I need a new CD/DVD disk publisher, the one I have is fairly old, and I’ve repaired it several times. It’s still running and producing CDs and DVDs, but it gets flakey on me from time to time and I think it’s time to look for a replacement.
I’ve been using the Primera Bravo Disk Publisher, which is the older version of this:
It’s worked very well for us, we’ve produced thousands and thousands of disks and it seems like the obvious choice would be to just get the current version. But I figured we might as well see what else might be available as long as we’re looking.
Whatever I get must burn both CDs and DVDs, work from pre-defined jobs (we have about 5 different disks we produce at any one time plus one-off jobs) and do the entire thing: take a blank disk, burn it, and print the label. It needs to be able to do a stack at a time hands free. Our current unit does up to 25 at a time, which is OK, but it might be nice to go to 50 at a time. Speed is not a huge concern, but obviously faster is better, and we don’t want to slow down much from where we are.
For printing, our current unit uses CDs and DVDs with ink jettable (is that a word) labels, and come out looking great. We do spray them with a sealant to make them more resistant to smearing. But I’d consider other types it they still produced good looking full color labels.
My budget is about $1500 to $2000, and obviously I’d like it if it were less. I’m willing to look at used equipment if it’s in good shape.
I’ll toss in another recommendation for you to consider. Check out the Epson DiscProducer ( Automated CD & DVD Duplicators & Printers | Disc Makers ). It’s a bit over your initial budget at $2700, but I would actually recommend it very highly. Also, consumables cost seems to be lower than other models we’ve used, so it may work out to be cheaper in the long run.
We bought one about a year ago and it’s gotten pretty heavy use since then. It’s a very well engineered machine, much more streamlined than most duplicator/printers in this price range. It seems to have been designed form the ground up as an integrated duplicator/printer rather than assembled from a standalone printer with cd burners and a robot arm grafted on. So far, we’ve never had any kind of malfunction and the print quality is excellent with no need for sealant.
Some advantages we’ve noticed over some previous units:
-ink is very easy to change and does not require a realignment of the print heads, so you can plug new ink cartridges in during a slight pause in an ongoing job
-ink level monitoring is very accurate and it predicts how many more discs you can print based on previous average coverage
disc grabber assembly has never failed to grab a disc or grabbed more than one at a time
unit is completely enclosed, so it really keeps dust out and is pretty quiet
software is easy to use for small or large quantities (up to 100 per batch)
software handles templates as well as pre-designed labels (like a PNG or JPG image from Photoshop) and can include auto generated text (like current date, serial numbers, even a list of files on the disc)
software allows job queuing
I only have one quibble with the machine (actually the software). It doesn’t allow for an easy way to track units burned in past jobs. We need to do that for accounting purposes sometimes and we end up doing it manually. On the other hand, none of the other units we’ve used did that either.
I don’t have any experience with the Bravo II system, but since they are the same MSRP I would go with the Epson in a second. We’ve used an older Primera, a Rimage and a Discmatic in the past and the Epson blows them all away. We’re even considering getting another one.
I’ll be glad to answer any additional questions, since I know from past experience how hard researching these machines is. And for the record, I have no stake in or relationship with Epson.
Thanks Enigma42, I’ll check those out. It does look like a good unit.
How durable are the labels? One thing we’ve noticed about the unit we have is that the labels will smudge if your hands are damp or sweaty. Not a lot, but some. So we’ve been spraying the disks after printing with a sealant. That’s works fine, but it would be nice not to have to worry about the additional step.
We haven’t seen any smudging at all unless they are subjected to a solvent like rubbing alcohol. Water or sweat doesn’t seem to budge the ink at all. The discs also come out basically dry and don’t need any drying time if you dial the ink coverage and quality settings back a notch or two from the highest settings. The Rimage machine we used to use did have problems with smudging on high coverage prints and we’re still using the same printable discs so the difference appears to be in the ink formulation.
We did a few tests to determine what the various quality levels looked like and we decided that we really couldn’t see the difference between the top 2-3 levels. Lower than that was fine for internal or draft discs, but we put it back to 75-80% for client deliverables. Higher than that just seems to use the ink faster and require a few seconds of drying time.
I should also mention that one other benefit we’ve seen is that the Epson uses 6 separate ink cartridges instead of a black plus a 3-color as some other machines use (I don’t know if that’s the case with your current machine). We tend to use a lot more cyan ink (clients love blue!) than the others, so it seem like we waste a lot less of the other colors. A full set of ink is expensive for this machine, but it does last a long time (800-1500 discs in our experience).
I have to admit, the Epson unit looks great. And not having to seal the labels after printing would be nice, and the separate ink carts for each color is a plus.
One last question, if you don’t mind: The specs show you ca do 100 disks at a time, but the description makes it sound like you have to unload the output tray after 50 discs. So can you do 100 discs unattended (like overnight) or is it 50 before you have to do something?
I use the Bravo unit, but I wanted to make a comment about discs and smudging…
I use Taiyo Yuden Watershield discs, and they are great. The printing does not smudge (it’s waterproof), and there is a very professional high-gloss finish. The finished product looks great!
You can do 100 in a batch, you just have to configure the unit for that at the beginning. There are 3 modes in can run in: One where you are just burning a few discs and they come out in a little slide-out tray at the bottom, one where you are burning up to 50 and they are taken from one of the two main 'stacker’s and placed in a third that goes where the tray is, and a mode where you can burn 100 and it takes the discs from both main ‘stackers’ and puts them back in the 2nd and 3rd.
Ok, that sounds a lot more complicated than it is. . . Basically, all you have to do is set the 3rd stacker in place and check the “Batch mode” option. The software has little images that show where the discs will be pulled from and where they will end up. We leave ours in the “standard mode” most of the time so we can have CDs in one stacker and DVDs in the other and it will automatically pull from the correct one.
Check the specs page; the pictures and video may help explain as well. There’s also a review linked on there (may not be unbiased, but it does give some additional info). Also, Epsons has a bunch of demo videos and animations on their website for the machine. All that stuff helped us pick out the machine in the first place and it seems to have all been generally accurate.
Just to follow up on this comment. . . **aaelghat **is totally right that the media can make a big difference. Whatever duplicator machine you go with, it may be worthwhile to experiment with the media you are using. The Taiyo are definitely great media in our experience as well. Some online shops will even sell a sample pack consisting of 1 or 2 discs each of several brands. I don’t have a link, but we bought one of those packs to help determine which media were the best buy. It used to be that the duplicators ‘liked’ different brands of discs for the data portion and these days that doesn’t seem to matter with the more modern burners. But it does still seem to make a difference in regards to the way the ink interacts with the printable surface.
Thanks, both **aaelghat **and Enigma42. We tried media from several different sources when we first got our unit about 5 years ago. But it’s been several years and we should look around again. I’m glad you reminded me; I’ll put this on our list to do as part of the process of updating our duplicator.
Now I’ve just got to see if we can squeeze a little extra out of the budget. I think I can sell it on long term savings in labor and the cost of ink.
As it turned out, our current Primera duplicator, which had been just acting up a little now and then, as of about two weeks ago suddenly would not pick any disks up at all to move them from tray to tray. Since we were now down completely and I needed a couple of hundred disks in the next few days, I spent a couple of hours and tore it apart myself one more time.
This time, I found that the microswitch that senses the disk on the end of the pickup arm was faulty. I replaced the switch and for the last two weeks it has been duplicating away with no problems. So for the cost of a couple of hours of my time and a $10 switch, it seems to be working again, better than it has in months.
At this point it’s working so well that it looks like I’ve pushed the buying decision back at least a few months. I’ve put some information together on the new units (and I’ll check out the new website above) so when it again comes time to buy, we’ll be ready.
