I recently saw most of the new Epson printer line and tdoay the company announced this killer all-in-one unit. What makes this interesting is a new direction for Epson and I suspect for all printers built by everyone from now on: the ability to print directly on a DVD or CD-ROM as a standard feature. This, of course requires the discs with the white coating that accepts ink. This will effectively change the dsik and label business forever. Labels on disks have always been problematic since they can come off and gum up a disk reading mechanism.
What this says is that if you copy a disk you can also copy 1:1 the disk label. Clever.
For more information about this $399 printer download the fact sheet here.
I think this would be more controversial if it included a DVD/CD burner so you could make a truly perfect copy. My god, could you imagine the uproar with such a device?!
I’d love to get one of these because you really can’t stick a label on burned DVDs due to wobble. I’ve created quite a few coasters via labeling until I learned about the cause.
People even sell alleged “wobble free” labels. E.g.,: http://www.americal.com/pd/313758.html But from what I’ve read in forums they aren’t necessarily better.
This feature has significant non-infringing uses so it should be ok.
So far, the ink isn’t very stable on the printable surfaces. Smudges are a problem. But eventually, someone will provide surfaces designed for the pigment inks then it’s Bootleg city for every one who whats to.
Great hearing you on TWiT!
I have been using an Epson R200 for over a year, printing onto white CD’s, and I can tell you that I would never go back to labels. In addition to looks, there is talk that the white surface is more durable than regular CDs and DVDs, and that there is no worry of media deterioration due to the CD label glue affecting the media itself.
One interesting item not mentioned in the blog: 3200 x 6400 dpi scanning and true 48-bit color and 3.3 optical density. Although the optical density is not all that good, the ‘native’ resolution is higher than that of many dedicated slide scanners. So this is an excellent solution also for those that would like to make at least basic backups of digital files from their slides and old photos. Scan your slides, make CDs from the scans, and send the CD’s to relatives or friends out of town for safekeeping in their own attic. If your house burns down, floats away, comes crashing down, gets blown away, etc, at least you have something somewhere that can be used to reconstruct the photos.
Maybe that would be a good topic for a ‘stand-alone’ column?
How much are the inks and how long do they last?
Can’t wait to see this hit the courts. Sony all over again?
This has always been possible at the “large scale” level – Chinese “factory”, for example, but now you and I can do it too.
However, putting holographic images into the DVD or CD coating should be pretty trivial, and damned hard to copy with this printer.
Send the money here, please….
This is a cool feature, that was not intended to make bootlegging easier. I would be very suprised if anyone have a damn about this.
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