Why are low dpi printers more expensive?

In article ,
writes

I think I'd very rarely use A3 size.

That's what you think right now - because you don't have the ability to
print 13x19" Super A3. Once you do, those little squiddly A4 prints
will just seem like trash magazine pages. ;-)

it's just one of those nice
things to have.

And when you have it its very nice. ;-)

I also like the idea of being equipped to deal with
bigger prints if the situation should ever arise in the future.


When so equipped, it is amazing how frequently that situation arises.
;-)

If I went for an Epson A4 printer would the quality be better?

No, unless you want the highest gloss on glossy paper possible, then it
will make a difference, but not in resolution. The R800 uses
ultrachrome inks which have a glossier finish than the pigment inks on
the 2100. The 2100 doesn't really provide a high gloss finish at all,
and the results on high gloss paper can look slightly embossed.

--
Kennedy
Yes, Socrates himself is particularly missed;
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he's ****ed.
Python Philosophers (replace 'nospam' with 'kennedym' when replying)

The R800 is the latest in epsons range of pigmented base inkjet printers -
apart from the width,it differs from the 2100/2200, and other ultrachrome
printers ( 4000 , 7600 etc) in that it uses a different inkset ( a red and
blue rather than a light cyan and magenta and, to improve the glossy finish,
has a clear gloss cartridge as well. this evens teh surface when printed on
gloss paper ( the 2100 etc suffer from what is called bronzing on semi and
glossy papers a reflection of the ink when viewed at an angle - it bothers
some, but I dont find it a major issue)

The greatest advantage of these printers is the print life - these should
outlast traditional, wet darkroom prints, so may be too much of a printer if
all you intend is to print contact sheets - If you intend to sell your own
prints, then these are the best available at the moment .

Finally with a 10d, you can print reasonable 13*19's without interpolation -
but I wouldn't recommend too much cropping, (or printing larger, nor
studying it too close!); how do I know - I have the same combination....


wrote in message
...
On Sat, 07 Aug 2004 21:18:21 -0500, David Dyer-Bennet
wrote:

writes:
I'm looking to buy a new photo printer for my Canon 10d digital
camera.

For example, Epson Stylus Photo 2100 is 2880 DPI on A3 paper and costs
around £422. The Epson Stylus Photo R800 is 5760 DPI on A4 paper and
costs £240. There are other printers aswell which are like this, low
DPI more money, high DPI less money.

The important point here is that the 2100 is a wide-carriage printer,
capable of printing up to 12 inches wide. The R800 is a
narrow-carriage printer, limited to 8.5 inches wide.

Wide-carriage printers are both harder to build, and sell in smaller
quantities, so they're expensive.

Is it worth investing in the 2100? or should I be looking at another
printer. From what I can tell, this is one of the best printers for
mid range money.

The reason I need a printer is because I'm a professional photographer
and I send out my pictures as jpgs to my clients.The publications
print the images themselves. I only want the printer for contact
sheets and samples of the jpgs. The images will be printed by the
client using the CD-ROM's I supply.

I could go for a R800 or R300 quite easily but if I'm going to buy a
printer I want to get it right first time. I like to keep my printers
for a long time.

I think I'd very rarely use A3 size. it's just one of those nice
things to have. I also like the idea of being equipped to deal with
bigger prints if the situation should ever arise in the future.

If I went for an Epson A4 printer would the quality be better? If yes,
which Epson printer is better than the 2100 for A4 prints.

The R800 is the latest in epsons range of pigmented base inkjet printers -
apart from the width,it differs from the 2100/2200, and other ultrachrome
printers ( 4000 , 7600 etc) in that it uses a different inkset ( a red and
blue rather than a light cyan and magenta and, to improve the glossy finish,
has a clear gloss cartridge as well. this evens teh surface when printed on
gloss paper ( the 2100 etc suffer from what is called bronzing on semi and
glossy papers a reflection of the ink when viewed at an angle - it bothers
some, but I dont find it a major issue)

The greatest advantage of these printers is the print life - these should
outlast traditional, wet darkroom prints, so may be too much of a printer if
all you intend is to print contact sheets - If you intend to sell your own
prints, then these are the best available at the moment .

Finally with a 10d, you can print reasonable 13*19's without interpolation -
but I wouldn't recommend too much cropping, (or printing larger, nor
studying it too close!); how do I know - I have the same combination....


wrote in message
...
On Sat, 07 Aug 2004 21:18:21 -0500, David Dyer-Bennet
wrote:

writes:
I'm looking to buy a new photo printer for my Canon 10d digital
camera.

For example, Epson Stylus Photo 2100 is 2880 DPI on A3 paper and costs
around £422. The Epson Stylus Photo R800 is 5760 DPI on A4 paper and
costs £240. There are other printers aswell which are like this, low
DPI more money, high DPI less money.

The important point here is that the 2100 is a wide-carriage printer,
capable of printing up to 12 inches wide. The R800 is a
narrow-carriage printer, limited to 8.5 inches wide.

Wide-carriage printers are both harder to build, and sell in smaller
quantities, so they're expensive.

Is it worth investing in the 2100? or should I be looking at another
printer. From what I can tell, this is one of the best printers for
mid range money.

The reason I need a printer is because I'm a professional photographer
and I send out my pictures as jpgs to my clients.The publications
print the images themselves. I only want the printer for contact
sheets and samples of the jpgs. The images will be printed by the
client using the CD-ROM's I supply.

I could go for a R800 or R300 quite easily but if I'm going to buy a
printer I want to get it right first time. I like to keep my printers
for a long time.

I think I'd very rarely use A3 size. it's just one of those nice
things to have. I also like the idea of being equipped to deal with
bigger prints if the situation should ever arise in the future.

If I went for an Epson A4 printer would the quality be better? If yes,
which Epson printer is better than the 2100 for A4 prints.

From: Kennedy McEwen

All of the Epson desktop range resample all of the images you send them
to 720ppi

Do you have a source for this? I know they resample to *something* internally
since if you save off the print files they are always the same size for a given
image regardless if you start with 100 ppi or 900 ppi (and it looks like they
use nearest neighbor resampling internally) but I've never found a source from
Epson that explicitly says they resample to 360 or 720 or ???.

I'm not doubting your number, I thought it was higher than 360 ppi myself and
so 720 would make sense but I would like to see if Epson themselves has stated
this somewhere.

Bill

Kennedy, you are a gem. Thanks for that very lucid explanation.

Toby

"Kennedy McEwen" wrote in message
...
In article , Douglas
writes

There is a great deal of difference to a photographer in 1440 and 2880!

Not if they know what they are talking about!

Here we are talking about *DOTS* per inch, not *pixels* per inch, or
ppi.

All of the Epson desktop range resample all of the images you send them
to 720ppi (other manufacturers do the same but with differing native
resolutions, like 300ppi etc.). The dots per inch is always higher than
this for an inkjet printer so that each pixel's colour can be reproduced
as accurately as possible by dithering the ink dot placement. More ink
colours means that less dots are required per pixel to accurately
produce its colour. In addition, since the highest resolution that you
can see on the printed page without use of magnification is about
250ppi, and for most people it is a lot less, that 720ppi resampled data
means that there are about 9 actual pixels on the page for each resolved
unit that you can see - so the driver can easily afford to dither dots
over 9 pixels before you would even see any performance fall-off. Epson
take advantage of this using a stochastic dither process which produces
very high colour accuracy over areas where adjacent pixels are almost
identical, yet achieves up to 360cy/in resolution on the page where the
image actually contains such information.

--
Kennedy
Yes, Socrates himself is particularly missed;
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he's ****ed.
Python Philosophers (replace 'nospam' with 'kennedym' when
replying)

"Douglas" . wrote in message ...
There is a great deal of difference to a photographer in 1440 and 2880!

If you're talking about printer dpi, it will be nearly indiscernable. The
difference between 720 dpi & 1440 is noticeable, but not from much more than
an arm's length. I'd be willing to bet very few folks could tell the
difference between a 1440 dpi and 2880 dpi print using the same image file.

Also
the 2100 IS the same printer as the 2200.The 2100 is the Euro version! The
2100(2200) and the R800 use "pigment inks"! The RX 600 does not! Pigment
inks have solids suspended in them,and give much loner lasting prints,on
the
right papers!By the way Mark,the 2000 was the printer replaced bu the
2200!
I agree people should check Epsons website for specs instead of
"speculating" on the differences!

OK, thanks - that's exactly why I recommended the Epson site for info.

Mark

wrote in message
...
On Sun, 08 Aug 2004 11:50:02 GMT, "stanb"
wrote:

The R800 is the latest in epsons range of pigmented base inkjet
printers -
apart from the width,it differs from the 2100/2200, and other ultrachrome
printers ( 4000 , 7600 etc) in that it uses a different inkset ( a red
and
blue rather than a light cyan and magenta and, to improve the glossy
finish,
has a clear gloss cartridge as well. this evens teh surface when printed
on
gloss paper ( the 2100 etc suffer from what is called bronzing on semi
and
glossy papers a reflection of the ink when viewed at an angle - it
bothers
some, but I dont find it a major issue)

So is the 2100 still a safe bet? The only reason I'm asking is because
it's been around for a couple of years and I'm worried that the newer,
cheaper printers such as the R300 or R800 are better.

Think of the R800 as a little brother to the 2100. They both use the
archival pigment based inks.

Mark

wrote in message
...
On Sun, 08 Aug 2004 11:50:02 GMT, "stanb"
wrote:

The R800 is the latest in epsons range of pigmented base inkjet
printers -
apart from the width,it differs from the 2100/2200, and other ultrachrome
printers ( 4000 , 7600 etc) in that it uses a different inkset ( a red
and
blue rather than a light cyan and magenta and, to improve the glossy
finish,
has a clear gloss cartridge as well. this evens teh surface when printed
on
gloss paper ( the 2100 etc suffer from what is called bronzing on semi
and
glossy papers a reflection of the ink when viewed at an angle - it
bothers
some, but I dont find it a major issue)

So is the 2100 still a safe bet? The only reason I'm asking is because
it's been around for a couple of years and I'm worried that the newer,
cheaper printers such as the R300 or R800 are better.

Think of the R800 as a little brother to the 2100. They both use the
archival pigment based inks.

Mark

I pretty much second what Kennedy states here... how nice to not have
to write all this stuff myself ;-)

Art

Kennedy McEwen wrote:

In article , Douglas
writes

There is a great deal of difference to a photographer in 1440 and 2880!


Not if they know what they are talking about!

Here we are talking about *DOTS* per inch, not *pixels* per inch, or ppi.

All of the Epson desktop range resample all of the images you send them
to 720ppi (other manufacturers do the same but with differing native
resolutions, like 300ppi etc.). The dots per inch is always higher than
this for an inkjet printer so that each pixel's colour can be reproduced
as accurately as possible by dithering the ink dot placement. More ink
colours means that less dots are required per pixel to accurately
produce its colour. In addition, since the highest resolution that you
can see on the printed page without use of magnification is about
250ppi, and for most people it is a lot less, that 720ppi resampled data
means that there are about 9 actual pixels on the page for each resolved
unit that you can see - so the driver can easily afford to dither dots
over 9 pixels before you would even see any performance fall-off. Epson
take advantage of this using a stochastic dither process which produces
very high colour accuracy over areas where adjacent pixels are almost
identical, yet achieves up to 360cy/in resolution on the page where the
image actually contains such information.

I pretty much second what Kennedy states here... how nice to not have
to write all this stuff myself ;-)

Art

Kennedy McEwen wrote:

In article , Douglas
writes

There is a great deal of difference to a photographer in 1440 and 2880!


Not if they know what they are talking about!

Here we are talking about *DOTS* per inch, not *pixels* per inch, or ppi.

All of the Epson desktop range resample all of the images you send them
to 720ppi (other manufacturers do the same but with differing native
resolutions, like 300ppi etc.). The dots per inch is always higher than
this for an inkjet printer so that each pixel's colour can be reproduced
as accurately as possible by dithering the ink dot placement. More ink
colours means that less dots are required per pixel to accurately
produce its colour. In addition, since the highest resolution that you
can see on the printed page without use of magnification is about
250ppi, and for most people it is a lot less, that 720ppi resampled data
means that there are about 9 actual pixels on the page for each resolved
unit that you can see - so the driver can easily afford to dither dots
over 9 pixels before you would even see any performance fall-off. Epson
take advantage of this using a stochastic dither process which produces
very high colour accuracy over areas where adjacent pixels are almost
identical, yet achieves up to 360cy/in resolution on the page where the
image actually contains such information.