Well one thing that's good about the new plates is that we're cleaner than we've ever been. Bad news is we're pushing the hell out of the colors. We have the second job on the new plates and the pressman is complaining. Problem is as far as I can tell we have no curves applied and I really have no clue how to make/adjust/apply one to our plates. I will be reading up tomorrow but does anyone have a readers digest version of how to do it? The information I have is quite verbose or maybe I'm just not grasping it. I output 2 old plates and hopefully that will get the press running but that's just a band-aid fix.

I don't think anyone on here is running an ECRM desert cat but the boss told me to post this up. He heard that there is a processor less plate for it. Doesn't know who or where he heard it from, for all I know it could be the voices in his head but I'm doing as asked.  :rolleyes:

Is anyone here running Excel ultragrain plates? Kodak switched in a "drop in replacement" Excel P45 plates. Guess what, they're not. Not listed on Kodak's site, only place I've heard mention of them is one post on PP. I'm kinda screwed here. Luckily I took the odd man out box we got and noticed they're bad. I have 2 boxes of good plates and my supplier says there are no more. 

Off to curse at the response center.

I have a 112 + cover book here. Quack 8, designer doesn't know what they are doing. I've gone from PDFs from the designer to FTP transfer that got AFU and now I have the natives on disk. Export PDF from quack, run it though and where ever there is a drop shadow (everywhere) the black goes from 100% to 95.69% where the picture box is. We did this job last year and it was crap but I don't remember having this issue with the Apology system we were running. I did a little testing and noticed if I brought all the text to the front I didn't have the issue. I'm not going through 112 pgs of a "freebie" to pull all text to the front. Any ideas out there? This is about the only job I have today but the weather here is shit so I'm planning on bailing early but I'm going to dick with this for a bit before I get pissed and give up.

Anyone out there have a 6 color test file we can use for print testing our new press? We basically bought a 6c hedi with an aftermarket coater and we would like to run a 6 color print test on it tomorrow on a 25x38 sheet. We have picky pressman and any 6c job I have here will piss one of them off because it's not blah blah whatever. If anyone has something that will really irritate them PM me and I'll give you my FTP info.

Since they seem to like to go out of their way to annoy me I figure I can give back now. You know, the Christmas spirit and all that.  :evil:

Don't know how many have gotten this email yet. Looks like Print engine and I have something in common. Not wanting to work on New Years Eve. 

At least they warned me. Anyone running Evo 5.1.6.3? Looks like I'm upgrading.

QuoteAdobe PDF Print Engine will temporarily stop working on December 31, 2009 [ID: 82384]

SYMPTOM
The Adobe PDF Print Engine stops working from midnight Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) to midnight local time (for example, 7 p.m. to midnight Eastern Standard Time, or 4 p.m. to midnight Pacific Standard Time). This problem occurs on:
- Prinergy Connect 4.1.2.5 and earlier
- Prinergy Evo 4.1.6.6 and earlier
- Prinergy Evo 5.0.6.x.

ERROR
The DiagView error message is: W 31Dec08 16:14:35.664-PST [6944.7048] STC1KOD01PGY STC1ARAXI PPrinterJTP MNZA_MonzaRip.cpp(619): Caught comn exception:
code = 1618001
developer-speak message = 'Create SubmitQueueEntry JMF: Exception 26 Error 8, Invalid time (Invalid zone hour).'
source file = MNZA_JMFClient.cpp
line number = 179
localized message = '( code = 1618001 )'

CAUSE 
The method that the PDF Print Engine uses to calculate time zones causes output to fail. 

SOLUTION
Customers who encounter this issue can use the CPSI RIP while the PDF Print Engine is inactive. Or, customers can upgrade to a version of Prinergy where this problem is fixed:
- Prinergy Connect 4.1.2.6
- Prinergy Connect 5.0.3.2
- Prinergy Connect 5.1.2.0 or later
- Prinergy Evo 4.1.6.7
- Prinergy Evo 5.1.6.3

I just had a job that didn't want to center. Used the geometry editor and it looks fine but it didn't want to play nice. I used the preview in preps to get it right but for some reason I couldn't figure out what button I had to press to make the adjustment stick. I ended up just writing down the numbers and using the set to option but there has to be a way to use preview and have the changes apply.

When we were being seduced by Kodak I was told the only difference between EVO and the full blown Prinergy was the oracle DB backend and RBA. After playing with it and reading posts there seems to be a bit more to it than the sales slime was telling me. There are a lot of stupid things I have to do so I was wondering if anyone else out there has EVO and are experiencing the same issues. While I do like the system I think it does some silly things and I'm starting to wonder if it is the system or how I do things.  :shocked: I do follow the "if it's not broke, don't fix it" motto I'm open to experimenting in my down time so I can make my life easier.

At times I have to provide a imposed dieline for certain jobs. Is there any easy way to output it from Prinergy? I've been manually doing them in indy but I fear one day I'll not get it exact and have to face the wrath of the boss when the die has to be remade. What do you guys end up doing?

I just got off the phone with another shop we sent work to because our press is full. The prepress guy was asking for screen fonts to go with the printer font I sent him. I can't remember the last time I herd the term screen fonts so it got me wondering. Do they even exist any longer?

I found this link and it seems that the OS made it obsolete around 2000.

We just replaced our aging AGFA system with a brandy new Kodak install... 

I fully expected my world to totally change. Even AGFA's new workflow looked nothing like my old printdrive. I expected things to be different with all the talk the term "limited operator interaction" was used a whole lot. I feel like I'm doing a LOT more interaction with the workflow. I used to be able to set mostly everything up in the ticket on the AGFA system, RIP it, and send the ripped file where it needed to go. Now I have a little ticket with impo info that I can drop in 15 different places, renaming it and shutting off colors every fricking time I have to send it somewhere. The Workflows that were touted in the demos are useless in the commercial offset world or so the install guys have made me think. Pagebuilder sounded great... until I found out it doesn't pickup white space, so much for flood varnishes. Preps is a Kodak product and AGFA's solution was better integrated. If I had a change to the impo I made it and resent it. Now I have to go back into the job, re output the .pjtf and resave everything.

I really hope I'm doing something wrong. I want to like it. The trapping is much better than the on or off I used to have. I haven't had a file that blew it up yet. What are the guys that are running Prinergy EVO doing that I am not?

I've had a recent issue that is driving se up the wall. I'm running Printdrive series 3 (old I know but so far it's been working without major issue) and for some reason the trapping software has gotten real, real picky. If I run the single pages through, no issues. Imposed pages are another story. Shut off trapping and everything is fine, except the pressmen hate me then. It's been getting worse as the months progress. Now jobs that would breeze through the RIP blow the damn thing up.

The bosses know we're behind on the software updates but as of right now the money is not there for the newest revision. They're considering a bandaid external trapping software or even a used printdrive RIP. Personally, I'd rather get it from AGFA direct so I can have a place to call when it all goes tits up but the powers that be enjoy making my life difficult. Any suggestions are welcome and I can provide whatever info is needed.