Digital Presses

[DigitalCrapShoveler]

My Production/General Manager has gotten wind that I am a member of this forum. I was bragging to a buddy about all the helpful information I get out of this place, and he in turn brought it up to the PM. Anyhoo, PM approaches me today, after his business trip to demo a couple DIs and wanted to know if I could post a thread asking about performance and what might be his best option. I am obliging him.

Basically he is looking at two presses/copy machines on steroids: The Xerox IGen 3, and the Kodak NexPress 2100.

Any information you have if you are running one of these beasts would be greatly appreciated. My PM is aware that Sales are full of Sheeeeot, and wants the opinions of the trench workers, smart guy!

[jimking]

I've worked closely with operators of Igens. The issue with these presses is they are very expensive and then some (add ons). You can purchase the igen for half a million or do a lease deal and get involved with click charges and have Xerox as a partner in your business and the maintenance or breakdowns and color issues are constant. Ask your manager why he's interested in these presses because my feeling is if it doesn't have anything to do with variable data tell him to have a close look at Presstek instead. It is a digital offset press.

[DigitalCrapShoveler]

I've worked closely with operators of Igens. The issue with these presses is they are very expensive and then some (add ons). You can purchase the igen for half a million or do a lease deal and get involved with click charges and have Xerox as a partner in your business and the maintenance or breakdowns and color issues are constant. Ask your manager why he's interested in these presses because my feeling is if it doesn't have anything to do with variable data tell him to have a close look at Presstek instead. It is a digital offset press.

Unfortunately, variable data is exactly why we are getting one. The suits want to tap the mailing market to stay in competition with out #1 competitor. I used to run, set-up an Indigo Eprint 1000, about, I don't know 12 years ago. It was a money sucking beast, temperamental, and killed the business that bought it with it's over inflated monthly charges. It was just a big, color copier. Well, fast froward to now... the company I currently work for has been flying all over demoing these things and I am the ONLY one with any experience... 12 year old experience.

I can't express enough how much I don't want to have to deal with this, even though I am the logical choice. I wear too many hats around here and one more headache will be one step closer to my ultimate insanity, but I do what i'm told. Jim your input is greatly appreciated. Since I have posted this thread, my PM has asked me about it twice. At least I have one good solid opinion to share, that totally backs up mine. Appreciate it!

[jimking]

I've worked closely with operators of Igens. The issue with these presses is they are very expensive and then some (add ons). You can purchase the igen for half a million or do a lease deal and get involved with click charges and have Xerox as a partner in your business and the maintenance or breakdowns and color issues are constant. Ask your manager why he's interested in these presses because my feeling is if it doesn't have anything to do with variable data tell him to have a close look at Presstek instead. It is a digital offset press.

Unfortunately, variable data is exactly why we are getting one. The suits want to tap the mailing market to stay in competition with out #1 competitor. I used to run, set-up an Indigo Eprint 1000, about, I don't know 12 years ago. It was a money sucking beast, temperamental, and killed the business that bought it with it's over inflated monthly charges. It was just a big, color copier. Well, fast froward to now... the company I currently work for has been flying all over demoing these things and I am the ONLY one with any experience... 12 year old experience.

I can't express enough how much I don't want to have to deal with this, even though I am the logical choice. I wear too many hats around here and one more headache will be one step closer to my ultimate insanity, but I do what i'm told. Jim your input is greatly appreciated. Since I have posted this thread, my PM has asked me about it twice. At least I have one good solid opinion to share, that totally backs up mine. Appreciate it!

As I said before, dragging prepress people into the running of presses is all the rage. The only way I see for yourself to get out of it is get a degree in graphic design and reinvent yourself. Do graphic design, web page creation and prepress. Those descriptions are now becoming the rage in my area and they most likely will not put you on a press with those skills, at least in my government infested area.

[30YearsandCounting]

We have 3 iGens. Don't work on them myself, but work closely with people that do.  Variable is the key to making any of these digital presses profitable.  But remember that if the machine goes down... which they do... how else do you meet the customer's mailing deadline?  Obviously you need the business to support it, but one machine is usually not enough.  Also... there are lots of other investments required.  Database management, multiple software solutions (none of them do everything) programmmers, environmental requirements etc.  We've been doing it for years now and love the iGens.

But remember... Drupa starts in a few weeks...

[jimking]

We have 3 iGens. Don't work on them myself, but work closely with people that do.  Variable is the key to making any of these digital presses profitable.  But remember that if the machine goes down... which they do... how else do you meet the customer's mailing deadline?  Obviously you need the business to support it, but one machine is usually not enough.  Also... there are lots of other investments required.  Database management, multiple software solutions (none of them do everything) programmmers, environmental requirements etc.  We've been doing it for years now and love the iGens.

But remember... Drupa starts in a few weeks...

Do you love'em enough to become the operator?

[DigitalCrapShoveler]

Guys, what would you say the biggest flaw in these systems are? Back in Indigo days, we had to apply noise to any solids because it would streak, and really tone down heavy coverage, otherwise it would smear. Anything else?

[30YearsandCounting]

Do you love'em enough to become the operator?

Of course not... I don't want to take a pay cut.

[30YearsandCounting]

Guys, what would you say the biggest flaw in these systems are? Back in Indigo days, we had to apply noise to any solids because it would streak, and really tone down heavy coverage, otherwise it would smear. Anything else?

Color consistency and color accuracy is always a challenge.  Want to talk about reflex purple... I mean blue?
Heavy solids can be a problem but since it uses toner, smearing is not.

[jimking]

Guys, what would you say the biggest flaw in these systems are? Back in Indigo days, we had to apply noise to any solids because it would streak, and really tone down heavy coverage, otherwise it would smear. Anything else?

I've seen lousy solids come off the Igen but they were rectified by the Xerox tecs, over and over again. The Igen appears to have thousands of moving parts which sends a red flag to me that too much can go wrong. If I'm not mistaking, didn't PPF have a Igen or digital press section? If so, can you still retrieve that info?

[DigitalCrapShoveler]

Guys, what would you say the biggest flaw in these systems are? Back in Indigo days, we had to apply noise to any solids because it would streak, and really tone down heavy coverage, otherwise it would smear. Anything else?

I've seen lousy solids come off the Igen but they were rectified by the Xerox tecs, over and over again. The Igen appears to have thousands of moving parts which sends a red flag to me that too much can go wrong. If I'm not mistaking, didn't PPF have a Igen or digital press section? If so, can you still retrieve that info?

Good Idea Jim, I will follow up on that. And thanks as well to you 30, I appreciate your input.

[Slappy]

Guys, what would you say the biggest flaw in these systems are? Back in Indigo days, we had to apply noise to any solids because it would streak, and really tone down heavy coverage, otherwise it would smear. Anything else?

The newest Indigo doesn't suffer from that problem, running a 5000 here and it holds solids like a champ. We fought with color consistency for a while, but seem to have a handle on it now. Even got a damned good ICC Profile from the offset side that matches pretty well. If you have a good operator (we do) then color is certainly manageable.

[EmptyWords]

As 30Years stated above, variable is the key to these things, course it doesn't hurt to have standard non variable run on them either. You do need something in addition to the iGen/Nexpress, since we have bought our iGen the higher ups keep talking about another one, but we dont have the room for something as big as another iGen on the floor.

I think they will buy something smaller to run non-variable and short run jobs. Yes, they do go down alot, at least the iGen does but I am sure the Nexpress does too, like Jim stated, they have a shit load of moving parts and many of them go out.

I actually like both of them for what they are, still not offset, but not bad for short run and lower cost jobs. As of right now, our presses are not very busy, but our iGen can't keep up with all the work that needs run. Our job count on the digital press side is about 6 to every 1 press job coming in.

I got dumped into the digital side since I am the jack-of-all here, we looked at both the Nexpress and iGen, really liked the 5th color option the Nexpress model we looked at had but we finally went with the iGen since the service people were not too far away from us, the closest Nexpress tech was over 125 miles away, plus Xerox sweetened the pot for us too. If you do go the route of the iGen, watch out what rip you purchase and also the options too, this can bite you in the ass very fast if you get the wrong thing. Hope this helps and maybe you won't make some of the mistakes we have made.

[DigitalCrapShoveler]

As 30Years stated above, variable is the key to these things, course it doesn't hurt to have standard non variable run on them either. You do need something in addition to the iGen/Nexpress, since we have bought our iGen the higher ups keep talking about another one, but we dont have the room for something as big as another iGen on the floor.

I think they will buy something smaller to run non-variable and short run jobs. Yes, they do go down alot, at least the iGen does but I am sure the Nexpress does too, like Jim stated, they have a shit load of moving parts and many of them go out.

I actually like both of them for what they are, still not offset, but not bad for short run and lower cost jobs. As of right now, our presses are not very busy, but our iGen can't keep up with all the work that needs run. Our job count on the digital press side is about 6 to every 1 press job coming in.

I got dumped into the digital side since I am the jack-of-all here, we looked at both the Nexpress and iGen, really liked the 5th color option the Nexpress model we looked at had but we finally went with the iGen since the service people were not too far away from us, the closest Nexpress tech was over 125 miles away, plus Xerox sweetened the pot for us too. If you do go the route of the iGen, watch out what rip you purchase and also the options too, this can bite you in the ass very fast if you get the wrong thing. Hope this helps and maybe you won't make some of the mistakes we have made.

Thanks Empty... very informative. I am going to print out the replies so far and run them down to the PM. Really guys, thanks for all your input. I can't thank you enough. By no means stop commenting, I would like to hear more, even though I think I have what I need to start. Thanks again.

[EmptyWords]

No Problem DCS, if you go the iGen route and need any other info, especially what not to do, I will be glad to pass it along.