the Color Copier

I can not tell you how many times I have walked into an account that uses a high-end, color copier to hear that prospect gripe about how long “it takes to print on this 30 thousand dollar machine and I print the same job in minutes on my HP color laser.”

I have seen this with my own eyes. K/M’s with all the bells, rips, memory etc etc – absolutely choke on .PDFs and the little HP chugs it out with no problems. Why is this?

Even after so many years of color, color copiers are still cumbersome. Color copiers with RIPs are still complicated and can be inconsistent – or worse, color copiers with RIPs and hardware and memory upgrades once configed and working with an application are now static. As long as nothing changes with the applications, or the operating environment all will be well.

But if the customer needs change, or a new software application is added or an existing application is upgraded – all bets are off. And this is a moving target for both the customer and the vendor. Copier hardware changes nearly every six months and the copier guys are going to talk about, sell, and support what is hot currently – they are not all that motivated to help upgrade or solve problems on a 2 year old color system. “All you need to do is go to the Canon site and upgrade the driver or flash the copier that’s all" - what kind of support is that ?!!

Committing service and support resources to the newest color system with the newest drivers and RIPs and ROMs and the minutia of details involved with supporting this specialized segment is daunting and expensive and unfortunately, well over the comprehension of most hardware tech's. Throw in shrinking profit margins and volume purchase commitments and monthly hardware forecasts and it becomes so much easier to just "sell the box".

Meanwhile, the HP 9500 color laser is spitting out 11x17 proofs.

Committing service and support resources to the newest color system with the newest drivers and RIPs and ROMs and the minutia of details involved with supporting this specialized segment is daunting and expensive and unfortunately, well over the comprehension of most hardware tech's. Throw in shrinking profit margins and volume purchase commitments and monthly hardware forecasts and it becomes so much easier to just "sell the box".

By the way, I hear that there is an Edgeline in some super-secret bunker outside of Boise churning out color at over 120 pages per minute. I also hear that an external RIP may be in the future for Edgeline.

And the I.T guys love this Edgeline thing.

Clients, Edgeline vs Xerography...

I had breakfast with a very important client today and he asked, "could you tell me what the difference is between Edgeline and all the other copiers? I mean, how does the toner get to the paper?" This is a large company headquartered locally with locations and plants across the country and over 1500 printing assets.

Well, he tossed me a slow pitch, hanging, softball and all I had to do was smack it out of the park - and I did.

And as I was explaining the process I started to relize, once again, how very evolutionary this period in time has become.

I was harkened back to the "good ole days" - when I saw the very first color VGA monitor, or the very first NEC MultiSync color monitor. The very first laptop I used was the Compaq SLT - the "lunch box" was worlds ahead of the "sewing machine".

Liquid Crystal Displays, the first IBM ThinkPad, and I remember the very first time I ran an Epson LQ-something next to the HP LaserJet II WOWZIE!!! And here I am nearly 20 years later feeling those same feelings - "THIS IS BIG, THIS WILL CHANGE EVERYTHING"

As my conversation filled with "negative static, latent images, fuser oil, melting toner, corona wires..." I had to slow down, my passion was getting ahead of me - I actually took out a napkin and drew a diagram of the "zero-graphic" process ( you know of course Compaq Computer started on a napkin over lunch somewhere).

Explaining the Edgeline technology can be a great deal less complicated and I guess less sexy, “the machine squirts ink on the paper…really fast”

The excitement is there, the time seems to be now and I closed my discussion with,” let me ask you this, do you have a black and white TV? Do you remember when black and white TV’s were manufactured and sold and everybody had one? Have you seen a NEW black and white TV lately? There was a time when people just took black and white for granted in their TVs and color TV’s were too expensive”. – Interesting.

Paperless Offices, Killer Toner , Carbon Offset - "A World Without Sin"

7/2008

Read the email, print the email, throw the email away, print it again, write on the email, send a response, throw it away - again" - yeah, that's how WE roll...

I stumbled onto this article from N.C. and it's illustrative of the next generation gap, and brushes up on the social reasons there are still newspapers being printed all over the world - and why we still cut down Ka-jillions of trees each year. And I really like it because the author uses the phrase "post-coital". One would usually need to go to a bowling alley to read something of this caliber.

The Killer Office - Dunder Miflin meets Resident Evil

I got this off of an article regarding "special" air filters -

"It has been indisputably proven by various international studies that ultra-fine particles are emitted by laser printers, fax machines, and copiers. In 2005, the University of Giessen in Germany initiated a "Toner Pilot Project" on behalf of the Bundesinstituts für Risikobewertung (BfR) to assess the effect of laser printers and copy machines on the quality of interior air.

The final report published on 08.01.08 stated that emissions by toner-based office appliances significantly increased the number of ultra-fine particles in interior air. According to the study, the increase in the concentration of fine dust can be assessed as being quantitatively alarming from a hygiene standpoint and may also be regarded as being questionable from the point of view of health." Based on this current knowledge and seen from the standpoint of precautionary aspects, the FIRA advocates preventative measures in this case."

Just another reason not to be a cube-rat: killer toner and TPS reports.