The Letterville BullBoard: HELP Summa D60 or Roland Camm 1 CX-24

This is topic HELP Summa D60 or Roland Camm 1 CX-24 in forum Old Archives at The Letterville BullBoard.

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Posted by Bob Betz (Member # 2466) on :

Planning on buying my first plotter and looking for opinions. From reading the info on the Summa d60 it looks like a better plotter than the Roland CX-24. But the CX-24 will print from Corell Draw and the Summa needs additional software. with the price difference and the software I am looking at About $800 more for the Summa Plotter. Opinions, sugestions would be most welcomed.
Thanks,
Bob

Posted by Dave Grundy (Member # 103) on :

Bob...It will be pretty tough to get a REALLY unbiased comment about this topic since it is unlikely that there are very many who have personally owned and used BOTH of the cutters you mention.

Personally, I am a Corel/Roland guy. My thought would be that if you are comfortable with and like working in CorelDraw then the Roland would be your choice.

If, on the other hand, you don't have much experience with Corel or find that it has a steep learning curve then you might be better off going with the Summa.

However, if the additional software you refer to is simply a way to cut Corel files on the Summa, then what is the point of bothering with the extra software? I guess at that point you would have to take a really hard look at what "features/mechanical/electronics" advantages the Summa has over the Roland.

I am sure you will get lots of testimonials from users of both machines, so I'll just say that I have owned two Rolands over the last 10 years or so and the original one was about 3 years old when I bought it used. I upgraded to go from a 20" to a 24" cutter. My original one is still running fine for it's third owner, as far as I know.

Good luck in your decision making!

Posted by George Perkins (Member # 156) on :

I agree with Dave 100%. I've been around the BB for about six years now and I can't recall anybody badmouthing ANY brand of plotter, seems they all work rather well within their individual limits. Software is another matter

I cut direct from Corel 8 to a 960 Roland, does all I want it to, I personally never ran across anything I can't do with this combo.
If you are just going to cut vinyl you don't need anything more than Roland/Corel.

Posted by Howard Keiper (Member # 1250) on :

Bob...
If you have already decided on the need for a bridge program, then it seems that the manufacturer who has done the most to integrate such a program into his current thinking would be Summa.
If you think that Roland is the only other machine that can cut from Corel, then you are short changing yourself. I am not aware of any machine on the market today that can't be driven from Corel, using the same methodology as Dave describes, and most of those machines have a great deal to recommend them. Ioline's been doing it for many years as have Mimaki, Ana, and others.
Corel is the great limiter. By itself, it makes every machine pretty much the same. It would be difficult to distinguish one Corel cut from another...unless you wanted to do work in a medium other than vinyl, for instance, then, individual machine characteristics should be considered.
hk

Posted by Philippe JACQUES (Member # 664) on :

As far as I know, It is possible to drive a Summa directly from Corel. Just a question of what you are awaiting from your solution.

If ever support is important for you, I would recommand you to read the post of Brian Diver the 13th november on this BBS. You would find it at URL :
http://www.letterhead.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=015551

It's titled :2 Thumbs up for Summa Support

I seldom read so positive thanks to a distributor for its support. This kind of arguments would help you to make the choice ! And if it is not enough, note that Jim Dogget from Summa is frequently supporting this board. As important that the price of a plotter !

Posted by Bob Betz (Member # 2466) on :

Thanks for the input.
The Summa says it comes with a cutting program for windows. that would lead me to believe that I could cut from any drawing software that's on my PC. If this is true, what is the reason to buy Cocut?
Thanks again,
Bob

Posted by Mike Kelly (Member # 2037) on :

Hi Bob. I work in Corel 7 and cut with a Summa D60 with CoCut Pro. I have never even tried to cut directly from Corel, but with CoCut, it's so simple. One click and I'm there. It's only been a year since I bought the setup, but one of the main reasons was that Jim Doggett from Summa shows his face here all the time, as does Howard Keiper from Graphtec. If a problem should arise, I know that a solution is easily obtained. The machine cuts great, tracks straight for miles and I can cut small pieces so there's less scrap material. I think I made the right choice. Good luck.

Posted by Bob Betz (Member # 2466) on :

I found the answer to my question by searching through the old posts on this board. I would be able to cut with corel draw by using the supplied summa cutter control.
Thanks for all the replies,
Bob
Now I need to find out who sells the D60 for the best price.

Posted by Dave Grundy (Member # 103) on :

Bob..As a couple of folks have mentioned..Both Jim Doggett and Howard Keiper are regulars here and that goes a whole long way in demonstrating their support of their own products!

If you are now inclined towards the Summa..Go for it! I know that you will be get excellent advice from Jim if you have a question and if he can't answer any questions you have he has recently had a tech guy reply to some questions and HIS advice/comments were supurb!

Even though I use a roland I have to say that Summa and Graphtec have two excellent representatives on this BullBoard!!!

Posted by SIHopkins (Member # 2118) on :

Hi Bob
I Have a summa D60 for a year now .
Did not no any thing about about it , but it was so easy & fun to learn on .
I think its a great machine. write or call
sihopkins @ aol.com -- 434-836-7785
steve hopkins

Posted by old paint (Member # 549) on :

ok..to simplify...corel will cut to any plotter that has a printer port connection. corel doesnt see the plotter as anything but a printer and uses HPGL to translate from screen to plotter.
this is how rolands work so well directly from corel. as for cocut, ive said this before...version 5 and 6 of corel were devoid of cutting to plotters.....corel leased the rights to the drivers outa corel to CO-CUT/EURO-CUT. then when corel brought out corel 7 they put the engine or code back into the program. so yes co cut will work from corel very well it ought to..it is corel....with more code for paneling..

Posted by Bob Betz (Member # 2466) on :

And the saga continues.

Now I am told the CoCut driver for the D60 cutter are built in Corel. This is a message I got on the Summa BBS. Any comments?

Bob

Hi Bob:

We have a couple of ways to plot without using CoCut:

Cutter Control can plot HPGL files you export from CorelDRAW ... and do so
automatically when you setup a Queue directory. For a step-by-step, please check out
our Corel Tips, http://www.summadirect.com/tips/tip9.html .

Additionally, we provide a free cutting program, WinCut:
http://www.summausa.com/support/downloads/WinCut.exe . With it, you can import
EPS files that are exported from CorelDRAW.

CoCut, is far more elegant than either the Cutter Control or WinCut methods. And well
worth the price.

Some cutter makers are starting to include Window Printer Drivers, that allow cutting
directly out of Corel, or pretty much anything. We'd do the same were it not for
limitation in Windows that cannot be gotten around with printer drivers. Here's the rub:

Windows printer drivers have following disadvantages:

Quality: By default windows drivers use a 500 spi (steps per inch) for vector data.
Summna cutters have a resolution of 1000 spi (0.001"). The inferior resolution is
most visible in small fonts.

Size Limits: 65 inches, because vector information in Windows drivers is limited to
16 bit, and the max resolution of 500 spi. When cutting at beyond 65 inches, the
resolution has to be scaled down even lower. So larger images are lower in quality
as well.

Users that are satisfied with Windows printer drivers are probably not cutting smaller
text, or long jobs. That's unacceptable to us, because Summa cutters are known
worldwide for their accuracy with small text and long plotting ... and our fear in offering
a printer driver is that users might blame the cutter for lousy quality on small type and
large jobs.

Neither Cutter Control nor WinCut have these limitations, since they bypass the
Windows Print Manager. But they're, admittedly, not as handy as a printer driver. CoCut
is the only product that combines the ease of a printer driver, and the quality of direct
plotting, which is why we offer (and strongly recommend) it.

Thanks for considering Summa. I hope we can be of service.

Sincerely,

Jim

--------------------

Jim Doggett
Vice President
Summa, Inc.

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