage I suspect that the printer switched to
only B&W ink.

Summarizing your question, if you really like or need high quality RC
style B&W prints then the HP will be your best choice although in a high
volume environment probably more expensive than the Epson due to ink
pricing.  On the other hand, if you like the look and feel of fibre
prints and that is part of your work, then the Epson would be your only
choice in this comparison.  Print life in excess of 70 years would be
typical for both machines if you use OEM ink and paper.

I hope this helps.

Don
dorysrus@mindspring.com

-----Original Message-----
From: lug-bounces+dorysrus=mindspring.com@leica-users.org
[mailto:lug-bounces+dorysrus=mindspring.com@leica-users.org] On Behalf
Of Daniel Ridings
Sent: Thursday, September 02, 2004 2:54 AM
To: Leica Users Group
Subject: RE: [Leica] the future happened yesterday

> The truth is that we now on the downhill side of the mountain dividing
> Filmland from Digiland...Filmland is behind us, even if there are many
> folks who have chosen to stay behind rather than explore the frontier.
> ;-)

Well, some of us are just low-key about it. I don't mind the digital
discussions, but on the Leica list, I keep to Leicas and we all know
where
they are in digital at the present. Not much to deal with there (and I
wouldn't go Leica for digital anyway).

:)

Daniel (Frontier Boone)

PS: As long as I'm off topic ... The Epson R800 or the HP XXXX (four or
five numbers). What's the best way to go for printing budget b/w? (I
regard those two as budget range so if there's something else in that
price bracket, I'd like to know).


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