XMF or Prinergy

[jeta]

We are a commercial print shop and our work consists of just about anything. We have 3 offset presses, 2 digital, and 3 wide format printers. We also do a lot of finishing that includes folding, stitching and die cutting.

With the discontinuation of Rampage we are having to look into a new workflow. We have narrowed it down to Fuji's XMF and Kodaks Prinery, they seem to be the best fit for our business. They both seem to offer what we need but I am just looking for some feedback from others who have made a switch to one of the two workflows. Either rampage to XMF or Prinergy or possibly Prinergy to XMF and so on. I am interested in both the positive and negatives. I would like to be able to find one front end to drive all processes if possible.

How are they both with trap and gradients?

 

[Joe]

Prinergy user here. We actually switched for a short time in late 2013 to XMF but ultimately decided to stay with Prinergy. XMF is a fine workflow but in the end it seemed like there were many more steps in XMF to accomplish the same task in Prinergy from setting up workflows to processing jobs to maintaining the systems. And at the time Kodak Insite was still far superior to XMF Remote. It might be better by now as it has been more than a year when we tried it.

Both handled trapping and gradients equally as well.

 

[macphenom]

Look at the support contract pricing before getting to far.

 

[ajr]

We have XMF moved from Rampage about 2 years ago, all ok it does the job. Depending how you set it up it can be very automated. We have litho, digital and large format we use different RIPS for all of them. I dont really see any benefit in using one RIP for all as ultimately the machines/procceses are all different. The Fiery on the Igens is great , the Large format Rip (dont know what that is ) works fine.

A

 

[jeta]

Look at the support contract pricing before getting to far.

We already have pricing from both and XMF is cheaper both up front and annually if I am remembering right

 

[csawatzki]

I have to agree with the other gentleman in several ways. If you are using it for internal rip/trap, and you are not too worried about automation with your digital/grand format, you can go with XMF with your eyes closed. If you really want customer facing approval, or fairly advanced automation, you might really look at Kodak, or ask Fuji (XMF) very specific questions before you move forward. Feel free to reach out if I can help further.

Cory Sawatzki
469-879-5546
[email protected]

 

[csawatzki]

You may also want to check out Esko with Automation Engine. Not bad, and with the packaging background, it can be good for Grand format depending on your customers. Webcenter could be your customer facing.

 

[Big Al]

We are a commercial print shop and our work consists of just about anything. We have 3 offset presses, 2 digital, and 3 wide format printers. We also do a lot of finishing that includes folding, stitching and die cutting.

With the discontinuation of Rampage we are having to look into a new workflow. We have narrowed it down to Fuji's XMF and Kodaks Prinery, they seem to be the best fit for our business. They both seem to offer what we need but I am just looking for some feedback from others who have made a switch to one of the two workflows. Either rampage to XMF or Prinergy or possibly Prinergy to XMF and so on. I am interested in both the positive and negatives. I would like to be able to find one front end to drive all processes if possible.

How are they both with trap and gradients?

I'm kind of in the same boat only I have to see if it is worth staying with Prinergy in the long term. I have no problem at all with the upgrade price but they want to charge more then half of the upgrade cost for a Maint. Plan.

I have reevaluated all systems again and even ran into some new ones. I want to stay with the APPE and vector bases trapping, both offered by Prinergy.

I also came across Xantes new Symphony workflow for offset printing. Interesting and may have to look a little deeper. Symphony Workflow

One other problem we are going to run into is we are going to be getting new Macs for the Prepress department. As far as I am aware I don't Kodak has solved the Java issues with the newer Mac OS Xs. You might want to check with Kodak before you sign.

Big Al

 

[Raymond Ramirez]

You are correct al...No answers from Kodak so far... XMF so far for me

 

[Joe]

The next version of Kodak Insite (7) will not use Java. It should be out later this year.

 

[Johu]

Hi, I know that you said that you have already narrowed your search down but did you have a look at Screen Equios? Screen sells Rampage in US so I would think that they would have some sort of upgrade plan from Rampage to Equios.

Judging by the presses/printers you have Equios would fit your needs. Besides making the workflow Screen themselves manufacture CTP devices, Hi speed Inkjet presses and large format printers so you can imagine that Equios fits them all.

Also there are no restrictions on user count or clients and all clients have imposition with again no size or user count restrictions.

But it's just my two cents.

 

[ajr]

I dont think there is a restriction to the amount of Clients for XMF, can either be Mac or PC.

 

[Johu]

Probably no restrictions on how many you can install, but what I meant was how many clients can be working simultaneously. Equios has no restrictions but to my knowledge XMF starts with 3 or 5 user license which of course can be upgraded for a price.

 

[jay12345]

I have looked at the ins and outs of both. we are in the same boat as well. In the end i have decided to go with Prinergy. Prinergy is cheaper both up front and in service. I was quoted $6600 annually for prinergy and $9800 for XMF. That XMF contract does include $1500 annually for PackZ's trapping software as this is the only option Fuji has for trap editing. Prinergy has a trap editing plugin for acrobat that is kinda whatever but at least you can edit traps without adding $15k for a 3rd party program. XMF has an acrobat plugin as well that will allow you to do zone trap editing but it only operates on a legacy version of acrobat. So you would have to keep a legacy version of acrobat installed so that you can do a half ass job at editing traps. I like the interface to XMF as it seems really intuitive but kodak is actually cheaper in every way and they have 20+ years under the belt. The built in impo in XMF seems killer but that is all they really have going for them. The new prinergy will allow you to impose into existing templates from within prinergy while only going out to preps for building new templates. So its kinda baked in. And as far as the prepress portal. Insite seems far superior to Remote. Remote looks like they blew 90% of there budget on the UI.

 

[Big Al]

WOW. $6600 annual support for Kodak Prinergy? They quoted me twice as much as that. I wouldn't mind if they were faster with patches when new OS X versions are released. Just out of curiosity, are you bundling your consumables for this deal?

 

[jay12345]

WOW. $6600 annual support for Kodak Prinergy? They quoted me twice as much as that. I wouldn't mind if they were faster with patches when new OS X versions are released. Just out of curiosity, are you bundling your consumables for this deal?

no i am not.

 

[pabney]

XMF does not have a limit for client install or use. There used to be a restriction, but not any more.
XMF also has a trap zone editor plugin for Acrobat.

I have been using XMF for about a year now.

 

[Big Al]

Does XMF have an online PDF proofing option?

 

[jay12345]

Does XMF have an online PDF proofing option?

yes they offer XMF remote. Seems ok but i think kodaks Insite is better.

 

[Bob Weir]

Jay
How are you making out with your Prinergy/Insite system?