Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2007/07/05
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]I've mentioned before on the list that I've had troubles with my Epson 1280 with MIS Ultratone 2 carts. I've now had several instances where I changed cartridges, and either the greytone distribution or the "tint" of the prints changed. A while back, my Roarke curves workflow, which had worked for 2 years, just stopped working. Gray tones were skewed or missing. Both with the Epson driver and with QTR, which eliminates driver problems. Well, it just happened again. This time I changed to a new grayscale cart, and my "neutral" workflow (EZ Slider method) turned distinctly bluish. Changing the sliders to the "warm" settings does little to change this. And there are no clogs. I had a clog when I changed carts, but I cleared it. Every nozzle check I print comes out fine, but the prints come out quite bluish. The Sepia ink prints out lighter than it should on the Purge Pattern 6 file (compared to an earlier cart's printout of the same file). I should also mention that when I print a Black-Only print, I get slight to moderate banding. But if I print the same image twice in a row, the banding will be in different places. It's possible it's the cart, but I'm coming to the conclusion that it's my printer. Unless MIS has much worse quality control than their reputation, it's just happened too many times for it to have been MIS' fault every time. So here's my question: If it is indeed the printer that's the problem, what are the chances that the problem would go away if I went back to the dye inks the printer was designed for? In other words, supposed I went back to color dye inks on the 1280, and switched to UT-R2 grayscale inks in my R200? If it worked, I could delay buying a 3800 for a while, and my finances would thank me. If it didn't work, I'm out a hundred bucks of ink and some more frustration. If there's a good chance that my problems are some long-term consequence of using pigment inks in a printer designed for dyes, I might chance the color/BW switch. If it's more likely that my 1280 is just slowly dying, maybe it's time to pull the plug. --Peter