Platesetter RIP vs. Corner Office RIP

[paulc]

Why is the corner office printer so accomodating with printing almost any client-supplied file, whereas our quarter million dollar platesetter is so strict and unbending about what it will allow to be output? Shouldn't it be the other way around? Isn't a RIP a RIP? And shouldn't an expensive one be more convenient than a cheap one?

 

[ASM]

Re: Platesetter RIP vs. Corner Office RIP

Paul,
It's not the platesetter that's unbending, it's the clients of the final printed product. They expect:
- The right colour
- In Register, with every dot in the right place
- at very high resolution
- At the right price
- at the right time (like yesterday)
- with no file problems; e.g. font substitutions, missing fonts, wrong PMS spot colours etc
- At a competitive price.

You can't win Indy in a standard Ford Mondeo - RIPs are the V8 engines of CTP print workflow.

You corner office printer does not have to do anywhere near the number of algorhtymic calculations that a colour-managed CTP RIP does; and it's doing it in A4 or A3 maybe, not 8-up impositions.