Versant 180 or Accuriopress 3070

[Aashish]

We have started our digital printing press with Xerox DC550, upgraded to Xerox C75. Now again the upgradation is due within 8 months. We have 2 options in the market, which are mostly running in this region.
One is Xerox Versant 180 & other is Konica Minolta Accurio Press C3070. Most of the KM machines installed to replace Xerox Machines for the difference in machine cost & click charges.
While comparing these two machines on technical ground, Print quality, Service,

machine cost & click charges, we are bit confused to select one of these.
Can you expert people guide us with your experience?

Thank you in advance.​

 

[gazfocus]

We upgraded from a Xerox C560 to a Konica Minolta C3070 about 8 months ago so I’ll share some opinions.

Firstly in in terms of price, while the core machine was cheaper with Konica, we found the finishing options very expensive. For example, we decurler on the Xerox was about £900. On the konica it was about £4,000 so we ended up with very little in terms of finishing options. The spec we went for in the end was the three drawer air feeder and the standard finisher with stapler and hole punch.

Also so worth noting, Konica don’t include staples in their service contract whereas Xerox do.

In terms of print quality and capabilities, we opted for the Konica because it can auto duplex 350gsm. We have actually tested 400gsm as well and that also auto duplexes (although not officially supported so have to put it through as 350gsm). The print quality is nice and toner is somewhat more glossy than Xerox, but I’ve not noticed a huge improvement over our Xerox, just that it holds better registration and is a much faster machine.

My only other gripe with the Konica is you can’t scan to usb like you can on the Xerox.

Given the choice again, I’m not sure which one I would for next time but so far as generally happy with the Konica.

 

[Jmacy]

Almost everyone talks about hardware without regard to vendor integrity and support. Konica has shown a strategy to buy market share by offering low cost hardware and little regard for the customer. I would run from Konica, Xerox in the long term will save you money and...that company has integrity.

 

[Aashish]

Thank You gazfocus & Jamcy for your views.

While upgrading to a new machine or changing over to a new vendor (In this case Konica Minolta), my concerns are color consistency in repeat jobs. Machine's capabilities, service and Machine Price & Click charges.

Regarding Paper handling capacity I found Konica is better (as per technical specs). Need to know the toner quality difference (color matching to Xerox' output).

financials of Konica sounds better than Xerox. I still confused about the machine's strength to maintain the output quality for long time.
Lowest price machine may have some quality issues in respect of mechanism & parts. (very first impression when you heard the difference of about 5,00,000 INR)

 

[Robot1984]

I’ve demoed both a few weeks ago here in Brazil.
I need to print book covers, 250gsm to 300gsm
the versant brochure says it handles up to 350gsm on the bypass but when it comes to longer sheets it goes up to 220gsm IIRC... the technician run it anyway with these settings but the colors didn’t look that good, maybe because the fusing unit didn’t deliver enough temperature for 300gsm paper.
the C3070L did better for these stock through the 202XLm (up to 760mm I believe) but I’m not sure it can handle a lot of volume for these stocks.
the versant is around 200 BRL, around 50K USD and the C3070L 125K BRL, 31,25K USD.
The versant 180 also had more expensive toner, no wonder why we see a lot of shops migrating their Xerox to KM around here.

 

[Aashish]

Hi Robert,
did you find any significant color difference in a same job printed on both the machines?
It is much difficult to match the Matt finish colors and gloss colors.
The price difference is the major point of switch over, here also in India, but all those printers are jobbers. The major players of digital print industry here are not bother about the price, and continue with Xerox. This creates some questions in mind, like, why these people are not considering Konica as a better option?
Why they are neglecting the rise in margin, they will get from this switch over?
And if they are not changing over, then there is something which we can not see. Whats that?

 

[Yes U Can]

Why not check out the new Canon imagePRESS C910-series ? Eats all media and has an improved image quality.

 

[Shaare]

I’ve demoed both a few weeks ago here in Brazil.
I need to print book covers, 250gsm to 300gsm
the versant brochure says it handles up to 350gsm on the bypass but when it comes to longer sheets it goes up to 220gsm IIRC... the technician run it anyway with these settings but the colors didn’t look that good, maybe because the fusing unit didn’t deliver enough temperature for 300gsm paper.
the C3070L did better for these stock through the 202XLm (up to 760mm I believe) but I’m not sure it can handle a lot of volume for these stocks.
the versant is around 200 BRL, around 50K USD and the C3070L 125K BRL, 31,25K USD.
The versant 180 also had more expensive toner, no wonder why we see a lot of shops migrating their Xerox to KM around here.

Set the stock as 177-220 gsm uncoated, run the image transfer on a 11x17 and then run that stock on the 26".