High-volume and mid-volume colour printers along with a black & white engine are recognised by Buyers Laboratory as being best in their class in the annual Pro Awards.
The bizhub PRESS C1100, 2250P and 1052 all took top honours in the BLI 2015 field evaluations. This entailed three days of intensive testing during which tens of thousands of impressions were printed on the engines. The devices were tested for productivity with coated and uncoated media in a wide range of weights and sizes and using various finishing options to simulate a wide variety of job scenarios.
BLI technicians also evaluated image quality, including production of halftones, text and fine lines; density levels and variations; and colour drift over the course of a 1,000-page print run.
According to David Sweetnam, head of BLI’s European Research and Lab Services the bizhub PRESS C1100’s colour consistency is among the best BLI has seen. “It is one of just a few production units to earn BLI’s highest 5-star rating for colour consistency,” he said.
This has translated into a local installation with Shaun Weir, Kwik Kopy Bankstown claiming an increase of 50% productivity since the installation of his bizhub PRESS C1100. “The speed of printing allows us to print on a wide range of media from NCR to 350gsm board with no problems,” he said.
Grant Thomas, product-marketing manager for production print at Konica Minolta Australia said the awards demonstrate the company’s research and development is striving to reach higher levels of productivity and reliability.