4 ms·

CISS's (Continuous Ink Supply System's) have been around for decades. You can buy pretty basic printers and retrofit them with a $100 system that will hold enou

by megraf 4y ago

CISS's (Continuous Ink Supply System's) have been around for decades. You can buy pretty basic printers and retrofit them with a $100 system that will hold enough ink to print 10's of thousands of pages. The problem with this system is that the ink heads dry (quickly). If you're doing a lot of printing (daily / weekly) – a CISS is pretty much your bread and butter. Refilling the ink in a CISS is pretty simple as well, just take your time.

crazygringo 4y ago
That's for inkjet printers though, no? This is for a laser printer. No worrying about drying ink heads. But now you've got me curious -- who is printing 10's of thousands of pages using an inkjet? I would have thought that anything at volume is laser, with the exception of photo printing.
- fibers 4y ago
  companies that still deal w a lot of paper like factories or warehouses
- seltzered_ 4y ago
  My understanding is you can still use CISS at a smaller scale, for example here's a 'mini' setup I came across: http://new.proinkshop.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=78&product_id=386 http://new.proinkshop.com/index.php?route=product/product&pa... I've hesitated on actually trying this though as there's usually some details about keeping an old firmware version or something to make it work.
- xenadu02 4y ago
  > who is printing 10's of thousands of pages using an inkjet Specialty applications such as large-format inkjets (eg 3ft/1m wide continuous roll paper), edible ink for baked goods applications, custom inks for branding/proofs/industrial, and so forth. My favorite was a specialty cake printer that was designed to print directly on the icing of a cake, not on an edible wax or fondant sheet (which always seem like cheating to me). There are quite a few applications where desktop-like inkjets are used in high-throughput modes. They either don't sit idle long enough to suffer from dryout or they're built to deal with it. They do automatic light clean cycles and some models have rubber gasket head parking areas to seal the heads and prevent ink evaporation when idle. Some manufacturers also sell auto-cleaning units so the printer can do a full deep-clean automatically. I'm not counting true industrial applications (eg packaging expiration date print heads) since those aren't usually document-centric nor do they speak desktop printing protocols like PCL.
- asldjajlfkj 4y ago
  On the contrary! Almost all books you buy are printed with ink. Companies buy ink for offset printing in bulk anyway and can use the same for jet printing. Ink is cheaper, faster and can achieve better quality, especially when color is involved. Laser only exists for offices, : black and white printing, unsteady usage patterns, fast printing on small scale, replacing cartridges are administratively challenging.

by megraf 4y ago

crazygringo 4y ago

That's for inkjet printers though, no? This is for a laser printer. No worrying about drying ink heads. But now you've got me curious -- who is printing 10's of thousands of pages using an inkjet? I would have thought that anything at volume is laser, with the exception of photo printing.

fibers 4y ago
companies that still deal w a lot of paper like factories or warehouses
seltzered_ 4y ago
My understanding is you can still use CISS at a smaller scale, for example here's a 'mini' setup I came across: http://new.proinkshop.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=78&product_id=386 http://new.proinkshop.com/index.php?route=product/product&pa... I've hesitated on actually trying this though as there's usually some details about keeping an old firmware version or something to make it work.
xenadu02 4y ago
> who is printing 10's of thousands of pages using an inkjet Specialty applications such as large-format inkjets (eg 3ft/1m wide continuous roll paper), edible ink for baked goods applications, custom inks for branding/proofs/industrial, and so forth. My favorite was a specialty cake printer that was designed to print directly on the icing of a cake, not on an edible wax or fondant sheet (which always seem like cheating to me). There are quite a few applications where desktop-like inkjets are used in high-throughput modes. They either don't sit idle long enough to suffer from dryout or they're built to deal with it. They do automatic light clean cycles and some models have rubber gasket head parking areas to seal the heads and prevent ink evaporation when idle. Some manufacturers also sell auto-cleaning units so the printer can do a full deep-clean automatically. I'm not counting true industrial applications (eg packaging expiration date print heads) since those aren't usually document-centric nor do they speak desktop printing protocols like PCL.
asldjajlfkj 4y ago
On the contrary! Almost all books you buy are printed with ink. Companies buy ink for offset printing in bulk anyway and can use the same for jet printing. Ink is cheaper, faster and can achieve better quality, especially when color is involved. Laser only exists for offices, : black and white printing, unsteady usage patterns, fast printing on small scale, replacing cartridges are administratively challenging.