Xerox 6360 problem - new printer required?

[gaudio]

Hello everyone, first time poster long time reader.

We print CD sleeves using a Xerox 6360 onto 170gsm gloss paper (duplex).

To be honest, the print quality is absolutely shocking - fuzzy fonts (even tahomas and century gothics) rubbish block colour, and you can forget about printing any form of text onto a background!

We print using Quark and Indesign and I am starting to wonder whether the problems involved could be due to my inexperience with these packages.

We print auto duplex, sometimes from photoshop the prints come out quite OK but when I place the same graphic (tiffs, jpegs or pdfs) into indesign or quark the fuzzy text problem occurs again.

So my main ask is this, can someone give me some advice to get the best out of indesign and my xerox 6360 or is it time to give up with it and purchase another printer?

We have been advised to go for the 7760, is this my answer?

We are a small company and budget is not huge!

Thanks so much in advance for any advice.
Stuart

[doubting_thomas]

It sounds like you're having transparency issues. Place your
graphic into InDesign and Export a PDF from there using Acrobat
4.0 compatability (top of the first dialog box on the right). Then
either print that to your printer, or place that back into InDesign
for imposition and print from there. If transparency is the issue
you'll need to flatten the file before it goes to your RIP/printer,
and exporting with 4.0 compatability will do it for you.

I need to do this when I print to my Fiery/Docucolor 2060.

Hopefully it helps.

[PrintPharmacist]

Be more specific...

When you say the fonts are fuzzy and the text on a background looks horrible, maybe it's the registration by chance? Do you have the printer serviced? Has it always printed in this manner?

I always like the "Ain't got no gas in it" approach...

[gaudio]

hi guys,

thanks for the responses!

its printing a lot better since I started exporting to PDF so thanks for the advice!

If I could possibly pick your brains as to what the best settings should be when I export the document?

EG - let indesign choose colour matching etc,

basically - in options - what tabs should I check?
What should my export layers be?

Compression - what should i click - i am on 'do not downsample' at present

in output and advanced do i change the colour conversion?
do i omit opi fonts!??

arrrgh!

any help, once again very gratefully appreciated!

The sleeves are usually colour pictures or graphics with very small texts - placed in indesign from either Jpegs or PDFS (whatever the client sends) and exported out.

many thanks again guys - got far better results than I have in a long time!

[doubting_thomas]

It really depends upon what you're doing. Exporting to Acrobat 4
compatability will flatten the file, so you should do that. If you don't
need to down sample to increase you rip times, or to save space,
then leave that alone too. Keep in mind that your printer won't image
much better if the resolution is over 300 dpi because of the way it
renders your artwork. For that piece of equipment you probably don't
use OPI, unless it's part of a larger workflow. If you're generally happy
with your color I'd leave it alone too. If you change your color management
settings you could be opening a can of worms. You may need to do a little
homework on the jargon so that you can decide what's going to work
best for you. It could be that the preset for PDF X/1a:2001 would
work for you, but be careful about how colors are acting when you test.
You were planning to test, right? ;)

[gaudio]

hi thomas,

thanks for the advice!

i will give it a go and muddle around with the settings. i done a course for 4 years in the uk for desktop publishing and graphic design but that was 10 years ago and ive even lost the basics now!

real pain!

do you know of a good duplex printer capapble of printing graphics and small text adequately.

we were looking at the Xerox 7760dn as it is the 'graphic designers choice' and it says in the brochure 'software to ensure the crispest of text, even small fonts on high colour background' (or something more english than that!).

i think we were missold the 6360 by our supplier as they said it would jumo through hoops for us but the reality is that it is nothing better than a photocopier (with no copier right enough!)!

thanks again,

[doubting_thomas]

I've never printed with a 7760 before. I'd make sure to demo it
with several files that would be worst case scenerios, or tough jobs,
that you've done in the past before you purchase it though. They
should be happy to let you try it if they have one on the floor.
The machines I have experience with are a bit larger than that, but it
looks pretty nice at a glance.

Good luck to you. Things have changed a bit in the digital world
since you went to school, but information has never been easier to obtain.

[gaudio]

thanks for the advice thomas!

good stuff!

have a nice day and hope to speak to you again on here shortly!