KBA Karat

[Raymond Ramirez]

Good day people. I need a little assistance. I have tried to understand how this machine works. It has a Scitex Brisque interface. That transforms the file into a .store file so that the Karat then print. my question is this. is there a different interface that can produce the files for the Karat?

we do not have a backup for that old brisque box.

 

[Paul Santer]

Probably the same as most of the other DI Presses, someone like RTI should be able to provide a Harlequin Rip with a plug-in for your Press.

I think you will find the .store file is the internal file format for Brisque Storage not the file format going to the Karat.

 

[dgrande]

The Karat's were initially produced with a CREO/Brisque RIP, which created output in a specific format for the press's integrated CTP. Later, KBA offered a TIFF Catcher (a special secondary RIP made by CGS). The TIFF Catcher would accept output from any RIP with the ability to create 1-bit TIFF output, and would then normalize the 1-bit TIFF's for use with the proprietary Karat imaging. replacing the Brisque. This required purchase of the special TIFF Catcher from CGS, plus a board upgrade (typically the CPU card in the Ebox), as well as the option from KBA (some firmware updates). It was pretty expensive, about $30K, and you have to rebuild your color curves and profile.

We have two used Brisque RIP's with Karat drivers for sale if you are interested. A 4.1 and a 5.x.

Send me a PM if you are interested, or call at: 703-740-4080

Dean

 

[Raymond Ramirez]

Dean...thank you. I also was given the task of coming up with a back up for the Karat computer. I am sitting beside myself because that box is a behemoth of a computer..and what is that I see on the back...bnc connection. Wasn't that from the seventies.

 

[dgrande]

If you mean the "eBox" (sits in the console beside the front of the press), it's just an industrial PC running Windows NT 4.0.

As you have discovered, it's legacy, with a lot of proprietary firmware.

It is also irreplaceable, except with identical OEM. You can't replace it with anything other than what it is, and it's no longer made or supported. There are a few used ones out there, but they are tough to find. KBA might have some left too, not sure, but it would be expensive.

We use an old version of Norton Ghost to mirror our drives in case one fails. That's about the best you can do to protect them. If a drive crashes without backup, it is possible to reinstall the OS and Karat application, but you loose your profile, which requires a factory tech and several days to configure. Much $$. Make sure you have backup of the profile (there is an app in the Karat UI to backup the profile.

But if the CPU backplane goes bad, you are out of luck without having to get a new one.