Help required for halftone in 5200 printer.

[Kshiteesh Parashar]

I need a little tech advice,
It is about halftone screen.
We are facing a prob, our pictures don come clear
as the halftone screen is very fine and makes the ink to smudge.
We out source one page, for which we get a ready pdf,
That page comes clear and printing also come cool on it.
We use pagemaker7 and The printer we use is hp5200.
Could you guys help.
??
It would be a blessing if you could.
jis jis ko jaanta tha sab se puchliya,
nobody could figure out the issue.
Kamal.
Sorry for the trouble.

[Tim Frank]

What halftone screen are you using for your settings?

[Kshiteesh Parashar]

Thanks frank,
I had started to feel that i wont get any help out here too....
We use normal settings for 5200ps print
lpi at 85 and angle at 45 for B/w.

The prob here is that we give the same for our outsourced page and that prints correct
where as those designed inhouse have a much finer screen resulting in ink smudge....

Help Chief. !

[Tim Frank]

That sounds fine. It could be so many things that I'm afraid I won't be much help from long distance. There aren't any prepress people over there that could take a look?

Does the outsourced page come as film or digital?

[Kshiteesh Parashar]

Hey tim,
Sorry for the trouble.
I have already asked the best in prepress out here, even they are baffled...
The outsourced page comes in PDF format.
You could have a look at my pages on http://www.dakshinbharat.com/epaperdisplay.asp
The page No. 10 is outsourced.
Could there be a problem with the PPD for the HP 5200??
This issue frustates as the photos don come out good at times.
In the PDF all is cool, it is only when we print the problem comes.
HELP HELP HELP.....

[Tim Frank]

well, we'll keep trying. I'm not an expert – I just work with the experts – and without seeing actual pages, I can guesses. some more information might help.

are you printing to film?

are your photoshop ink levels too high? that can cause overinking and smudging. that's in the color profile.

If you compare pdfs of the good pages vs. the bad ones, is there any difference? You can upload files here, if you'd like.

[Kshiteesh Parashar]

Chief, I am back at doing what i do best !
Troubling you....

Well, I have attached the pages for your reference. Page 1 and 3 are done at our place
where as page 10 which i have attached is the outsourced one. We print on Film.

I remember one more thing, I cross checked every small setting with the system from where my page is outsourced. Still I could not figure out....

By what i feel, it is either some setting on my printer device. or maybe the PPD Driver has to do something, but i still remain confused...
The halftone is there, but is very fine. not the usual dot dot type. that is the issue.
I wish you were in Bangalore, I would have come up to your place with all I have to get my prob solved.
Do you have any PPD Drivers which I could try with ?

[Arindam Biswas]

Is this the problem with colour page or with BW page. Can u tell me the angles of all Cyan, magenta and yellow as you have said that K is 45 degree.

[Kshiteesh Parashar]

Sirji,
The problem is with B/w pages,
The screen is too fine. Agar Magnifying glass laga ke dekhe to
every thing is cool but only in print we have the problem

[Vikram Barthwal]

I am Computer Hardware Engineer and we have News Paper Clients
some of my clients have HP 5200, they also face the same problem like yours.
the problem is with the printer / or may be the ppd file,
it doesnot recognises the ppd file and doesnot prints as per the ppd file.

As the News paper roll paper is very porous, photo which are made up of closer dots, the ink spreads, as the paper sucks in the ink and the ink spreads.

if the same photo is printed with halftone i.e photo made up of dots that are not close enough, the ink will
not spread so the result of the photo will be good.

We have contacted to the HP company they say
"the HP 5200 has problem with halftone, better buy HP 9000 series"

As of now i also dont have the solution regarding this issue.

If u get the answer plz message me at ([e-mail])

Lets hope the HP guys do some work on this issue...

Nearly 90% of the Newspaers in Surat(Gujarat) have HP 5100 which prints perfectly, its halftone prints are also
good, some have sold their new HP 5200 & bought second hand HP 5100, from other cities.