Another mid tone goes pink in the HP 315 and its eve of destruction, the advent of the 700.

[depps74]

I have officially had it with my HP 315. Anything mid tone, CMYK black and white, or sepia just does not print right. It's usually pink, pink pink freaking pink. I could make valentines day cards forever with the amount of pink I have to toss. I have tried everything too, it's not the heads or any of the usual fixes. I have one thing left to try with a tech support company and then going to bite the bullet and get the 700. The real pisser is that the 315 prints high quality pics great. My questions is does anyone out there with a 300 series experience inconsistency with black and white and mid tone prints?


dave

 

[ColorCrest]

Anything mid tone, CMYK black and white, or sepia just does not print right. It's usually pink,

When you send a truly neutral grayscale RGB image, with the three channels of RGB being equally the same, say mid gray tones at 128, 128, 128, does the print appear to be rather neutral and acceptable? Yes, or no?

 

[JBurton]

What rip are you using?

 

[Solventinkjet]

It's a very common issue with CMYK printers and the solution is making your own profiles.

 

[depps74]

What rip are you using?

onyx

 

[depps74]

It's a very common issue with CMYK printers and the solution is making your own profiles.

does that mean getting a HP 700 series would not solve this issue? I am about to pull trigger on that cause I just cant print with confidence and without the spectrometer I definitely can not make my own profiles.

 

[depps74]

When you send a truly neutral grayscale RGB image, with the three channels of RGB being equally the same, say mid gray tones at 128, 128, 128, does the print appear to be rather neutral and acceptable? Yes, or no?

I have not tried that yet, my workaround has been to up the cyan and yellow, that seems to do away with the pink sometimes.

 

[Neil]

does that mean getting a HP 700 series would not solve this issue? I am about to pull trigger on that cause I just cant print with confidence and without the spectrometer I definitely can not make my own profiles.

Get a spectrophotometer. Considerably smaller and less expensive than an HP 700.

 

[MJerome]

Sounds like the current printer profile you’re using is based on a material with a blue cast white point, causing magenta to be introduced to counteract the white point of the material used when the profile was created. Try a different printer profile, or bite the bullet and get a spectrometer, not a new printer. While building your own profiles you can change the amount of GCR which introduces more black and takes out CMY to create more neutral grays and cmyk based black and white images. By far the best investment you can make into your business.

 

[shepherddesigns]

I've had a 315 for a while and use a i1pro2 to create my own profiles in Flexi. Yes, the colors shift over time and you'll need to reprofile regularly, but it's the only way to be as consistent as you can be.

 

[ColorCrest]

I have one thing left to try with a tech support company and then going to bite the bullet and get the 700.

This line of thinking is tantamount to using an out-of-tune guitar and then purchasing a new guitar as a replacement. It's only a matter of time when the new guitar will surely need tuning.

I recommend printing a simple grayscale RGB file to learn what color bias, if any, the system has at this time. This is the same as strumming the guitar the learn how it sounds before it's played.

There are a few inexpensive fixes depending upon where the failure is occurring.

 

[ColorCrest]

Yes, the colors shift over time and you'll need to reprofile regularly, but it's the only way to be as consistent as you can be.

Well, the goal is to keep the printer calibrated over time so "re-profiling" is not necessary. It's far easier to routinely read just a very few calibration swatches as opposed to hundreds of profile swatches. Onyx and others have a "recalibrate" button for this reason.

So far as customers are sometimes concerned, they want just one or two of your printer profiles as opposed the periodic updates to what they keep on file from their vendors. So, the goal is use ICC profiles as valid for a very, very long time. (Years.)

 

[Terrance the Deuce]

does that mean getting a HP 700 series would not solve this issue? I am about to pull trigger on that cause I just cant print with confidence and without the spectrometer I definitely can not make my own profiles.

Why not? Get an I1. You can easily build profiles in onyx for an HP Latex. Onyx's youtube channel is actually very helpful on this and can walk you thru everything.