I am thinking of buying a risograph for printing but not so sure of the quality of print compared to what am getting from my canon CLC/IR3200. How economical is the risograph and which model of riso is highly recommended Any advice or recommendations?
I haven't looked at digital duplicators in many years. I looked at a riso & ricoh digital duplicators ~7 years ago because of the economy, low maintenance simplicity, and speed/ease of use for quick turnaround economy jobs, but I don't think it will come close to the quality of your 3200. I would only consider a duplicator at this point for straight text-only or fairly simple line art only. I believe the screen size is limited by the fundamental technology so you simply can't get the fine screens that we take for granted on laser equipment now. Semi-related, I looked at the HC5500 a couple of years ago for its economy and speed, but the quality and consistency was not as good as our 3200. It would be ideal for accent color on mainly text pages, but for more graphic items I think lasers are still the way to go.
The two are completely different animals. For quality/full color go laser or offset. For mono, spot color, and difficult medias like envelopes, go digital duplicator.