Archive for May, 2008
The Teac P-55 thermal dye-sublimation disc printer creates CD and DVD labels on printable CDs and printable DVDs with the same or better quality then silk screening. Teac's P-55 software features a color matching process that allows you to match Pantone color accurately. As the world's only dye-sublimation disc printer the Teac P-55 four color, CMYK thermal printing prints at 400 DPI (290 LPI) one of the highest resolution desktop thermal printers. The Teac P-55 has 4 different print modes in one printer: Photo Mode (Dye-Sublimation), Color (cyan, magenta, yellow and K-true black/thermal re-transfer), Black (thermal re-transfer, 256 shades of gray)) and VersaMax (thermal re-transfer). The new VersaMax ribbon offers more CD and DVD options to choose from. VersaMax can print on most inkjet printable CD and DVD discs and silver lacquer media by utilizing a print process that adds a printable surface layer onto the disc first before the label is actually printed.
The process of thermal re-transfer works in the following manner. The image is printed with 4 individual color panels onto a re-transfer ribbon that is adhered to the disc. The P-55 does this in two seperate modes based on the consumables: First thermal wax transfer, and then dye sublimation.
Dye sublimation is a process of thermal printing in which a "dye" is transferred from the color ribbon to a transfer ribbon as a solid to a gas to a solid. The dye never becomes liquid, only a gas. Thus it is not applied like an ink-jet process in dots. The gas application allows the colors to blend better to produce a more photo realistic image.
The P-55 will print the photo, color and VersaMax prints including the transfer time in about 100 seconds. The black print will take 40 seconds for the print and transfer time. The P-55 has a 400 dpi print head. This is the highest resolution print head available. This produces the equivalent of 290 lpi, compared to the Rimage Everest III with only 173 lpi. Photo, Color and VersaMax ink ribbons get 500 prints per ribbon and the black ribbon gets 2000 prints.
An interesting feature of the Teac P-55 is it's method of holding the disc. All other printers drop the disc into a tray which "aligns" the disc in a rather crude manner. Teac uses a device that holds the disc in the center of the hub which precisely aligns the disc with the print head.
Why is thermal re-transfer and dye-sublimation better then inkjet?
Thermal printed surfaces are indelible vs. inkjet which is easy to scratch, fade, run and smudge
Thermal provides a more consistent print quality whereas inkjet print quality can be inconsistent
Thermal printing drys instantly vs. inkjet which can vary on dry times due to the print surface and amount of ink applied. Full color inkjet can take a minute or more to dry.
Thermal printing does not create banding or "run out" where as inkjet does. This can create a large number of discs of inferior print quality. As the ink cartridges run out of color they still print but in less and less colors. Color shifting occurs when one of the three colors in a cartridge runs out.
Edge-to-edge printing: Inkjet printer can not print to the edge of the disc. Due to the non-printable characteristics of the edges of an inkjet printable disc. Over-run ink never dries and smears when touched. Thermal printing prints edge-to edge.
What is included with the Teac P-55 thermal dye sublimation disc printer?
Teac p-55 printer
USB 2.0 interface cable
IEEE 1284 parallel interface cable
disc labeling editor software
thermal printable CD-R discs (10)
Color ink ribbon/transfer kit
AC power cord.
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According to Digitimes Prodisc is planning to discontinue CD-R production. This is the continuing saga of the Philips action against several Taiwan CD-R manufacturers over royalty payments.
CMC, Ritek and Prodisc have been in negotiation with Philips since last year when the last license ran out. Digitimes had pointed out that the troubles for Prodisc really started with them publicly
protesting how unfair the royalty program is. Philips requested and received a request to seize assets of Prodisc in Taiwan which includes a manufacturing facility and money in a bank account.
Stay Tuned
This is a link to the full story Digitimes article
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DVD Duplicator Tower:
What is a DVD duplicator anyway? It consists of a enclosure that can hold from 1 to 15 CD-R, DVD and Blu-ray Recorders, a power supply, a drive controller and fans. Optional features can include USB 2.0 and or Fire-Wire connectivity to one drive. This allows for mastering a disc using a PC connection via USB. For the added cost it's just as wise to buy a drive specific to your mastering needs and keep the duplicator to doing what it's made for. The USB connection does not provide a means of connecting the hard drive. That would be a cool feature. There are duplicators that can copy a USB flash drive or several other flash memory cards. There are some hybrids, specifically the OS based units that offer greater mastering features as offered by MF Digital.
Controller Based:
Disc Controllers are the brains of the DVD duplicator tower. It controls all the drives including the hard drive. All models present some kind of interface. Typically a LCD screen is used that has two lines of text. You simply use a push button keypad to scroll through the options. Options such as password protection, disc count, track extraction, dynamic partitioning and many other features make a DVD duplicator a great choice for production and office needs. One of my favorite is the CD Dimensions Disc Commander which has all the features of the other CD Dimensions DVD duplicators and the ability to be daisy-chain connected so one tower DVD duplicator can control 20 or more units.
OS based:
There are some DVD duplicators that use an operating system based controller using Windows XP home or pro. Specifically the MF Digital Live Event rackmount duplicator. this system is the only network DVD tower on the market with the ability to link together DVD towers on a network. With live event recording ( Record directly from mixer, console or any analog / digital source) for both audio and video and disc spanning the MF Digital Live Event rack-mount duplicator has a lot to offer beyond duplication
Rack mount:
Rackmount DVD duplicators provide a more compact footprint then tower duplicators. They are designed to fit into a standard rack or you can just stack them up. They are also excellent for mobile applications like duplicating at concerts or conferences.
The critical components of any DVD duplicator are the drives, controller, power supply, hard drive and cooling fans. One or two fans is not sufficient in tower DVD duplicators over 5 drives especially when one of the fans is for the power supply: Heat kills drives. The more air that can be pulled through the duplicator the cooler it runs. It's important to note that the DVD duplicator needs a way of pulling in the cooler air. Vents on the front of the duplicator help and keep the drives from being the main vents drawing in dust in the process. to learn more about DVD duplicators please follow this link to CD Dimensions article about Tower DVD Duplicators
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The Recordex StudioJet 50 CD Printer offers value and performance. It uses non-proprietary ink cartridges that are half the cost of other CD printer manufacturer's ink cartridges. The Recordex StudioJet 50 features HP printer technology using out of the box HP56 black and HP57 color. The HP inkjet engine is very quick and the Discus LE label software is very intuitive so you are not sitting in front of a CD printer for an hour trying to get everything to work. I have demo'd a lot of units and this was the easiest and actually worked right out of the box. The Recordex StudioJet 50 features a 50 disc input hopper and a 50 disc output. Essentially the disc drops down from the hopper into the printer tray (using a singulator that only allows one disc to drop at a time) the disc prints, the tray opens and the disc is ejected out into a bin that sits to the right of the unit. No robotics and a very short path between input and output.
It's very easy to set-up and operate: Snap on the output bin, screw in the input hoppers posts, USB 2.0 connection, install 2 ink cartridges, install the driver and disc software and you are ready to print labels. Works with all inkjet printable media for CD-R, DVD-R,DVD+R and recordable Blu-ray. It only supports PC and comes with a one year warranty Link
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CD Dimensions is offering free sample packs of the thermal and inkjet printable CD-R and DVD-R Falcon Media, made by FTI
Free Sample Offer
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