Just out of curiosity, what company manufactured your primary printer. Mine is an old Hewlett-Packard LaserJet 4MV that I purchased used off of eBay. It's still running like a champ at 11 years old.

HP all in one 1210v scanner printer copier Lazer Ink Jet, K-mart 4 years old, $99.99. :D It replaced a Lexmark(used for 6 months before it crapped out $179.99 :mad: ). HP makes great stuff. Thinking about HP computer as a Work Station for CAD/CAM. Any suggestions on what Model?

I have used Canon since my first bubble jet, now on the 4th printer, a model, i860, bought in 04, beautiful pictures but most of my printing is B/W, it is very fast and I really like the individual ink tanks for all colors which are re-filled, albeit, never with out mess.

Ken

I have a Brothers Laser printer as my primary, and an HP-882c Ink Jet printer.

Thinking about HP computer as a Work Station for CAD/CAM. Any suggestions on what Model?
Hey tobyaxis, already off topic on the second post, and this time it's your doing :D.

I used to work at an authorized HP Computer repair store. Almost all of the problems (9 out of 10 or better) were caused by adware/spyware, viruses or idiot operators (a.k.a. I/O errors or ID-10-T errors). Except for the occasional hard drive or case/power supply/CPU cooling fan failures almost all other problems were due to catastrophic failures resulting from an unexpected electrical event (ie. a thunderstorm).

No matter what model you select, make sure that you read the warranty. This is especially important if this is a production, money earning CAD/CAM Work Station rather than a "for hobby use" machine. All of HP's Work Stations seem to have 3/3/3 years warranty (parts/labor/onsite). If next business day repair is not included in the warranty, see if you can purchase a warranty upgrade unless you have a backup work station.

The other important item to consider is choosing a graphics card. Make sure that if the graphics card is included your software package supports it. Vice versa, find out what graphics card(s) your software package supports and make sure that the graphics card manufacturer will provide support for that card in the workstation you choose (double check graphics card speed, slot type, and voltage requirements).

I hope that helps. It's always fun picking out a new computer and waiting for the UPS/FEDEX truck to deliver it.

I really like the individual ink tanks for all colors
Ken
Individual ink tanks are great for ink based printers. The individual ink tanks AND individual printheads used in the HP Business InkJets, higher end Canons, Epsons & others is definitely the way to go if you do a lot of ink based color printing. The money saved in only having to purchase replacement printheads as necessary and replacement inks for the colors you use most, more than pays for the higher initial cost of the printer.

Has anyone else seen or own one of Xerox's printers that use their patented "Solid Ink (http://www.office.xerox.com/solidink/index.html)"? Exceptional print quality, you have to see it to believe it! If you get a chance check out the Xerox Phaser 8500/8550 or the Xerox WorkCentre C2424 (both use Solid Ink technology).

Hey tobyaxis, already off topic on the second post, and this time it's your doing :D.

I used to work at an authorized HP Computer repair store. Almost all of the problems (9 out of 10 or better) were caused by adware/spyware, viruses or idiot operators (a.k.a. I/O errors or ID-10-T errors). Except for the occasional hard drive or case/power supply/CPU cooling fan failures almost all other problems were due to catastrophic failures resulting from an unexpected electrical event (ie. a thunderstorm).

No matter what model you select, make sure that you read the warranty. This is especially important if this is a production, money earning CAD/CAM Work Station rather than a "for hobby use" machine. All of HP's Work Stations seem to have 3/3/3 years warranty (parts/labor/onsite). If next business day repair is not included in the warranty, see if you can purchase a warranty upgrade unless you have a backup work station.

The other important item to consider is choosing a graphics card. Make sure that if the graphics card is included your software package supports it. Vice versa, find out what graphics card(s) your software package supports and make sure that the graphics card manufacturer will provide support for that card in the workstation you choose (double check graphics card speed, slot type, and voltage requirements).

I hope that helps. It's always fun picking out a new computer and waiting for the UPS/FEDEX truck to deliver it.

Off Topic? (chair) Guess I got busted :eek: I already have BCC V20.7 and want to Gear Up for V22 Release. Both Computers now are Dell. Lap Top has a P4 2GHz Processor 1GB Ram 32mb ATI graphics (OpenGL support) chip on mother board. Desk Top has Dual H/T P4 3.2GHz each, 1.5GB Ram (soon to be 4GB RAM) and PCI Card Bus 256mb ATI Radeon X1300 Pro (OpenGL support). I may need more juice for BCC V22 as it maybe extremely Graphis Intensive. I'm also looking at VisualMill 5.0 Full 3 & 4 Axis with 5 Axis Indexing which for right now is way beyond BCC V20.7 in Graphics Capability and Function. I am a fair Machinist by Trade and also a Crafty CNC Programmer for 6 Axis Swiss with Live Tooling, Full 3 Axis Milling w 4 Axis Indexing, and 2 Axis Turning. All self taught on all machines listed. I need more Power as I am a FREAK about pushing PC's with CAD/CAM Software :D What Computer Model Do You Suggest for HighEnd Application CAD/CAM?

BTW; At presant with one program (BCC V20.7) running only I've Pushed the Desk Top to 2.2GB RAM usage Program was 1.2 Million Sequence Blocks for one tool picking a surface :D

(wrong) (wrong) (wrong) (wrong) (wrong) (wrong) (wrong)
:nono: :nono: :nono: :nono: :nono: :nono: :nono:
:stickpoke :stickpoke :stickpoke :stickpoke :stickpoke

Desk Top has Dual H/T P4 3.2GHz each, 1.5GB Ram (soon to be 4GB RAM)

(wrong)

XP home and Pro can only use 3Gigs of RAM. Any more than that is wasted. You need to use 64 bit XP to use more than 3Gigs.

If you print mostly black and white, find a Canon iP1500. Pretty quick, $50 new, and $7 black ink cartridges. Looks like it's replacement (iP1600) uses $20 ink. :(

If you print mostly black and white, find a Canon iP1500. Pretty quick, $50 new, and $7 black ink cartridges. Looks like it's replacement (iP1600) uses $20 ink. :(

My printer handles everything I throw at it. Actually I interupted the Thread with a Question about Work Station Class PC's made by HP. I'm looking to upgrade again and wanted suggestions on HP Work Station Models.

BTW: The last time I purchased Ink it was $75.00 for one 56 black and two 57 color at Costco. Good deal, because HP wanted a lot more.

Thanks Gerry

I have used Canon since my first bubble jet, now on the 4th printer, a model, i860, bought in 04, beautiful pictures but most of my printing is B/W, it is very fast and I really like the individual ink tanks for all colors which are re-filled, albeit, never with out mess.

Ken
Agreed. Those were good ones.

I moved to an i850 from an HP inkjet and have been very pleased with the amount of money saved on ink.
The only difference I've noticed is you have to keep spare inktanks and never let the heads dry out.
Things have changed since I bought this one. I went shopping for a printer for a friend, they no longer use this ink tank and the new ones use ink tanks that are comparable to HP prices now. :mad:

I use a $30 el-cheapo printer. I have had two lexmarks and now an HP. With the replacemnt ink costing close to 30 a cartrige, I use the orginal cartridge and refill it as many times as I can before it stops working all togeather and then just buy a new preinter.

Opps, My bad, hit the wrong radiobutton and threw off the thole poll. Ment to say epson but accidently hit lexmark.

Epsons are ink hogs btw. At startup they go through this whole cleaning and initialization that sometimes can use more ink than the actual document your printing. But their resonable fast and print fairly good quality. And if you get them with the rebates during a new model introduction then they are close to free.

I just bought an HP1020 Laser printer a couple of days ago. I've had a 930C color printer that I use for printing photos and stuff, but I hate using it to print things like manuals (which I do a lot) because of the price of ink. Plus, the laser is much faster for document printing. I just hope the number of documents you can print is a lot more than the inkjet because I checked the price of the toner cartridges when I bought the laser and they're $69! Anyway, I always buy HP and have very good luck with them.

Scott

(wrong)

XP home and Pro can only use 3Gigs of RAM. Any more than that is wasted. You need to use 64 bit XP to use more than 3Gigs.

Why do they put 4, 1GB slots in this computer then? Is it to get suckers like me to buy extra stuff they don't need? Or is it so I can upgrade to a 64 bit O/S? I don't get it. :confused:

tobyaxis: its a marketing move, although it is useful for the linux crowd, but i doubt they buy many dells. On the x64 note, im running win64 here on my opteron workstation, and its ok, but support is still lacking in a lot of packages. For instance i can run solidworks but not cosmos.

Personally i have dealt with dell tech support in the UK (read is the mouse plugged in support), and i wouldnt waste my time and money on them. Out of the last 10 issues we have had, it has been quicker for me to repair the machines myself, then spend hours of my time on the phone to dell answering stupid questions.

tobyaxis: its a marketing move, although it is useful for the linux crowd, but i doubt they buy many dells. On the x64 note, im running win64 here on my opteron workstation, and its ok, but support is still lacking in a lot of packages. For instance i can run solidworks but not cosmos.

Personally i have dealt with dell tech support in the UK (read is the mouse plugged in support), and i wouldnt waste my time and money on them. Out of the last 10 issues we have had, it has been quicker for me to repair the machines myself, then spend hours of my time on the phone to dell answering stupid questions.

I've never had any problems with "plug-and-play" devices on the Dells. Using XP Home now. Are you saying that Gerry is right with the amount of RAM that XP O/S will only handle a Max of 3GB? That is odd because Dell XPS and their Work Stations are very good. Actually the Work Stations can handle 16GB in RAM and 1GB in Graphics PCI Cards. Are they running a different O/S?

I meant not wasting your time and money on dell support contracts, as they are a right nuisance to claim, and generally by the time you add up all the hours of time you waste dealing with dell, you could have just bought the replacement parts and fitted them yourself for less. I mean they are fine for people that dont know how to restore from a backup, or swap out a faulty floppy drive, but im guessing that if your on this forum you are probably technically minded enough to manage that.

(This is just my view after having dealt with them several times, maybe other people get a better service)

As for the ram issue, check:
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/server/PAE/PAEmem.mspx

Basically winxp pro can see 4gb of ram, but any one program can only use 2gb, due to the virtual memory limit, there is a workaround to raise that to 3gb, but thats not done by default. This means that although you have 4gb of ram your cad package only ever sees 2gb out of the box.

This is system ram, graphics ram is seperate, and is limited to whatever the gfx card manufacturer is sticking on the card. However whether your software actually produces 1gb of texture map data is another thing. I doubt that anywhere near 1gb of gfx ram is used by most cad style packages, unless your doing photorealistic rendering.

I meant not wasting your time and money on dell support contracts, as they are a right nuisance to claim, and generally by the time you add up all the hours of time you waste dealing with dell, you could have just bought the replacement parts and fitted them yourself for less. I mean they are fine for people that dont know how to restore from a backup, or swap out a faulty floppy drive, but im guessing that if your on this forum you are probably technically minded enough to manage that.

(This is just my view after having dealt with them several times, maybe other people get a better service)

As for the ram issue, check:
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/server/PAE/PAEmem.mspx

Basically winxp pro can see 4gb of ram, but any one program can only use 2gb, due to the virtual memory limit, there is a workaround to raise that to 3gb, but thats not done by default. This means that although you have 4gb of ram your cad package only ever sees 2gb out of the box.

This is system ram, graphics ram is seperate, and is limited to whatever the gfx card manufacturer is sticking on the card. However whether your software actually produces 1gb of texture map data is another thing. I doubt that anywhere near 1gb of gfx ram is used by most cad style packages, unless your doing photorealistic rendering.


Thanks for the tip. I didn't know this. My Lap Top only has 1GB which is the MAX.

I was thinking about this

http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/xpsnb_m1710?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs

and This

http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/precn_690?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&~section=specs#tabtop

I must admit, i do quite like the xps laptops, as they do look cool, and the loadouts pretty good. I havent played with any core duo machines yet, so i have no idea what the battery life is like. I would suggest that you go find someone on a forum who has one of these to ask about that, as with all the manufacturers the battery life quoted
is optimistic at best.

I was considering one of these for my next project, but i rely on pci interface boards for quite a lot of my work, and i have yet to find a decent priced bridge to let me use them on laptops. Best i could find was mini-pci -> full size pci -> pci bus expander, and it aint cheap.

Other manufacturers to check might be alienbrain (pricey but very customisable), acer, and rock (not sure on this one, was looking a couple of monts back). They all have similar products, some support dual hdds in raid (extra performance or redundancy, good if you travel with your laptop), and extra batteries.

Dual Core Xeon Processors are very good in the Desk Top's. I've used this processor at a shop once. They were useing Catia V5. Powerful, and the Fastest PC I have ever worked with.

As for Battery life. When you use CAD/CAM like I do you don't get any battery life. My Lap Top is supposed to get 2.5 hours. Running just CAD/CAM about 30 minutes if I'm lucky. CAD/CAM is probibly the most intense Program for a PC.

Reading all the stuff about multiple gigs makes me feel positively archaic; 256MB in my machine which drives a Panasonic dot matrix printer that is around 18 years old printing 2D sketches I draw in a copy of AutoSketch dating from the 1980's; it is even on 5" floppies!!! And we even have an old IBM PS2 with a 5" drive. But I can remember as a kid having to do all the drafting with a pointed stick in smoothed over sand and all the calculations using an abacus.

Panasonic dot matrix printer that is around 18 years old printing
I have a Panasonic KXP-1124 DMP somewhere in my attic. Great little printer and relatively inexpensive at the time. I retired mine about 15 years ago when I purchased a Panasonic KXP-4410 Laser Printer.

At the time the laser printer was one of the less expensive models, coming in at just shy of $500.00. Amazingly enough it was only slightly more expensive than having resumes printed due to the set up charge, minimum run of a couple of hundred, paper charge, etc. What a rip off! With WordPerfect for MS-DOS and my "new" laser printer, I could print professional looking resumes on real nice high cotton content paper (with matching envelopes) on demand. I still have about 3/4 of a ream of paper and a bunch of envelopes after 4 different job searches for myself and a couple for my wife.

I gave the 4410 to my mother after her printer punked out about 7 years ago and she's still using it today!!!

i have a panasonic k xp1123 -- had a an 1124 one time i bought new .. had an okidata thermal at one time .. had a canon 6000 , thought it was great .. got another used one as i was getting 6 beeps .. i used to be able to refill the cartdridges and it was so fast .. but i beleeive they built in obsolescense that when it reaches so many prints or the ink spit tray isfull/saturated it requires service code reset , which, since costs morre to service thana new printer, people dont have done..

hi to all

I am using printers HPlaserjet 1100 @ Inkjet hp 945

hi to all
Welcome to CNCzone, Abulayth! Thanks for your input on my printer poll.

Take a look around, lots of great information is to be had on all kinds of subjects, no matter what your interest.

I hope things are well for you and your family in your part of the world.

1) Those Xerox solid stick printers are exxxxpensiveeeeeee. So are the replacement sticks! Are they really worth it?

2) Im shopping for a new laptop dell direct at the moment. It costs about €180 extra for 2GB RAM instead of 1GB, but to go from 1GB to 4GB costs a whopping €1800 extra, WHY IS THIS?

Thanks. :)

Xerox Phasers use wax to print, and they cost an arm and a leg, as do the sticks. Lord help you if one of the thermal heads go bad, $$$$$$$$.

Hp has had the US market for a long time. Their game is simple, sell printers cheap and then rob everyone on the supplies. It can often be cheaper to buy a new HP than get replacement cartridges. Businesses do not see what they spend in cartridges because its usually ordered by the secretary and never questioned.

Your concern should be cost per copy. What is my cost per page when I take into account what I am paying for that ink cartridge divided by how many sheets of paper I get out. When it comes to laser there is even more, toner, developer units, drums, fuser units. They aint cheap. Look at the rated yields, 20K to 30K is pretty bad. There are printers out there that go 300K. Color is even going to cost more in the laser section because you have 4 of each (except a fuser).

Things are changing. Zerox is close to a fairy tale, HP is loosing more and more market share every day because of competion. If you plan on printing a lot, do your homework when shopping for a new one.

OK enough ranting and raving.

Jerry