Using Epson 1270 with 1290 driver?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Chris
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Chris

I seem to recall reading somewhere that it is possible to use the 1290
driver with a 1270 - that way you can get borderless prints.

Is this right? Is anyone doing this, and is there a downside?

Thanks in advance for your comments...

Chris.
 
I seem to recall reading somewhere that it is possible to use the 1290
driver with a 1270 - that way you can get borderless prints.

Is this right? Is anyone doing this, and is there a downside?
Click to expand...

IIRC, it would only give you borderless on three sides.
 
Ed said:
IIRC, it would only give you borderless on three sides.
Click to expand...


Think I tried this and the 1290 drivers would not work.

With the borderless images you have to use roll paper as the paper is
feed by the rear rollers and still has th grip the paper as its pushed
through. You will not get boarderless prints off sheet paper.

There is other software to use with roll paper - this is downloaded off
the epson site. or its on the CD. Someone else will know the name.
 
Think I tried this and the 1290 drivers would not work.

With the borderless images you have to use roll paper as the paper is
feed by the rear rollers and still has th grip the paper as its pushed
through. You will not get boarderless prints off sheet paper.

There is other software to use with roll paper - this is downloaded off
the epson site. or its on the CD. Someone else will know the name.
Click to expand...

Well I tried it a while ago and it did work but, as Ed pointed out, only
provides edge to edge printing on three sides - the leading edge out of
the printer is bordered. There are ways around this though, but I'll
leave it to your imagination to figure them out - it isn't difficult.

When I tried the driver. it failed to detect the printer and so did not
the USB port and the Status Monitor. The actual printer interface
appeared to be OK and defaulted to driving the printer via the parallel
port. Since I had already installed the 1270 driver, and it had
installed its own USB port, I simply redirected the driver (under the
details page) to the pre-existing USB port and it worked OK.

After that, the 1270 printer and 1290 driver worked fine - in every mode
supported by the 1270 printer.

The main reason I was interested in trying this was to find out if I
could get borderless prints with the combination. The answer was,
frustratingly, almost! The printer certainly printed edge to edge,
however it still printed a 3mm border at the top of the print and then
printed about 3-6mm off the edge of the bottom of the page. Consequently
I ended up with some overspill inside the printer which needed to be
cleaned before I could use it again.

I tried different paper types and sizes to overcome the top/bottom page
mismatch, but unsuccessfully, the best that can be achieved is edge to
edge printing on 3 sides and loss of approximately 3mm of image from the
bottom of the page. Eventually I printed two identical small prints to
file, one via the 1270 driver and another via the 1290, and then
examined the data for differences. It appears that the 1290 driver
sends several remote commmands which do not appear in the 1270 software
manual, so it is likely that these are unique to the 1280/90 printers
and probably position the paper correctly. After I discovered the code
incompatibilities I did not progress it any further because I had, in
the meantime, established a solution for borderless printing on the 1270
which works just as well as the 1290 driver did - without the mess.

The report I posted to the now defunct Leben Epson Inkjet list soon
after the 1290 was initially released follows:
________________________________________________________________
To: (e-mail address removed)
Subject: Re: 1280/1290(?) Edge-to-edge?
From: Kennedy McEwen <[email protected]>
Date: 25 February 2001 00:59:07

Having just looked at the drivers menu for the 12(8/9)0 it would appear
that it only gives edge to edge printing at defined paper sizes and this
mode does not support user defined sizes. It does support edge to edge
printing right up to the full 13" carriage width though. Overspray is
collected by the same little sponges which the printer uses to clear the
head of ink build-up during use. These are located at the 4" and 13"
positions on the 1270 and there is a location available for an
additional sponge at around the 8" position - I presume that the
12(8/9)0 has similar sponges at other positions.

From a cursory first look, the full list of paper sizes supported in
edge to edge mode includes:

A4 210x297mm
A3 297x420mm
Super A3/B 329x483mm
Letter 8.5x11"
Index card 5x8"
Photo Paper 4x6" No Perforations
Photo Paper 100x150mm
Photo Paper 200x300mm
3.5x5" : 89x127mm
5x7" : 127x178mm
Panoramic 210x594mm

The full range of sizes supported by the 1270, including custom sizes,
is available IF the edge to edge mode is deselected.
 
On Wed, 27 Apr 2005 17:59:12 +0100, Kennedy McEwen

After I discovered the code
incompatibilities I did not progress it any further because I had, in
the meantime, established a solution for borderless printing on the 1270
which works just as well as the 1290 driver did - without the mess.
Click to expand...
<snip>

Thanks for the very helpful replies, everyone. Kennedy, what was the
solution you referred to, please? (Apologies if I missed it in your
post).


Chris.
 
Chris said:
On Wed, 27 Apr 2005 17:59:12 +0100, Kennedy McEwen


<snip>

Thanks for the very helpful replies, everyone. Kennedy, what was the
solution you referred to, please? (Apologies if I missed it in your
post).
Click to expand...
Using some low tack masking tape (available from most hardware stores)
to attach a backing sheet to the back of the page to be printed so that
it overhangs by 3.5mm all around the edges. Then place this in the
printer feed. Use a custom page setting to make the page 7mm larger
than the actual size of the page to be printed (save this as a custom
setting for future use) and then print as normal. The printer picks the
backing sheet as the start of the page and begins printing at the edge
of the real page - with a 0.5mm overspray onto the backing sheet. After
it is finished, just peel off the backing sheet and use it on the next
page to be printed.

Harder to describe than it is to do. It isn't really worth it for long
print runs, but for a few edge to edge prints it is perfectly adequate
and works pretty well.

To ease positioning of the backing sheet and the main page and be more
reliable, I stuck some card strips around the outside edge of a Super B
box of paper, with a second layer of card on top of that but 3.5mm
further out. So I just place the page I want to print on the outside of
the box, face down, push it up into the corner formed by the inner card
edge. Then place the backing sheet on top and push that into the corner
formed by the second layer of card, tape it in position with the low
tack tape and you have an "oversize" sheet with a backing that prevents
the overspray getting onto the printer insides. The whole process takes
about 15-20 seconds with practice and is perfectly repeatable and
accurate.

The only time I use the 1290 driver now is when I want a full 13" wide
borderless print, since the maximum custom width is limited to 32.9cm
(13") - then use the same backing page and custom size technique just to
overcome the 3mm leading edge border.
 
Using some low tack masking tape
Click to expand...

And there was I, expecting a registry tweak, or some such...
Bet you watched Blue Peter in your youth :-)
Seriously, thanks for the tip - I'll have to give it a try!

Chris.
 
Chris said:
And there was I, expecting a registry tweak, or some such...
Bet you watched Blue Peter in your youth :-)
Seriously, thanks for the tip - I'll have to give it a try!

Chris.
Click to expand...

There's also a low-tack spray adhesive that's designed just for that job.
Well, actually its designed for holding stencils, but it does both jobs
perfectly.
 
There's also a low-tack spray adhesive that's designed just for that job.
Well, actually its designed for holding stencils, but it does both jobs
perfectly.
Click to expand...

Scotch also makes a restickable adhesive glue stick which might be
appropriate.
 
There are a number of repositionable adhesives on the market which I
have used for this exact purpose, since I often use smaller pieces of
paper or wish to make full-bleed prints, and none of my printers have
this built in.

3M makes a "post it" glue stick which can make any paper into a post it.
You can use it on the backing sheet. There are also a number of
"double sided" products that come dispensing devices that apply a double
sided tape in either permanent of repositionable adhesives.

One way to make very repeatable results is to make a 8.5 x 11 (or
whatever standard your backing paper is going to have) "sheet" in your
program, then simply place one or more black edged "boxes" representing
the locales of the images. Then print this on the sheet you will use as
your backing sheet. Then add the repositionable adhesive to the backing
paper, and then adhere the smaller paper to this backing sheet exactly
where the lines are. You don't need a lot of adhesive. Just the
leading edge and maybe a couple spots.

In your program again, paste the virtual images "into" the black edged
boxes on your screen, and then send that page back through the printer,
and have it print the images. They should match up nearly perfectly.

You may have to raise the printer head to accommodate two thicknesses of
paper. You can reuse the backing paper unit the adhesive no longer sticks.

Art
 
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