DSF

If any members are considering the A3 Ricoh GX7000 printer then get in quick. These machines are going/ have gone end of line from Ricoh and any supported replacement A3 Ricoh printer for sublimation hasn't been announced yet. It's possible the GX7700 will replace the GX7000 but details are scant at present about technical specifications.So if you are considering this printer then get your skates on. We do not have any stock left now, so this isn't a punt for business but other suppliers may still have stock for a limited time.

Hi Martin,
Does this mean that, in time, the sublijet carts will get harder to obtain?

Don't think so. I'm hoping the new Ricoh will take the same cartridges - might be wishful thinking though.

Hmm, the GX7000 is £700+ on Amazon. I wonder how many actually sold, given that Joe Public can buy an A3 printer for little more than £100 these days?

You've got to have some serious love of Ricoh to pay that kind of price.

The Ricoh is a good quality piece of kit though, much better than the Epson R1800 I had previously.

Mark

mgibbs;27699 wrote:The Ricoh is a good quality piece of kit though, much better than the Epson R1800 I had previously.

Mark

I've always maintained that the R1800 is the wrong printer for sublimation. It was only supported by Sawgrass when the 1290S was being discontinued. They panicked to support the R1800, in the mistaken belief that the R1800 was the replacement for the 1290S. It wasn't, of course.

The high cost of the Ricoh is unjustifable in my opinion. I'd rather spend the money on a cheaper printer together with a profiling device so that, in the future, you're not slave to whichever printer Sawgrass bothers to support nor are you tied to a discontinued printer while waiting for Sawgrass to support whatever comes next. Far better to be able to make your own profiles and select your own choice of printer. That way your business isn't tied to the dictates of some third party that couldn't care less about your business in the first place.

I agree with you about the R1800 - nothing but trouble for me - and also not cheap when you add the cost of the CISS system.

Unfortunately the choice of printer was very limited so it was either another Epson (never again for subli printing), scale down to A4 (I seriously considered this but I didn't wasnt thew limitation) or get the A3 Ricoh.

It is expensive but its a well made, solid bit of kit - quick and trouble free (touch wood) and I don't regret paying the premium for it.
Also the Powerdriver adds flexibility.

Mark

What keeps me away from the Ricoh is the price because that price makes it a significant investment so I'd want to still be using it in 4-6 years time. However, I read reports of electrical problems that Ricoh won't fix if you've used someone else's ink. There are vague reassurances that, if you bought from an authorised Sawgrass reseller and the printer fails within the first year then maybe Sawgrass'll help fix it, but that isn't reassurance enough - particularly as it's no reassurance at all if it fails after the first year or if you've bought it from somewhere like Amazon.

In an ideal world we'd have the ink manufacturer (Sawgrass) either manufacturer or licence a printer as good as the Ricoh directly - so that they would specifically offer support for failed printers as we would expect under the normal SoGA. But that's not what we have. If we put third party ink into a printer that wasn't designed for it, it's our own responsibility if something goes wrong. For a printer costing £700, that risk is just wayyy too high. For a printer costing £100 (or less in the case of A4), the printer becomes a "throw it away if it's too much hassle" product. I wouldn't want to be throwing away a £700 Ricoh! Gulp!