Please recommend an entry level production printer

[SitaKriti]

Please help me choose an entry level production machine for my small/medium print shop. These are my criteria's.

High Quality Printing at the lowest click per page
Colour consistency
Should be able to handle 350gms
Back and Front registration should be on point
Solid colours should print vibrant

These are the machines I am currently looking at:

Canon imagePRESS V700
Xerox Versant 180
Konica Minolta AccurioPress C4070
Ricoh Pro C7200

Your recommendations would be highly appreciated.

 

[jwheeler]

This type of question comes up quite frequently in this forum and others, and the answer is always the same: These days, the digital presses in this category from the big 4 brands you listed here all produce similar reliability, quality prints on the same range of media, and offer the same types of inline finishing and paper feeding. There is little difference in the machines themselves....the biggest difference is going to be support/service in your area. Some areas have excellent dealers for Konica and Ricoh, for example, but not the other brands. You want to make sure they have several techs trained on this class of equipment and understand what their average response time is, and access to supplies (do they store in a local warehouse or have to ship everything from across the country). You also want to make sure they have a trained specialist who can help you dial in the color on the machine and train you how to run the daily/weekly maintenance routines.

Beyond that, you should bring your own paper and files to demo each of the machines and see which one produces the quality of color and toner sheen that you prefer. Some brands have a very shiny toner and some look more matte...some have more control over the shininess. Doing these demos will also give you an idea of how their service/support is.

Any recommendation you get for a specific brand is usually going to be very biased since most print shops have only ever used 1 or 2 brands. Usually someone gets comfortable with the service they are are receiving and just stick with them.

 

[Biggs]

My first choice when it comes to digital toner machines is Canon. Followed closely by Konica. I WANT to like the Ricoh - I sold Ricoh and Canon production machines for a while - But the Ricoh just doesn't hold up. The Xerox, without the Fuji gear inside isn't so great these days either. Sharp has the Fuji contract now.