Difference between Production Printer and Office Copier?

[jpfulton248]

We've outsourced our color work and done our bw in house work on a combination of offset and a Canon IR105 for years. Quality is majorly lacking but we've gotten away with it because, though we have customers that we make money on, we are not straight pay for print. We are at the point that we need to upgrade our IR105 which probably also will include bringing our color work in house. The big question is this:

What is the difference between a "light-production" level printer and an "office" level copier?

I know some answers will be stock options, finisher attachment options, RIP/Color Control abilities, quality (which is completely subjective).

 

[wonderings]

The the answers are stock options and quality of print. Depending on the machine you can print on heavy card stocks, duplex them, have colour control, be able to adjust spot or pantone colours, colour consistency. An office photocopier does not compare to a proper production or even light production machine. You get a much better level of control when you move into production machines.

 

[Keith]

Oh, man you just opened up a can of worms. Vendors and printers have different qualifications for 'production level'. It's like saying, is that a forest or just a bunch of trees? I'll start with my definition - any machine that produces jobs that you are paid to do. Now that I think about that, that is the definition of 'professional'.

 

[Possumgal]

Production machines are usually (hopefully?) built a little hardier than office machines. One caveat: just because it says "production" or "digital press" it doesn't necessarily make it so. You need to see them in action, not just take a salesman's talk.

 

[jpfulton248]

Obviously this wouldn't even be a consideration for a commercial printer but in the business we are in there is just more flexibility on quality. We print almost everything duplexed on 20lb and 65lb all uncoated and finish off-line on a bookletmaker. So super simple stuff. No real flexibility needed in terms of various cover stocks. I love the idea of a nice production machine and technically it might be "affordable" compared to our current costs of outsourcing but just don't want to spend more than we need to.

 

[arossetti]

Biggest thing to look at in my opinion is the average monthly duty cycle and the estimated impressions between service calls. Figure out how many impressions you plan on printing in an average day and make sure that the sum of a week is at or below the impressions between service call number.

 

[jpfulton248]

We do approximately 330k clicks annually. 300k is black, 30k is color.

 

[PricelineNegotiator]

Something like a Xerox D95 might be a good option, but even with that you'd be pushing a pretty low volume for that machine.

 

[AP90]

Id have to agree with the ones who have mentioned duty cycle and monthly volume. A lot of the entry "production" machines seem to be beefed up high end copy machines.

You keep mentioning that quality isn't such a big concern to you. If that's so, Id really be looking at a used machine. The newer ones are basically new technology, which turns out to be better quality. But the older xerox 700's and 770's would still put out acceptable quality from what you have been saying.

This was mentioned in another thread earlier today and I've talked with the company a few times, but there's a company that refurb's xerox machines and resells them and guarantees them for FSMA with xerox. I think they were selling 700's for something like 16k. Might look into that.

Here's a link to another machine they have for sale.

http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item.view&alt=web&id=301738283341&globalID=EBAY-US

 

[jpfulton248]

Thanks everyone for the advice. Used is definitely on our radar as long as there is someone out there who will do a service plan for us whether that is direct with the manufacturer or through a local third party. There don't seem to be a lot of third-parties interested in taking on a production level service contract.

 

[BobRym]

We have been a digital shop for 20 years and are on our 4th or 5th production colour toner machine - currently a Pro Ricoh 651ex. One of the most important differences between a production machine and an office machine is the RIP - the ability to process Postscript files is all important. When you shop for one of these - you need the Graphic package and you need imposition. Click charges on new machines will often be substantially less than used which will help negate the price difference. These machines require regular service (nature of the beast) - you want to deal with whoever in your area can provide superior service. The differences from one brand to another are less and less all the time - quality is excellent and their features are very similar. We lease (as do many others) and will try to keep a machine in service for a year or two after the lease is up to spread out the lease cost over a longer time period - but after that time period will start the cycle again with more current equipment. We run a Black and White as well - if you do - make sure you can utilize one common RIP so that your workflow and abilities are the same regardless of which machine you are using. This will normally mean you need current equipment from the same manufacturer. The difference in click charges on Black and White from a dedicated machine to a colour machine will pay for itself (B&W click charges on colour machines are higher). Once you have the colour capability in your shop - you will find lots more work for it - quality these days on the newer machines is excellent - it is hard to distinguish from top end work done on a press. Higher volumes still belong on a press but with today's trends to do smaller volumes - the production toner machines can be very profitable.

 

[jpfulton248]

The click charge we've been offered on the Canon ImagePress C800 is .05 color and .01 black up to 11x17. We'll be running all 2 up so it halves our current click count. Also the lease we've seen is an FMV lease rather than a dollar buy out.

 

[JustinB]

You may want to be patient and wait a little bit on this. Canon introduced the new 8000 and 10000vp machines this week at Graph Expo and I think they're starting selling them in October or November. When those come out, Canon dealers are going to have a bunch of used 7010 and 7011vp machines back in their inventory, and they'll probably give you a GREAT price on one.

The new machine is basically an upgraded version of the 7011vp that uses a toner with a lower melting point so it can run a little faster. I'm sure they would say it's an all new machine blah blah blah, but I pulled out a fuser assembly, and I pulled out the image transfer assembly, and it's the same basic stuff as they use now.

 

[Shawnd]

I would push for 1 click for up to 13x19 and a dollar buy out, those FMV leases only lead to one thing, another lease.

 

[jpfulton248]

I would push for 1 click for up to 13x19 and a dollar buy out, those FMV leases only lead to one thing, another lease.

Yep, if we are leasing it's going to be a dollar buyout... And actually I think I was wrong about the one click 11x17, I think it is one click for any sheet size (the limit is the capability of the machine)

 

[jpfulton248]

You may want to be patient and wait a little bit on this. Canon introduced the new 8000 and 10000vp machines this week at Graph Expo and I think they're starting selling them in October or November. When those come out, Canon dealers are going to have a bunch of used 7010 and 7011vp machines back in their inventory, and they'll probably give you a GREAT price on one.

Question: Do you have any experience with Canon bringing in used inventory? Does Canon corporate sell used direct to end users? Or do they sell to 3rd party brokers who then sell to end users? Just curious what the process is.

 

[devilprinters.co.uk]

I see that you're in the US. For entry-level "graphics" machine look at the OKI ES9431 (aka C931) or the Xerox Phaser 7800. In the UK they are both available on click but in the UK only the OKI is now single click A3 at less than 9p for colour and 1.5p mono. Xerox has moved over to double-click A3 for all new contracts so it's very expensive to run. Not sure of the situation in US.

Moving up from those into "light-production" you can drop your cost per page drastically the more you spend but you need lots of throughput to balance your TCO. You will get the other benefits previously mentioned like better print quality but be aware that you really need to know what you're doing to get the best out of the higher-end kit. They should go through some sort of RIP (i.e. EFI Fiery) and that's going to add to the cost, plus you may want to get yourself a spectrophotometer to calibrate it.

Lots of dealers offer finance to their customers and after the term is over they take the machine back and push out a replacement. That old machine is usually already paid for in full so the reseller has plenty of scope to negotiate on the price.

Hope this helps and good luck.

Nick

 

[jpfulton248]

I see that you're in the US. For entry-level "graphics" machine look at the OKI ES9431 (aka C931) or the Xerox Phaser 7800. In the UK they are both available on click but in the UK only the OKI is now single click A3 at less than 9p for colour and 1.5p mono. Xerox has moved over to double-click A3 for all new contracts so it's very expensive to run. Not sure of the situation in US.

Moving up from those into "light-production" you can drop your cost per page drastically the more you spend but you need lots of throughput to balance your TCO. You will get the other benefits previously mentioned like better print quality but be aware that you really need to know what you're doing to get the best out of the higher-end kit. They should go through some sort of RIP (i.e. EFI Fiery) and that's going to add to the cost, plus you may want to get yourself a spectrophotometer to calibrate it.

Lots of dealers offer finance to their customers and after the term is over they take the machine back and push out a replacement. That old machine is usually already paid for in full so the reseller has plenty of scope to negotiate on the price.

Hope this helps and good luck.

Nick

Great thanks... As an aside, does 9p mean 9 pence which converts 14 cents usd?

 

[Craig]

What's the difference between production and office... about $200,000.00! We have a Kmc6000 and a Xerox 1000. In my opinion the KM is an office machine with aspirations on being production. It is SLOW when compared to the Xerox 1000 and about 1/4 as reliable. If you really want to know the difference you just need to open up each machine and look at the paper paths. It should hit you like a brick.

 

[jpfulton248]

What's the difference between production and office... about $200,000.00! We have a Kmc6000 and a Xerox 1000. In my opinion the KM is an office machine with aspirations on being production. It is SLOW when compared to the Xerox 1000 and about 1/4 as reliable. If you really want to know the difference you just need to open up each machine and look at the paper paths. It should hit you like a brick.

Speed is a concern but you can get a fast office machine. And so the paper path is different, but what does that really buy me? I'm pretty much only running 20lb bond and 65lb cover. I don't need any finishing attachments.