Anyone know of a printer that compares to the ALPS MD-1000 type printers. I see that Olympus makes a Dye-Sublimation Digital Photo Printer (Model P-10). I guess it will do most of what the ALPS does except you would have to cut the sheets of water slide stuff because its is not a full size printer. I think the alps has gold and silver ribbons too but I wonder how long you will be able to get the ribbons since it is out of production? Anyway I thought I would ask. This at least looks like a good photo printer!

I don't know the process that Alps uses. However I do know a little about dye sub printing.

Dye sublimation printers work by heating ink on an ink roll. The ink on the sheet is converted to a gas form, then forced on the paper surface. The ink rolls are in sections of 3 or 4 primary color panels, cyan, magenta, yellow and black if it is a 4-color roll.

Dye sub printers achieve photo quality by eliminating much of the graininess and edge sharpness that pixel printers have. Color shifts and tones are very soft and have a natrual appearance, like photos.

They are bad for text, and lack edge clarity that makes text very sharp-looking due to the technology. The ink rolls are typically very expensive and you burn up 4 panels of color, regardless of the size of the image or text you are printing.

I would think this is a poor choice for our purposes, where mostly sharp text is required.

Terry

John -first the MD1000 Alps is not a Dye Sub printer once you get above the 1000 some are capable of printing in dye sub mode. Alps had at one time a comment on their web site to the efect that the Dye Sub inks were not suitable for decals exposed to the elements in that they would fade with exposure to UV at the same rate as ink jets,todays photo printers are much better then the older models but at some point in the not to far future they will fade,they simply are not made for exposure to direct UV. One other key difference with the Alps is having the ability to print in white.
The Alps has not been made for a number of years for sale in the US personally I don't think I would look into bidding on @#$%& for one they are just to old for the most part and there are occasional driver problems best bet go to Decal Connection for the decals for the vast majority it will end up being less expensive then getting a new printer of any type
John

Otherwise., if you DO decide you want to be able to print your own on a moment's notice...The..ALPS MD-1000 is perfect...or. the MD 2010 will also do the job for rodbuilders.( less $)...The MD-5000 works,but is overkill($$)

A citizen "Printiva 700' will work but,ONLY with Win 95 &98.


BTW....if you decide to own one of these printers, and your wife/girlfriend is into any type of crafts or scrapbooking, be prepared to be constantly hounded to print stuff for them in metallic colors....you've been warned.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/13/2005 10:24AM by Harv Gorton.

Alps made printers for Citizen called Printiva same drivers and ink cartriges. I have the Printiva 700 uses full sheets of paper and prints in metallics also. Beware both the alps and citizen printers have not been made in years and the drivers that come with the printers they recommend running on windows 95. You can download drivers that will work with newer systems but for me the metallic option was not present. I ended up buying a cheap laptop on @#$%& to run the printer. I could have bought alot of decals for the 2 to 300 dollars I spent on my set up but I like having the ablity to make and modify my decals at home and the quality is great.

Allen

Myles Boon may chime in here, but I believe the Alps isn't made and sold new "in the US". It is still being made and sold new elsewhere; Myles has a place 'down under' selling these new machines.

My Alps works fine on both my newer computer with Windows XP and on my older one with Windows 98.

Putter
Williston, ND



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/13/2005 12:44PM by Randy Parpart (Putter).

I see they're available at www.tangopapadecals.com in bulk orders

Since I just acquired and Alps printer on @#$%&, I've been "studying up" on the whole issue of using Alps printers to do your own decals. I was first initially amazed at the large and active @#$%& market for these out-of-production printers. Even non-working ALPS printers command a price of $40 to $70 on @#$%& and the reason has to do with Alps support and warranty policy. Send them your old, non-functioning Alps printer and they'll replace it with a refurbed, essentially new replacement for $350.

True, you'd have to need a lot of decals to justify that kind of expense,UNLESS, you just also have a wife who is also into ceramics or decoupage or decorating candles, etc. So there it was....... the perfect opportunity to be a hero and encourage my wife's arts and crafts endeavors. The fact that I'd be getting an occasional decal for my rod building hobby is, of course, only incidental, naturally......... (Thin, I know, but it worked for me!)

Decal paper and ink cartridges for the Alps printers seem readily available on-line. Cartridges are about $10/ea. With the kind of demand that seems to be out there for these things, I can't imagine that they will disappear any time soon.


Paul B.

Thanks everyone! really good feedback and advice as usual.