Epson Stylus Pro 9600 - size and general query.

[guymark]

Hi.

Although I have an HP 500plus 24" printer I like to play with, I have had several enquires now for printing work to be displayed outside for which it really isn't ideal.

I have found an Epson Stylus Pro 9600 using the ultrachrome ink and the fellow is happy to show me it working with all nozzles working, plus a few rolls of paper for £295. That seems a fab deal.

I have found the manual online and even with that (and Google of course), I can only find the dimensions of the printer when it is one the stand. I am trying to work out the ACTUAL size of the printer if it is sitting on a worktop style table. Amaingly it gives the dimensions of its smaller brother WITHOUT the optional stand but only gives the dimensions on the 9600 WITH the stand. It is not so much height or width I need to be careful of - just depth - as my doorways are old (narrow) and I need to know the "standless size".

If anyone has one of these printers and has a tape measure to hand and five minutes, I would really appreciate a "worst case" front to back depth please - taking into account any flaps/doors/covers etc that cannot be simply removed and popped back on. As I gather they must be shipped with the cartridges out and "de-primed", I am guessing I don't need to take them into account.

I also understand that the 9600 will do borderless printing and will handle media upto 44" wide. HOWEVER further searching reckons the maximum printable area is 43.?? inches and NOT 44 - so I am guessing (but would appreciate confirmation if you know for sure), that if you need borderless you must use 42" paper (or less) and NOT the 44" paper.

I have double checked it is the ultrachrome (some models were set for dye only apparently) and for the price, it seems like a reasonably safe gamble. I would however very much welcome comments (good and bad) about this particular printer.

And most of the all the depth as the manual only gives it "including stand dimensions".

Very many thanks.

Kind Regards
Mark

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

I'm running a Pro 7600 for a while, you should be able to download a user reference guide for the 7600/9600 from the Epson website, borderless printing is possible for paper widths of 10/12/14/16/20/24/36/44 inches, but not formats in between. 44" are listed as 1118 mm. The look of both the 7600 and 9600 from the side should be the same, I think there are some sketches and drawings in the service manual, I need to dig it out and will contact you.
The 7600 and 9600 could be used either with dye or pigment inks, as you start with the resp. first cartridge set. But there is a way via the maintenance mode to reassign a dye printer to the pigment mode so that should not be a limitation.
Overall I don't have a problem with my 7600, it is printing, pretty slow due to the limited number of nozzles, but it works, with refill inks. I did resets of various maintenance counters - head, pump, cutter etc and the printer is still running.
You need to check whether the Ultrachrome inks are o.k. for outdoor use, it is not just the ink to consider, you might look into inkjet coated PE foil material so that moisture is not impacting paper based material, or use protective spray coating or other protective measures.

 

[Mike Earussi]

It's 23" at its widest point due to the ink receptacle sticking out 5" inches from the rest of the printer, and it can't be removed AFAIK. The other two dimensions are 21.5" tall and 64" long.
Also don't tip it if there's any ink in it as it will easily spill (I lost a good pair of pants finding that out). Two people can easily lift it, but a third is really nice to help position it on its stand.

But the K2 ink is only rated for 40 years regular display compared to 80 for K3 (Epson 9800) and 100 for HD (Epson 9900) so it's not something I'd recommend for outside display unless it's short term.

I haven't tried borderless 44" printing, but I did try it on 42" paper and it won't allow it, but it works fine on 36" paper.

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

I started a separate conversation for you. You may do refill easily into the original Epson cartridges, you just would need a resetter, you can use any Ultrachrome K3, HD whatever compatible ink, you just need to create your own icm color profiles or get them done.

 

[Mike Earussi]

That I didn't know. Have you tried using K3 or HD ink in a 9600 or 7600 printer without any problems (wouldn't want to ruin my machine)?

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

No problem with K3 inks, or HD inks for the P800, but you need icm - profiles in combination with your papers, you may get HD inks from various sources - precisioncolors.com or Vermont Ink or other ones in your country, they work without problems, if you are familiar with refilling. The newer HD inks have a wider gamut and a better/more uniform gloss on glossy papers. I have tried quite some inks , as well in my 7600

 

[Mike Earussi]

I use OEM only. I would like to be able to use the OEM inks for the Epson 9900 in the 9600 but was concerned about them damaging the printer, or at least not working correctly. Profiles I can make for myself.

 

[guymark]

As always, a fantastic wealth of information on here from people - thank you so much.

Really helpful with the sizing information - as try as I might, I simply couldn't find the dimensions of the 9600 *without* the stand being taken into account. I did wonder if the height and depth would be the same as the 7600 but was not sure. I now know I can get the thing into the house!

I had seen some good reports on "K2" inks for use with the 9600 and I had head people saying it was so close to the original that you could even mix cartridges, some OEM, some refillable. While I see no reason to do this beyond "using up what's left", it did make me think the inks may be closely matched enough to not need to do a new profile. However if I need to do one I will learn a new skill! I will commence googling in a minute to see what is involved!

As for the K3 inks, I noticed they were available for other Epson printers (the 9900 I think) but not the 9600 so I was going to leave them be. If however there are folks on here using the K3 ink on the 9600 then that would make good sense as they seemed to sell them in larger bottles for a cheaper price per ml than I could find for the K2.

The K2 inks I was looking at were here http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/All-Inclu...467511?hash=item27dd2d71b7:g:tBIAAOSwNyFWcW9s for a set of 250ml bottles, a refillable cartridge set and a resetter too. With additional refillable ink at £20 per 250ml bottle. As I am in the UK, I am guessing there may be different brand names to look out for, but this seller SEEMED to have good feedback and was not using "universal pigment".

Just have to have a a word with a friend to borrow his estate car I think and go pick it up

Again, thank you everyone for feedback and information, always so much help in here it is awesome

 

[Mike Earussi]

As always, a fantastic wealth of information on here from people - thank you so much.

Really helpful with the sizing information - as try as I might, I simply couldn't find the dimensions of the 9600 *without* the stand being taken into account. I did wonder if the height and depth would be the same as the 7600 but was not sure. I now know I can get the thing into the house!

I had seen some good reports on "K2" inks for use with the 9600 and I had head people saying it was so close to the original that you could even mix cartridges, some OEM, some refillable. While I see no reason to do this beyond "using up what's left", it did make me think the inks may be closely matched enough to not need to do a new profile. However if I need to do one I will learn a new skill! I will commence googling in a minute to see what is involved!

As for the K3 inks, I noticed they were available for other Epson printers (the 9900 I think) but not the 9600 so I was going to leave them be. If however there are folks on here using the K3 ink on the 9600 then that would make good sense as they seemed to sell them in larger bottles for a cheaper price per ml than I could find for the K2.

The K2 inks I was looking at were here http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/All-Inclu...467511?hash=item27dd2d71b7:g:tBIAAOSwNyFWcW9s for a set of 250ml bottles, a refillable cartridge set and a resetter too. With additional refillable ink at £20 per 250ml bottle. As I am in the UK, I am guessing there may be different brand names to look out for, but this seller SEEMED to have good feedback and was not using "universal pigment".

Just have to have a a word with a friend to borrow his estate car I think and go pick it up

Again, thank you everyone for feedback and information, always so much help in here it is awesome

Glad to help. I had the same problem trying to find the same info on the 9900 to see if it would fit into my back bedroom (now printing room). It wouldn't as it's 10" longer and so it's now in my store room.

Just make sure you get a clean nozzle check before buying 9600. Once plugged they're a pain to unplug (I tossed a 7600 for that reason).

I'm going to do some more research about using the 9900 inks on the 9600, as they come in 700ml cartridges and can be bought in the U.S. eBay for around 10 cents/ml. (outdated).

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

I don't have problems to use Epson compatible inks in various Epson printers - like the K3 HD ink for the P600/800 or the vivid magenta version in a Pro 7600 - or such pigment ink in a dye R265 or...You need to have some understanding of the refill process and possible pitfalls when problems occur - not all clogged nozzles may be an ink problem but something else. And again - you need to get proper icm-profiles. You may look for premium refill inks at marrutt.co.uk or other sources supplying consumables to the lfp market.