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which RIP do you use ?

Buddy

Buddy

New Member
Is there one particular brand or a "most popular" RIP software out there ?

I'm thinking of Wasatch, Onyx, Flexi (mainstream brands) and wondering if one or another is by far more popular.

We use Flexi that comes with Mutoh but are going to look at Wasatch soon and even considered Onyx recdently.
 
asignstop

asignstop

New Member
I have both Flexi and Wasatch, For banners and posters (and wrap soon) I use wasatch, but I use flexi for most print and cut stuff - it’s just easier to use with my mimaki Equipment even though I have print and cut with wastach.

As far as color is concerned since I don’t make my own profiles - I like Wasatch better , but I'm convinced with your own color spectrometer & profiling software - you can make any rip do wonders.

I think Onyx and Wasatch are the top printing RIPs with Onyx taking the lead. However as far as obtaining ICC color profiles from manufactures - a lot of them supply flexi files.
 
DRPSignsNGrafix

DRPSignsNGrafix

New Member
Can someone suggest a spectormeter and & profiling software? I have a printer but need to start makign my own ICC profiles to make better prints. Thanks
 
Checkers

Checkers

New Member
Hiya Buddy,
I've only used Onyx and have nothing to compare it to. But I found it to be a fairly simple and straight forward program.
From what I recall, it drives most printers and can run mulitple printers at the same time. Profile management was fairly easy and it had some nice recall functions too.

Checkers
 
C

ChiknNutz

New Member
I'm using Wasatch Softrip 6.0 and am content with it, though I don't have any comparison at this point. I have Versaworks, but have never used it.
 
R

Rodan68

New Member
I used to use Wasatch 5.14 but recently switched to Flexi 8. I like them both but I can create my own profiles with Flexi and an X-Rite Spectrophotometer. With Wasatch I needed more software to do that. Some of the factory profiles just didn't seem right and I hated tweaking them. Now I can create a new profile in about 20 minutes and they're pretty spot on. By the way my Wasatch Rip is for sale if anybody is interested.
 
Buddy

Buddy

New Member
We have the Mutoh ValueJet & Mutoh Ultima cutter. It came with some version of Flexi that prints & cuts with some design capabilities. We're not interested in designing out of Flexi (we use Sign Wizard & Corel for the most part) but we have to use the flexi RIP portion.

Recently our ValueJet vendor has offered to provide a version of Wasatch at no cost so we're up for that (or down with that......depending on your slang). We'll see how that pans out.

It's amazing how many different software applications & configurations there are out there for sign design / print & cut.

Somebody should open up a sign design / print / cut trade school. I'd think you could make a fortune with a signs101 trade school idea. I understand why certain programs (like Flexi) try to be a "one software program does it all" since the idea of learning umteen gillion programs could be intimidating. But if it were that simple.....(one program does it all) then I suspect there'd be a lot of people espousing that one program over all others.

BUDDY
 
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ezkimo

New Member
i use the PhotoPrint 5 pro from Scanvec Amiableand i love it, the color mapping is so easy. I run 3 printers and two plotters from it
 
RobGF

RobGF

New Member
I have Wasatch and Onyx Production House. They are both full featured programs and if you know what you are doing you can get excellent colour all of the time. It didn't matter to me which shipped with more profiles as the only way to get accurate colour is to make your own. For that I have ProfileMaker and a very slow Spectrolino/Spectrocan (a scanner on an x/y robotic table).

If I had to pick just one of the systems it would be Wasatch... Onyx is very slow relative to Wasatch.

Rob
 
mrugen

mrugen

New Member
Rips'

I think the real answer here is education! I am convinced that if you LEARN how to use ANY RIP you can make great prints.

The second part to that question is WORKFLOW. Do you want to transfer files between different softwares or do you want a single software for design and print.

Thirdly, Flexi can be used for Design, but if you want to use just the RIP you can open Production Manager and use it alone. Just drag and drop any compatible file format on the printer and double click to set RIP otpions. Great for PDF's, EPS, TIF etc printing where you just want to print, resize tile etc, and not necessarily edit the job content.

Overall, I'd say Flexi has the best workflow, but as I said EDUCATION is the answer.
 
Print-Kwik

Print-Kwik

New Member
mrugen said:
... I am convinced that if you LEARN how to use ANY RIP you can make great prints. ...
Overall, I'd say Flexi has the best workflow, ...
Click to expand...

Not so sure I would completely agree with that after this mornings dealings with Production Manager. It doesn't seem to do so well with a PDF that contains raster elements with transparency over vector elements (fully or partially).

This same file can be printed to my Xerox Docucolor (Creo RIP), my canon imageRunners(B&W and color)(Fiery RIPs), my ricoh engineering printer. So no, I don't think "ANY RIP" can make great prints. Some are just better than others...
 
mrugen

mrugen

New Member
Any RIP?

I guess I should temper my comments....sometimes it does depend on the blessings of the software and hardware god's .

I hear from users all the time that swear by one software while another curses the same one. So I still think a lot depends on the following:

1) Is your hardware and software compatible?
2) Do you understand how to use the hardware and software?
3) Is the file format you are trying to use compatible with the RIP? Not all EPS or PDFs are alike.
4) Are there any limitations to the RIP? Limited printer driver set or limited ICC available? Limited size , tiling etc.?
5) Do you want to press a button to print or are you interested in setting options? Do you understand those options?

If I said EDUCATION, would this apply to all parts of this system?

Education on files types and management.....
Education on color management.....
Education on software options/features.....
Education on printer and computer hardware features......

Color printing has moved from the beginnings of a simpler printing press where most devices were mechanical to a complex set of digital circumstances. As we move forward with the digital age, we must continue to enhance our knowledge of each aspect of color printing to a large format printer much as a doctor would keep up the the latest knowledge in medical advances. This includes not only our RIP discussion here, but also all business aspects as well.

We must realize that we operate a business where we must deal with sources of files that are sometimes unknown and must be diagnosed.

We then must apply our color knowledge to that individual file as best we can taking into account our digital system and the customers expectations.

Finally, we must, at the end of the day, make some sort of profit. This will not happen every time, but if it happens more often that not, we can say we are successful!

No matter what digital system you find yourself in, continue to seek more digital knowledge for yourself and your staff. Be willing to change if your business requires it, not getting too attached to what you are doing now.

Remember, the business gods are watching.......
 
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