» New Epson Printers Invite Controversy Dvorak Uncensored: General interest observations and true web-log.

Published on August 31st, 2005

New Stylus Photo RX700 — Great Product

I recently saw most of the new Epson printer line and tdoay the company announced this killer all-in-one unit. What makes this interesting is a new direction for Epson and I suspect for all printers built by everyone from now on: the ability to print directly on a DVD or CD-ROM as a standard feature. This, of course requires the discs with the white coating that accepts ink. This will effectively change the dsik and label business forever. Labels on disks have always been problematic since they can come off and gum up a disk reading mechanism.

What makes this printer particularly controversial comes from the press release cited here:

• Built-in CD/DVD printing directly onto ink jet printable media (printable CDs and DVDs are available from all major disc manufacturers)
• CD/DVD printing can be done without a PC or with the included Epson Print CD software
• Items placed on the scanner such as photos, designs etc. can be easily printed on the surface of a printable CD or DVD without the use of a PC

What this says is that if you copy a disk you can also copy 1:1 the disk label. Clever.

For more information about this $399 printer download the fact sheet here.

8 users responded in " New Epson Printers Invite Controversy "

# 1 Ima Fish said, on August 31st, 2005 at 10:49 am

I think this would be more controversial if it included a DVD/CD burner so you could make a truly perfect copy. My god, could you imagine the uproar with such a device?!

I’d love to get one of these because you really can’t stick a label on burned DVDs due to wobble. I’ve created quite a few coasters via labeling until I learned about the cause.

People even sell alleged “wobble free” labels. E.g.,: http://www.americal.com/pd/313758.html But from what I’ve read in forums they aren’t necessarily better.

# 2 Dan Moutal said, on August 31st, 2005 at 10:53 am

This feature has significant non-infringing uses so it should be ok.

i say should because we all know that the RIAA and MPAA have been out shopping for politicians lately

# 3 Rick said, on August 31st, 2005 at 11:40 am

Soon it will be a one step process. For the past year, it was a 2 step process. First you had to scan it on your PC, then print on an Epson R200, R300 or R800 printer. In the rest of the world, HP, Canon and others provide the service on many models of photo printers…
So far, the ink isn’t very stable on the printable surfaces. Smudges are a problem. But eventually, someone will provide surfaces designed for the pigment inks then it’s Bootleg city for every one who whats to.

Great hearing you on TWiT!

# 4 Edward said, on August 31st, 2005 at 12:01 pm

I have been using an Epson R200 for over a year, printing onto white CD’s, and I can tell you that I would never go back to labels. In addition to looks, there is talk that the white surface is more durable than regular CDs and DVDs, and that there is no worry of media deterioration due to the CD label glue affecting the media itself.
The disaster in New Orleans reminded me to mention someting very imkportant:
One interesting item not mentioned in the blog: 3200 x 6400 dpi scanning and true 48-bit color and 3.3 optical density. Although the optical density is not all that good, the ‘native’ resolution is higher than that of many dedicated slide scanners. So this is an excellent solution also for those that would like to make at least basic backups of digital files from their slides and old photos. Scan your slides, make CDs from the scans, and send the CD’s to relatives or friends out of town for safekeeping in their own attic. If your house burns down, floats away, comes crashing down, gets blown away, etc, at least you have something somewhere that can be used to reconstruct the photos.
Maybe that would be a good topic for a ’stand-alone’ column?

# 5 rus said, on August 31st, 2005 at 12:13 pm

How much are the inks and how long do they last?

# 6 Stu Mulne said, on August 31st, 2005 at 12:53 pm

Whoa….

Can’t wait to see this hit the courts. Sony all over again?

This has always been possible at the “large scale” level – Chinese “factory”, for example, but now you and I can do it too.

However, putting holographic images into the DVD or CD coating should be pretty trivial, and damned hard to copy with this printer.

Send the money here, please….

Regards,

# 7 Fusion75 said, on September 1st, 2005 at 3:35 am

I use the casio handheld thermal printer for labeling on white thermal printable media. For archiving I just use hub labels that I print in my laser printer. I just number them and use a program called cathy to index the files. When I need something I search my index then locate the disk. I think this will be the way to do it when 50gb and beyond disks become available. I currently fit 12 tv episodes on one dvd using divx. Posted from my treo 650

# 8 Adam said, on September 1st, 2005 at 5:29 am

This is a cool feature, that was not intended to make bootlegging easier. I would be very suprised if anyone have a damn about this.

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