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View Full Version : Learned something important about vector cuts on a Speedy 300



Raphael Weil
03-09-2016, 8:57 AM
I learned something this past week that I think is worth sharing with other Trotec owners. I think it's a bug (compared to other brands) but I'll work around it. You can't make vector cuts on a Speedy 300 at 250 DPI using ADOBE. That's fairly mind boggling since there's so little information stored in a tiny cut line. Needing to design a piece at 500 DPI seems like total overkill. Certainly in my large art pieces this will increase my production times on some skews (where I vector and raster) since rastering at 500 DPI is 50% slower than 250 (and my pieces are designed at 300 anyway).

So word to the wise, never try to cut on a Speedy 300 at 250 DPI. You'll get a whole lot of nothing. Big thanks to Neville who took time out of his weekend to look at this for me. Ultimately I found it while doing a team viewer with Chris from Trotec Canada. He's a champ.

Scott Shepherd
03-09-2016, 10:27 AM
Must be a new issue in 10.5 or whatever you are using. I've vectored at 250 many times.

Mike Null
03-09-2016, 10:38 AM
Raphael

Try again....
Also try your rastering at 333. It's fast and is more than adequate resolution for text.

Gary Hair
03-09-2016, 11:26 AM
You can't make vector cuts on a Speedy 300 at 250 DPI.

That is very odd because DPI has nothing to do with vectoring. DPI = dots per inch and is pertinent to rastering, PPI = pulses per inch and is pertinent to vectoring. If DPI is affecting vectoring then they have a serious problem that should be fixed.

edit: I just tested vectoring a 1" square, rgb red, hairline, at 125 dpi and it worked fine, same with every other resolution. There must be something wrong in your settings if DPI is affecting your ability to vector.

edit #2: I thought maybe having something to raster might be messing it up so I typed the word "TEXT" in 24pt arial in the middle of the square and ran it again - no problem.

Dan Hintz
03-09-2016, 11:50 AM
That's fairly mind boggling since there's so little information stored in a tiny cut line.

To be fair, there's no more/less information stored for a short vector as there is for a long one... endpoints, that's it. It's what the conversion program (driver) does with that info that counts.

Kev Williams
03-09-2016, 11:52 AM
You guys correct me if I'm wrong, concerning Trotec's at least, but the dots per inch setting has nothing to do with cutting speed, yes? Whether 50 dpi 1500 dpi, the cut speed is the same, only the spacing between the laser pulses changes...?

And while most of my laser work is raster, what vector cutting I've done in the past 12 years has typically been between 250 and 1000 dpi, usually acrylics, and I've never noticed any difference? I'm sure there IS, but my vector needs are usually cutting rowmark and other acrylics... I guess what I'm driving at is, it should be just fine to cut at 500 if 250 won't work, and shouldn't affect production time?

Mike Null
03-09-2016, 12:19 PM
Gary

You are correct. Raphael has some bad info.

Kev

You are also correct--dpi doesn't have anything to do with the speed of the machine but increasing dpi does increase the time necessary to do the job. Dpi is not a vector cutting parameter, at least on the machines I am familiar with.

Gary Hair
03-09-2016, 12:25 PM
The only thing that has an effect on cutting speed, is the -wait for it- speed setting... DPI is for raster only, PPI simply controls the number of pulses per inch the laser fires, not how fast it travels. I confirmed on my machine that JC 10.5.x will vector with any DPI setting.

Keith Winter
03-09-2016, 1:35 PM
Another bug that exists is if your cut patterns become too complex (I had some with over 9,500 points in the illustrator file) or if you have too many layers in a file causing a large file size, and you print from Adobe Illustrator then the speedy 400 will randomly mess up about 5% of the time. Additionally if there are any CUT LINE artifacts in your file outside of the engravable area in Adobe Illustrator the speedy 400 it will mess up about 40% of the time. I spent 4 months tearing my hair out and on the phone with tech support before I figured out those two things cause issue, they never did figure it out, we had to figure it out ourselves. Happens more on my 120w 400 than my 80w but it occurs on both 400w machines from time to time. I tried different job control software, different computers, different firmware, even had the electrician redo all the wiring to the laser at Trotec's behest which cost me a pretty penny, but it still didn't fix it. Now we just know to check files for those artifacts and to break larger files into smaller files so the Trotec can handle it. Same errors do not occur in the speedy 300s with the same software so I believe it must have something to do with the 400s specifically. Great machines but if you run into one of these bugs it can be quite a nightmare to figure out. Hopefully these tips help someone else avoid downtime.

Raphael Weil
03-09-2016, 2:51 PM
Gary

You are correct. Raphael has some bad info.

Kev

You are also correct--dpi doesn't have anything to do with the speed of the machine but increasing dpi does increase the time necessary to do the job. Dpi is not a vector cutting parameter, at least on the machines I am familiar with.


Not sure what to tell you, with Trotec support on team viewer today we reproduced it 100%. 10.2.5, I couldn't get a cut line to cut at 250 DPI in stand mode/colour, but it worked immediately at 500 DPI. We reproduced the problem in both directions numerous times. So it could be something specific to my install, but I've got no idea what. Chris from Trotec also said he'd seen it once before.

As for the speed part, I 100% agree that DPI has nothing to do with cut speed.

Mike Null
03-09-2016, 3:57 PM
Raphael

Try your job in black and white mode.

Ivan Shuliak
03-09-2016, 8:50 PM
Another bug that exists is if your cut patterns become too complex (I had some with over 9,500 points in the illustrator file) or if you have too many layers in a file causing a large file size, and you print from Adobe Illustrator then the speedy 400 will randomly mess up about 5% of the time. Additionally if there are any CUT LINE artifacts in your file outside of the engravable area in Adobe Illustrator the speedy 400 it will mess up about 40% of the time. I spent 4 months tearing my hair out and on the phone with tech support before I figured out those two things cause issue, they never did figure it out, we had to figure it out ourselves. Happens more on my 120w 400 than my 80w but it occurs on both 400w machines from time to time. I tried different job control software, different computers, different firmware, even had the electrician redo all the wiring to the laser at Trotec's behest which cost me a pretty penny, but it still didn't fix it. Now we just know to check files for those artifacts and to break larger files into smaller files so the Trotec can handle it. Same errors do not occur in the speedy 300s with the same software so I believe it must have something to do with the 400s specifically. Great machines but if you run into one of these bugs it can be quite a nightmare to figure out. Hopefully these tips help someone else avoid downtime.I just read this about Trotec, but it was like I was reading it about our Epilog machines :) Can tell exactly the same about Zing/Mini comparing to Fusion M32. The first two work like a charm no matter what, but if you send a job to the Fusion which is 1 pixel outside the working area, it will take 3 times longer to cut. It looks like the machine goes into a "safe" mode and cutts very-very slow. Also if you try to send such job to a job manager first and then from it to machine, job manager just crashes.

Raphael Weil
03-10-2016, 7:28 AM
Raphael

Try your job in black and white mode.

Hi Mike,

That was one of the first things I had tried before engaging support. Interestingly we noted that even how the line appears in job control changes based on the dpi we selected. In 500 DPI the line is thicker and clearer. At 250 dpi when using the mode where you can view the work piece on the plate, the line is thin and almost faded. Same exact file. And the only reason I even ran into the bug is because of the move to 250 for some other work.

Fwiw I've seen a few other Job Control bugs too. I print from adobe viewer typical (as a pdf), and quite often once I've sent one thing to Job Control, if I attempt to send a second job it won't appear in the print queue. I've got to close Job Control and start from scratch. Once I do all the other attempts of things I sent will appear in there at once. Must be some sort of refresh bug.

Scott Shepherd
03-10-2016, 8:09 AM
In my opinion, the best way to use any mainstream laser is with CorelDraw. I have seen, as well as talked to, too many people having quirky issues and it almost always comes from using Illustrator or some other software. I use Illustrator every day, it's my primary design software. However, I save everything out and import it into CorelDraw for the laser. I can't count the hours that I've seen people waste trying to track down bugs that all end up from trying to use Illustrator. I understand why they want to use it, but I also understand that most laser companies don't invest much time in sending things from software other than CorelDraw. I've seen a lot of issues across multiple manufacturers and to this day, I've never seen one of them fixed. They just don't spend the time tracking down and fixing bugs that come from outside of CorelDraw, in my opinion. Of course I could be wrong, they could devote 100's or 1000's of hours to trying to fix things, but I can say that in most all cases, it ends up being like Keith, where the user figures out a work around and that's the end of the story. 5 versions of drivers later, the same issues will still be there, showing me they don't focus on those things.

Raphael Weil
03-10-2016, 8:40 AM
In my opinion, the best way to use any mainstream laser is with CorelDraw. I have seen, as well as talked to, too many people having quirky issues and it almost always comes from using Illustrator or some other software. I use Illustrator every day, it's my primary design software. However, I save everything out and import it into CorelDraw for the laser. I can't count the hours that I've seen people waste trying to track down bugs that all end up from trying to use Illustrator. I understand why they want to use it, but I also understand that most laser companies don't invest much time in sending things from software other than CorelDraw. I've seen a lot of issues across multiple manufacturers and to this day, I've never seen one of them fixed. They just don't spend the time tracking down and fixing bugs that come from outside of CorelDraw, in my opinion. Of course I could be wrong, they could devote 100's or 1000's of hours to trying to fix things, but I can say that in most all cases, it ends up being like Keith, where the user figures out a work around and that's the end of the story. 5 versions of drivers later, the same issues will still be there, showing me they don't focus on those things.

100% agree. It's only taken me a few weeks to accept that, I started noticing it fairly early. Same thing happened on the FSL I used before. I found a nice cheap version of X7, looks like my very next purchase. I made a change to my OP to reflect the software used.

Mike Null
03-10-2016, 10:04 AM
Raphael

I think you may have identified the issue (software). I haven't experienced any of the issues you've mentioned but I'm using Corel X5 and a Speedy 300 with 10.5. Good luck with your new X7.

Raphael Weil
03-10-2016, 10:48 AM
Raphael

I think you may have identified the issue (software). I haven't experienced any of the issues you've mentioned but I'm using Corel X5 and a Speedy 300 with 10.5. Good luck with your new X7.

I do think it's safe to say that it's job control dropping the ball on this one though. That it cares about 250 vs 500 for a pdf from adobe is certainly a bug. But I can get around it obviously :)

Neville Stewart
03-10-2016, 8:35 PM
I do think it's safe to say that it's job control dropping the ball on this one though. That it cares about 250 vs 500 for a pdf from adobe is certainly a bug. But I can get around it obviously :)
Glad you got it sorted out Raphael, you have some heavy hitters chiming in here, and I've learned a few things from the comments and your travails.

Keith Winter
03-10-2016, 9:58 PM
In my opinion, the best way to use any mainstream laser is with CorelDraw. I have seen, as well as talked to, too many people having quirky issues and it almost always comes from using Illustrator or some other software. I use Illustrator every day, it's my primary design software. However, I save everything out and import it into CorelDraw for the laser. I can't count the hours that I've seen people waste trying to track down bugs that all end up from trying to use Illustrator. I understand why they want to use it, but I also understand that most laser companies don't invest much time in sending things from software other than CorelDraw. I've seen a lot of issues across multiple manufacturers and to this day, I've never seen one of them fixed. They just don't spend the time tracking down and fixing bugs that come from outside of CorelDraw, in my opinion. Of course I could be wrong, they could devote 100's or 1000's of hours to trying to fix things, but I can say that in most all cases, it ends up being like Keith, where the user figures out a work around and that's the end of the story. 5 versions of drivers later, the same issues will still be there, showing me they don't focus on those things.

The problem is designers all use and are trained in Adobe Illustrator. I can convert the files, but it's a pain because if there is a problem the designer tends to be dumbstruck using Corel because they don't teach it in college, so changes on the fly are difficult for them to do. They have to go back to the original illustrator file, change it, and then reexport it in an Corel friendly file.

That being said Illustrator is $30 a month/$360 a year. If you have multiple pcs then that quickly gets out of control. Buying Corel x7 for $350 one time and not yearly would be a very welcome change. One I am going to strongly reconsider after your post. :) Excellent point Steve.

Scott Shepherd
03-10-2016, 10:25 PM
The problem is designers all use and are trained in Adobe Illustrator. I can convert the files, but it's a pain because if there is a problem the designer tends to be dumbstruck using Corel because they don't teach it in college, so changes on the fly are difficult for them to do. They have to go back to the original illustrator file, change it, and then reexport it in an Corel friendly file.



Believe me, I get it. I wish all laser manufacturers supported Illustrator as much as they do Corel. However, I've taken calls, emails, and PM's from Epilog and Trotec owners that sound identical. Odd,quirky issues that may or may not be repeatable, always based around one phrase, "I'm using Illustrator".

I can say I haven't seen any of those issues from Corel.

We just save things as eps files, import them into Corel, burn them and move on. If something needs changing, we can change it, export back to eps, but if it's a long term change, we go back to Illy and save it again.

I wish that wasn't the case, but I think it's something to do with art boards in Illy. No one seems to take it seriously or push the issues.