I have an R800 and only use it on photographic paper. We produce thousands of CD-Rs a month and I use a Rimage thermal printer on silver CDs. Before we got the Rimage, I actually had one customer threaten to sue me in small claims court if I did not refund his money because his ink jet printed CD were smearing. Rimage now makes a color printer that is scratch and water proof. I will probably purchase one of these next.

We mostly seem to be talking about Epson printers, and I would assume that they would use basically the same inks.

I have the Epson R200, which I like, and I have never had any ink smearing problems. Perhaps what we need to look at are the disks we use. I do use the matte finish. Maybe part of the problem is any gloss finish disks. That does make sense, as they have less for inks to adhere to.

Just a thought.

Mike

I had one sitting on my desk last night when I read that post, and gave it the old spit test, rubbing it with my finger. It was a matte finish with a photo on top-- a FUJI printable disk, printed with the Epson 300. It smeared a bit. So they are not completely water proof.

Ink jet ink is really bad when it comes in contact with moisture, and I don't think it matters what type of surface you print on. There are other threads which gloss over using clear paint to seal the disk.

They will not be completely waterproof. Commercial CD's DVD's are silk screened, which is a totally different process, and involves very different inks, and a drying process.

Personally, unless I have touched mine before they have completely dried, I have never had a problem. Printed a fresh one the other day, and wanted to put it in a sleave right away, so I hit it with the old hair drier and that worked great!

I guess the bottom line is that if you want perfection, you have to pay for it.

Mike

I agree, Mike. The particular disk I am talking about was printed about 3 months ago, the smear wasn't complete, but it did degrade the image. Of course, I guess my spit could have something to do with it :)

The Epson printing is great for my purposes. However, if you are going to wash the disc in water, there may be degradation of the image. I sometimes have to wash disks I get from Netflix, and I can see that might be problem with the Epson printed disks.

Have any of you guys had good luck with primera or similar inkjet printers?

I am just looking for a cost effective solution that will print more durable copies then the r300. Even months after one of my disks is printed, the surface is still pretty virgin and all it takes is clammy hands to smudge it.

I am not going to dump $3000 in a laminator but I am thinking about one of these dup/printer systems if the ink is more durable then my current system. I am even considering thermal printing. Primera produces inkjet printable disks called TuffCoat that are advertised as being water resistant. I have no idea how something like that works but I would be willing to give it a try if it was truly water resistant.

However, I have heard some bad things about the primera printers. This one from microboards looks perfect: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/cont...ughType=search

Just in case Chris, I wouldn't spit on your car to try and clean off any bugs :)

Maybe I can bottle it and sell it as a solvent.... :)

I think I have a couple of older disks, so I will try a test with water. Saliva is very different from plain water. It has digestive juices and enzymes.

I'll check it out.

Mike

Chris...

Have you tried the test using FRESH spit? :-)

I tried a drop of water on a TDK disk printed with an Epson R200 and the ink came right off.

However, when I print business cards using the Epson 2200 onto semigloss paper, I can drench the print with water and the ink stays put. Probably as something to do with the type of coating Epson uses on their paper.

If Epson made printable DVD's I'm certain the inks would also stay put.

Guys and gals, we just have to realize that our ability to print neat DVD's and CD's from our printers is a gift at this time. The cost of silk-screening is beyond our budgets unless we are doing thousands.

I'm very happy with my $88.00 Epson, and until I'm doing a commercial run in the thousands, I'll stick with it.

Have fun, be honest and up-front with your customers, and if they want silk-screened CD's and DVD's then tell them the price. That will bring them back to reality.

You can spray coat them with clear coats, but I would not bother for the most part.

Mike

I have an HP external Lightscribe burner and love it. It has both Firewire and USB 2.0 ports. True it does take about 30 mins to burn a label, but that is if I include a pic on it. If I just make a simple title it takes about 15 mins. The discs have come way down in price since they first came out. You can find them quite cheap at Wally's World, Office Depot, Staples, ect. I'm not sure if BH has them, or any of the other sponsers here. I get them at the first mentioned places so I don't have to pay shipping. I mainly buy my more expensive stuff on the sponsers sites.

Now THIS is a real tip...
 

if the ink won't smudge. Any experience with these cartridges and smudging?

I use the R300 with white-faced discs, and would print more/better stuff if cartridges cost less.