Is there an 11x17 ledger solid ink printer?

Is or was there ever an 11 x 17 solid ink printer? I thought I remembered there being a larger phaser solid ink printer back in the day, but now xerox who bought phaser only has solid ink printers in letter or legal size maximum. Are there any historical solid ink printers still supported with solid ink that would print 11 x 17?

 

Xerox has announced a new colorcube line of solid ink tabloid size printers, 23-30k, print speeds between 38 and 50 ppm, and "flexible print speed from 30 to 85 ppm depending on model.)
http://www.office.xerox.com/multifu...tifunction/colorqube-9201-9202-9203/enus.html
*Print and copy up to 50 ppm in color or black and white (with flexible print speeds from 38 to 85 ppm) on ColorQube 9203
*Maximum paper size: 12 x 18 in. / 320 x 450 mm (SRA3)

 

was offered a ColorCube from Leasing company contact recently. If you're interested let me know please. UnlimitedBT@yahoo.com Roman.

 

Unfortunately for those who prefer to own their equipment, Xerox has set these up as lease-only printers. While it does add copy/scan functionality, granted, the tabloid-size ColorQube 930x range turned out to sell for $17,000–$25,000 (USD), a steep price compared to their sub-$1000 (8570) and $2,000–$3,000 (8870) letter/legal counterparts. Or even compared to the letter-size Phaser multifuction units, the 8560 and 8860, which comparably- or better-configured only set you back $2,000 and $4,000, respectively.

That 1000% price bump just for tabloid makes the 930x kind of hard to take seriously. You have to be really committed to the solid-ink process, at any cost (literally), to spring for one of those babies.

 

I'm glad, or at least interested, to see a solid ink entry-level production machine instead of relegating it only to desktop-type printers. My main concern would be operating cost, service requirements, and print permanence and durability from the solid ink printers compared to their laser counterparts.

 

Yeah, I've been researching Xerox's current model line recently as part of our own search for new equipment (more on that in my own thread, perhaps, as I am interested in the forum's input) — based on Xerox's own published specs, IMHO there are a lot of question marks surrounding the ColorQube/Phaser solid-ink machines. For instance:

• The ColorQube 8570 is expensive to supply — more than what our low-volume, fine-art inkjets cost to run, based on the solid-ink prices and capacity numbers Xerox provides. Yet, somehow, the 8870 is far cheaper to operate, several times cheaper in fact (it's even touted by Xerox as offering the "lowest TCO in its class") — supply costs look roughly on par with our Konica-Minolta bizhub C351. I... really don't get how that works, unless they're just flagrantly gouging on supplies for the 8570.
  
  
• Is there really a point to solid-ink machines anymore, from a production-quality perspective? I mean, I remember when I was in school 2 decades ago — when Tektronix still existed — how clearly superior their Phaser solid-ink printers were for printing color, and especially for photos. But this was back when color laser was strictly a high-volume commercial process, high-resolution line drawings were output on actual pen plotters, and inkjet printers were just sad, messy little toys, infamous for their uneven quality even under ideal conditions and for having printheads that clogged enthusiastically unless you ran them diligently every 2 or 3 days. Printing technology has come a long way in the intervening 20 years, obviously, and I'm not yet convinced that Xerox isn't just clinging to an outdated technology and trying to make it seem relevant any way they can think of. This is based on several observations:
  
  • The obvious strides that have been made in improving output- and process-quality with laser and inkjet printer technology, over that time. There are color lasers today that can produce prints comparable to those 20-year-old Phasers, at a minimum, and inkjets today can print rings around them. Unless solid-ink printing has also improved by leaps and bounds, it may belong by the wayside, alongside those pen plotters we output CAD drawings and blueprints with back in the day.
    
    
  • Xerox's marketing for the solid-ink printers focuses mostly on two factors, the convenience of handling solid ink vs. bottles or cartridges of toner, and how much greener solid ink is compared to supplies that require lots of complex, bulky, wasteful containers and packaging. From the POV of choosing a production printer, and looking to maximize output quality and process reliability & cost-effectiveness, those are about the least important factors I can think of, and would only become considerations in the event I was choosing between two machines that were equal in all other ways.
    
    
  • It took me a disturbingly long time to find any discussion at all of the solid-ink systems' output quality, in the Xerox sales lit. When I finally did, in a competitive analysis of the ColorQube 8870 and the HP CP4525dn, I wasn't at all convinced. You have to assume you're looking at best-case output of the Xerox vs. pretty much worst-case output of the HP, and still I didn't find the Xerox output to be compellingly superior. (That document is here: http://www.office.xerox.com/latest/887CC-02.pdf)
    
    
  • In another competitive analysis, they compare the little-brother ColorQube 8570 to the HP CP3525dn. Now, I don't require that my printer be equipped with a sprawling display screen, or hand-hold me through every step of operation with a full-color, animated GUI. (In fact, I generally find those interfaces tedious and condescending, and prefer to control the process from my workstation as much as possible.) I'm even willing to entertain the possibility that the ColorQube's menu system is genuinely easier-to-use. However, it still takes a seriously powerful reality-distortion field to show those two machines' control panels side-by-side, and then declare the Xerox machine the winner! It makes me even more reluctant than usual to swallow any claims they make about their product. (http://www.office.xerox.com/latest/857CC-02.pdf)

You also mentioned durability, historically always an issue with output from what were semi-affectionately referred to as "crayon" printers. The output of the Tektronix Phaser III was remarkable enough that it was worth putting up with despite its shortcomings, but it definitely had some, and output fragility was a big one. I see that you still can't re-run solid-ink printer output through any high-temperature process (which isn't all that surprising), and that leads me to suspect they're going to have significantly less than archival permanence.

Basically, after researching the machines a little, I've come to the conclusion that I'd probably have to see a wide variety of output samples, and be totally blown away by every single one of them, to continue giving a solid-ink device serious consideration.

 

Hi, nice article - excellent point but... I have few Xerox solid ink printers that we use to run numbers on NCRs and minimal VDP imprinting. When Xerox says it is lowest cost to use/print, surely they live in perfect world that does not exist but in typical laser printer you have 4 toner cartridges, 4 drums, 4 developer units, an intermedia (transfer) belt, transfer roller, fuser unit that all play together to print the image and all losing % of their life span while at it. In solid ink technology (lets not discuss head clogging, etc - as I had mentioned before - perfect world where nothing malfunctioning, user just changing supplies, nothing else ever goes wrong with both printers), yeah, in solid ink printer there are ink sticks and maintenance tray, nothing else... So yeah, Xerox saying that ColorCupe is cheapest one to print - I see where they coming from. There are multiple articles addressing the issue where laser printers creasing/embossing the envelopes because of high heat and pressure in the fuser, I would imagine solid ink printer would not give this problem because there is no fuser, surely print is fragile but what is the life span of the envelope? 2-5 days while in the mail before an envelope has been open... I suppose many could live with that fragility in this particular application... But generally I agree - this method of printing will have it's own little niche and will not go far. Once again - excellent article ferdnyc, 5 star.