Discuss the various aspects of heat pressed vinyl transfers. Popular and new types of vinyl media, suppliers, vinyl cutters /plotters, press times, quality, how to instructions and more can be found in this heat press sub forum.
So finally Im looking around for a Vinyl Cutter and would like everyone's with them.
Im sure everyone has their preferrences, but Im sure anyone who is in the market for a vinyl cutter would like to hear the positives and negatives of the different brands and their exeperiences with them.
Of course we all want the most for the cheapest price.
Has anyone had any exeperience with the vinyl cutters on eBay like this one?
buy cheap....get cheap...this cutter does not appear to have any registration system...and if that is okay...then maybe... BUT
There is NO WAY that I will buy ANY cutter/printer or other technical bit on ebay...you have no recourse...no after sales support, parts may or may not be readily available in a year only 90 day warranty and the interface is either parallel or serial...no USB...the modern way..and the serial to USB adaptors are iffy sometimes..
but if you have the $$ to spare...go for...but you might want to check with some of our sponsors to see what they have in that price range...you will be best served to do that
I need to be completely honest. When we were first thinking of buying a plotter to suppliment Mark's friend's sign business up here, we were considering a plotter very similar to this, and our reasoning was this: Who cares how long the machine lasts. Once we start making things on a regular basis, we'd upgrade to a more expensive, but more reliable plotter.
Well, we decided to go with quality right from the get-go, and we're very happy we did.
If you want to purchase a less expensive plotter, my suggestions would be to go with a USCutters plotter. Many people here have them and are very satisfied.
But as Charlse said, this plotter won't contour cut, and neither will most of USCutters' plotters.
If you do want to contour cut inkjet transfers, buy a Roland or a Graphtec plotter with an automatic registration mark sensor on it. It will save time and time is money.
Another thing to consider when you're looking at a machine of this price (the one you linked to) is whether or not it reads the size of the media you have loaded into it. Not being able to read your media size will be a major pain. You might want to ask about it.
On the plus side, it comes with a plugin to cut direcly from CorelDRAW.
We'll happily answer any specific questions you might have.
I have a copam its a great machine but it will not contour cut, if you need that Graphtec would be my choice,,, or even US cutters Laser registration cutter,
corel is not a a requirement...most come with some sort of software to let you cut...for ex...the gx24 comes with cut studio.. the 2500 and gx 24 are both good machines..not sure if 2500 has optic eye as I dont own one..
The copam only has a optical eye to mesaure material only, but I have to say that their support is not to good, you have to go to their forums for support. Also I might add that thr Roland is a great machine also.
Contour cutting is when you have a design that you print on either stiker media or inkjet transfers, and you cut around those designs so you don't just have a box around them. Kinda like die cutting, only more versitile.
Optical Eye: Be careful with this one. The Copam 2500 has an optical eye for reading the size of your media only. It does not have a registation mark sensor for contour cutting.
Plotters like the Roland GX-24 and the Graphtec CE5000-60 have what's known as an optical eye, but it's officially called an Automatic Registration Mark Sensor (ARMS), at least by Graphtec.
In order to be able to contour cut, your plotter would need some sort of registration mark sensor (not just an "optical eye"). If that's something you think you might do with your plotter, make sure that it mentions registration marks in it.
the laser point is a new entry. at first they were not shipping the software that had the registration feature. I think the may have solved that. I think this unit has been on the market for about 7 months or so.. I think I would do some more checking on the unit first. I think there is a review by someone on the forum...
You do not "have" to go to our forums for support, you simply have to be patient and wait to get through to me just like everyone else. Sometimes you get through on the first call, sometimes you get voicemail if I am already on the phone. Problem is, I am the only one currently, and we sell to ALOT of beginners, so if you can only imagine the hand-holding I must do every single day. Alot of my calls are from customers who do not even know the difference between raster format and vector format........
Many callers do not know how to get to their Device Manager on their computer system.......
Some do not know how to unzip a folder.......
I could go on and on, but I am sure you get the picture. Point is, we have great support, me, but you need to be patient while trying to get in touch with me.
By the way, we have a new toll free number: 1-888-298-8143
I was not intending to undermine your support system or a direct attack, fortunatly I have had only minor issues and I am able to think and reason for myself, however I have called your office without a return call and found my answer at your forum ,this is most certainly do to the call volume you are having, heck it happened to me today, I like my cutter I would and have refered potential customers to US cutter.
Naw, I didn't take it as a personal attack , just want to let others know that the forum is not the "only" method of support, which was kind of implied. I am on the phones with customers all day, so I know that is not the case.
I apologize if your call was not returned. Some messages are hard to make out, and we also had problems with our VoIP phone system for awhile, so when I went to repeat a message to get a phone number that was rattled off too quick, it would delete them instead of repeating them.
New firmware for the phone system has since resolved that issue.
Glad to hear your issues have been minor, and you were savvy enough to resolve them using another method.
Did you try to call me today? If you did not catch me and you left a voicemail, it will be returned today.
Looking for a Vinyl Cutter 
, just want to let others know that the forum is not the "only" method of support, which was kind of implied. I am on the phones with customers all day, so I know that is not the case.
