Buying Xerox 550 - fiery or no fiery?

[fatfrog]

Hi,

We want to bring our printing in house and have been impressed with the Xerox 550. We are looking at a 66month lease, and it looks like the Integrated Fiery is going to cost $130 per month, so it's costing $8500 over the cost of the lease.

From a colour quality perspective, is the Fiery going to offer that much of an improvement? We don't need bang on pantone matching, and we don't have large files to spool or anything like that. Any feedback or comments would be helpful. I'm going to go in for a demonstration in a week to see for myself, but would like to do a bit or research before I go in.

 

[MagicBox]

If you're a print shop looking at a 550 buy the fiery. Otherwise you might as well save some more money and buy an office device. If a $130 per month is a lot you could probably save even more than that by stepping down another level. The way the device processes data does have a big impact on how the output looks and you will see the difference.

 

[direxiondm]

66 months lease!!

66 months lease!!

In 66 months prints will be comming out of a matchbox!! In this market 66 months is like life!

a 550 cant be that expensive so shorten the term or buy! Tech is going to fast to be stuck for 66 months

 

[graficworx]

A separate RIP is always nice, and the firery will help with job control, accounting, and maintaining a consistent print month after month. The biggest trouble I've seen with using the internal engine is color drifting over time, as there really is t that great of calibration. So in 6 months when a customer re-orders, the colors look very different.

 

[rcreveli]

Do you plan on calibrating with an Eyeone?
Do you want to be able to send jobs to a hold queue?
Do you hold jobs on the server and reprint from the Queue?
Do you want to be able to adjust the image position and line up front to back better?
Do you want to print a proof from the hold queue and print from that same file when approved?

These can all be done with the Fiery. We have bustled Fiery's on our 2 242's and they are great devices, Command workstation and hot folders can help you create a more efficient workflow. We have had Fiery's in our shop since the late 90's and while they aren't perfect, they really add a lot for the price.

As an aside we have an Ricoh box that we got through an acquisition. 65ppm B&W nice quality loaded up on finishing. It sits most days and is used only for quick walk in jobs. The interface is so clunky compared the the machines with EFI front ends (That everyone knows) that no one uses it.

 

[Milo Wilson]

DC5000 instead

DC5000 instead

I would look at buying a used DC 5000 with external rip. Better cost and runs heavier stock reliably.