Help me choose between a Xerox J75 and a KM C7000 or C6000

[funwork]

Hello,

We are in the process of changing our Xerox DC252 and are talking with two dealer.

KM first made an offer for the C7000 which we found acceptable.

XEROX than made an offer for the J75 with a really good price, and i mean GOOD, with their FIERY EX RIP (I would prefer a CREO as we mainly do VDP printing)

Now KM come back and tell us they could ajust their offer by cutting some initial options that are not on the Xerox offer and that we could live without (Sticher, demoistener for exemple)
One of the option they consider would be to step down to a C6000 that would let them come closer to the Xerox offer...

So my questions are the following :

1- I have a strong feeling, KM C6000 or C7000 are more professionnal printer that Xerox J75. Am I right ?

2- We have always used CREOP Rip for our VDP printing (we use DESIGNMERGE from MEADOWS)
Do you think the FIERY EX would be an issue to print VDP jobs (average jobs are between 1000' and 50000')
Most of the time we will print 2 up A4 pages on a 13x18 blank paper

3- What would be your call. Service will not be an issue as the two dealers are really serious people.
We are on a small island and this J75 would be the first one installed...
After a day "playing" with it, it seems to be a good printer.
What we can't see is if it really compares to a C6000 or a C7000.
Speed is not really an issue at that level of speed...*

Thanks a lot for your feedback.

Best regards

 

[Bobbreda]

The km7000 is an nice piece of equipment. Nice colors/nice all-around printer
Search very well here or elsewhere. Registration is an "little"" issue on the KM. No idea on the Xerox

 

[funwork]

This is the feeling I have...
The J75 is really nice with it is about registration.
There is a scanning option that will let you correct any registration issue...
My concerns are more about the reliability of the machines, more than speed and color quality.

 

[Craig]

The Spectrophotometer is not an option, it is a necessity if you want consistent color. EFI will handle everything Creo will, who knows if Creo will even be around at least as a Kodak product. What is your print volume, what types of substrates do you print on, how much do you intend on growing?

 

[funwork]

Hi Craig.
Thanks for your answer.
Most of the time we will print commercial mailing and invoices (We are not a commercial printer. We print and send mailings)
From time to time we will need to print these documents on light coated papers.
We could be asked to print leaflet or flyer that come with the mailing, and which is the part we want to extend.

On average I would say we process around 40000 documents per month and most of the time it is 13x18 sheets printed 2up.

We were the close to sign for a km7000 but we have received a counter offer for a J75 Xerox which is a machine I don't have any feedback on...

Again thanks for your feedback and have a nice day

 

[FileJockey]

Can't comment specifically on C7000, but we just installed a C8000, chosen over the Xerox 800/1000 based on price (and our bad experience with a 700). We are very satisfied with the KM, really fast, with excellent, reliable color and is very solid and capable overall. We do commercial printing, some variable and direct mail.

 

[arossetti]

I don't know how the 6000/7000 is but maybe someone can comment on this. With the Xerox you have access to your corotrons, drums and fuser. You can replace those as needed. If you have an issue with a cyan drum you can easily switch it out. With my KM5501 I have to call a tech to change out the drum, clean a corotron or fix a fuser. Something to consider.

The J75 is no more or less a production machine then the 6000/7000 line. They both have spawned from an office printer line and have been modified to do production work.

 

[Steve0]

Creo is an option with the KM C6000/C7000 although a bit more expensive than the Fiery. However he Fiery can process PPML and VPS for VDP jobs.

Image registration can be adjusted as part of a paper profile.

 

[Despotes]

I don't know how the 6000/7000 is but maybe someone can comment on this. With the Xerox you have access to your corotrons, drums and fuser. You can replace those as needed. If you have an issue with a cyan drum you can easily switch it out. With my KM5501 I have to call a tech to change out the drum, clean a corotron or fix a fuser. Something to consider.

The J75 is no more or less a production machine then the 6000/7000 line. They both have spawned from an office printer line and have been modified to do production work.

The J75 has same inline photospectrometers that the Xerox 8002 and 8080 machines do. If you want accurate easy color this is the way to go. The J75 is the latest version of the 700 series which is light production..In between the Xerox 560 and the 8080. They also have a new registration adn alignment tool that is pretty nice. in the 2 in-plants I mange we I have Xerox (2) 8002s, (2) 8080s, (2) 560's, 1 (550) and a 700. I am repalcing the 700 with a J75 shortly.

I looked at the KM products but the lack of in-line color management and no-inline full bleed booklet making options like Plockmatic or ColorWorks Pro were deciding factors.

 

[Drewstre]

Hello-
We have a 700 with a Creo RIP and a KM C8000 with a Fiery RIP (and a 242...). The most important advice I can give based on our C8000 is do NOT get the KM without the humidifier if you are concerned about curl. We don't have the humidifier, and even the maximum decurl is not enough for heavy stock (100lb cover for example). This is especially important for variable data jobs, where you might wanna run all of a common front and then reload it to run the variable side... something we do a lot. By far my biggest gripe with the C8000. Not an issue with text-weight stocks.

Regarding variable data on a Fiery versus a Creo, I definitely prefer the Fiery. (We also use DesignMerge.) One big issue is if the machine has a problem when you are halfway through an imposed variable data job, and you have to resend part of the job. This is much more easily done on the Fiery, because it always treats imposed sheets as actual sheets, whereas the Creo does not. If you need to resend SHEETS 50 through 100, for example, that's what the Fiery will do. But if you tell the Creo to print "50-100", it will reimpose and print RECORDS 50-100, which is no bueno when you're doing a cut-n-stack.

As far as the actual machines go, they're both good. We have maybe 3,000,000 clicks on the 700, and about 600,000 on the C8000. The C8000 is MUCH faster on heavy stock than the 700, but from what I've read, I think it is only slightly faster than the J75. Registration is better on the C8000. There is curiously no way to adjust skew on the C8000 without a screwdriver, but that hasn't been an issue because you can tighten your paper guides with the paper at the lifted, feed level.

I've always been weary of machines that can scan their way back into register, I've never seen good results from that, but things might have gotten better since I last looked. I personally prefer to run a machine that wouldn't need it to begin with :^)

Arossetti does bring up a very good point: On the C8000, you cannot yourself switch out the drums or fuser (there are actually two fusers). You can clean/swap out the corotron wires if your tech thinks you won't screw it up. I think they are technically a service-only item, but they are _really_ easy to get to. Gotta have a competent, responsive tech.

Despotes, the KM C8000 does have in-line color management...

If you can find a decent used C8000 with low meters, that might be a good way to go.

Feel free to ask any questions...
Drewstre

 

[Despotes]

My understanding is that the KM8000 has inline densitometers, not spectrometers and the op still needs to manually calibrate color and create output profiles with a X-rite i1Pro Spectrophotometer. Xerox's ACQS is automated. hat has made the task extremely easy and fast for our operators. Maybe the KM8000 added spectrophotometer since I looked at it in 3 years ago?

 

[printing656]

Despotes, you are correct that the KM8000 still needs Operator intervention for calibrating.