INKJET UV Printer & Coat & CUT

INKJET UV Printer & Laser Cutting Machine

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XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions – ARTJET 2026

XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions

✅ Who Should Read This
  • Anyone deciding which print resolution to use with an XP600 head
  • Anyone curious how E-closion (feathering / gradient mask) affects pass count and speed
  • Anyone wondering about the real quality difference between 720dpi vs. 360dpi, or unidirectional vs. bidirectional printing
  • Anyone skeptical of a competitor’s claim that “faster carriage speed means double the productivity”

⚠️ Precautions
  • This article reflects the author’s own testing and personal opinion — results can vary depending on the board manufacturer and equipment setup
  • If head height (stand-off) is set higher than the material, image quality suffers significantly regardless of resolution
  • Pushing carriage speed too high can cause serious ink misting/spatter
  • If a competitor claims “twice the speed” on the same head, the first thing to suspect is a reduced pass count

🧭 Key Summary (Field Insight)
  • Each E-closion level (Low/Mid/High) adds 2 passes — banding decreases, but speed drops proportionally
  • Most 360dpi modes lacked sufficient density and color to be practical; only 360×720 at 2 passes was kept, and only for line-only work
  • Among the 720dpi modes, 720×1080 at 6 passes — even with E-closion High added — gave the best balance of quality and speed
  • Conclusion: aside from the dedicated 2-pass line mode, 720×1080 with E-closion adjusted as needed is the optimal setup

Today I’d like to share a personal opinion and some hands-on experience about print resolution.
Print resolution is a genuinely sensitive topic, so I expect plenty of people will disagree with what follows. Please take this as one person’s opinion, not a definitive answer.

Back in September 2019(?), during our first XP600 head installation, I was coming from a background of developing, manufacturing, and selling only industrial head equipment — this was my first real exposure to Epson heads, through a piece of Chinese-made equipment. After the installation wrapped up, I asked, “What print resolution should we set the XP600 head to?” My Chinese contact replied, “720 x 1080 is all you need!”

Privately, I thought, “That doesn’t sound right — I should test the resolutions myself and find the right one.”

💬 Most Chinese-made XP600 equipment runs on motion and head boards from a handful of board makers. To really understand the product, I tested every resolution and speed combination, and I suspect most Chinese XP600 head equipment behaves similarly to what’s described below (though it may not always hold true). All test results here are based on the Epson XP600 head.

I. E-closion (Feathering, Gradient Mask) — XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions

At first, I didn’t realize how much E-closion slowed things down — but while testing resolutions at different pass counts, I noticed the timing lined up, and realized each E-closion level adds 2 passes.

  • 720 x 1080 resolution is normally 6 passes. But printing with E-closion Low adds 2 passes, bringing it to 8.
  • It’s a technique that scatters ink where passes meet, so the seam (pass banding) becomes harder to see.
  • Depending on image complexity and how well the material’s surface tension lets ink spread, you can choose Low, Mid, or High — each adding 2 more passes, softening the seams and reducing banding, but at a proportional cost in speed.
E-closion Description
Close Prints at the native resolution — 720 x 1080 is 6 passes, and stays 6 passes at Close
Low Adds 2 passes over Close — speed drops accordingly
Mid Adds 4 passes over Close — speed drops accordingly
High Adds 6 passes over Close — speed drops accordingly

II. X-Axis 360dpi Print Mode Tests — XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions

The X-axis is the print direction, and the Y-axis is the feed direction. Let’s start by looking at an X-axis resolution of 360.

1. 360 x 360 dpi, 1 pass

  • When printing an absolute density target to build a profile, the density itself came up short.
  • Because of that density shortfall, this mode couldn’t even hold an ICC profile → not usable.

2. 360 x 720 dpi, 2 passes (after ICC work)

  • Printing a normal image showed overall low density, and Red and Blue in particular looked noticeably off.
  • Since it’s fast, we decided to reserve this mode for line-only output.

3. 360 x 1080 dpi, 3 passes (after ICC work)

  • This 3-pass mode was oddly interesting. A normal image looked passable with E-closion Low, but it was hard to use for solid colors.
  • Even getting the normal image to print without banding required 5 passes [3 passes + 2 passes (E-closion Low)].
  • Not meaningful in practice.

4. 360 x 1440 dpi, 4 passes (after ICC work)

  • Normal images weren’t a big problem, but solid-color banding was severe — even with E-closion High (4+6=10 passes), solid-color banding was worse here than in other modes.
  • Not meaningful in practice.

5. 360 x 1440 dpi (asymmetric X/Y case)

  • Whenever X and Y resolution are asymmetric, color values tend to shift significantly. For that reason, we didn’t run this test.
  • Not meaningful in practice.

💬 In the end,

  • For X-axis 360dpi, we decided to keep only the 360 x 720, 2-pass mode as a general line mode.
  • This mode is currently used with a two-head color configuration (Color in place of White) at companies printing text on COVID test kits and outline printing on picture-cafe products.

III. X-Axis 720dpi Print Mode Tests — XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions

1. 720 x 720, 4 passes

  • Normal images printed without major issues, but solid colors showed banding problems.
  • (720x720dpi, bidirectional printing, tested at High and Mid carriage speeds)

    XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions
    XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions

2. 720 x 1080, 6 passes

  • Normal images had no issues, and with E-closion High (adding 6 passes), solid colors were reasonably acceptable.
  • (720x1080dpi, bidirectional printing, tested at High and Mid carriage speeds)

    XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions
    XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions

3. 720 x 1440, 8 passes

  • I expected higher dpi to improve things further, but solid colors were no better than at 720×1080 — if anything, they looked slightly worse.
  • (720x1440dpi, bidirectional printing, tested at High and Mid carriage speeds)

    XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions
    XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions

4. Things I noticed while testing

  • Comparing unidirectional and bidirectional printing, plain solid colors showed little difference. But for sharp, detailed images or skin-tone portraits, bidirectional printing looked noticeably rougher. In the end, unidirectional mode is the one I’d recommend.
  • More than the unidirectional/bidirectional difference, image quality drops sharply if the head height sits higher than the material. Setting the correct print height is essential every time.
  • On carriage speed: once stand-off is properly optimized, High and Mid printing quality showed almost no difference — though that assumes the ink is well-matched to the head. Low speed brought a slight improvement but no dramatic quality difference, and it’s simply too slow to be worth using except in special cases (e.g. when material warping forces you to print at a greater height).

IV. Print Time and Image Quality Summary by Resolution – XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions

Print conditions: bidirectional printing, 600 x 900mm output size.

After printing every test image, timing each output across the whole unit, and running this over three days, here’s the final conclusion.

XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions
XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions
💬 Aside from the 2-pass line mode, using 720×1080 for everything else — adjusting only E-closion as needed — is the optimal setup.
XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions
XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions

V. Losing a Two-Unit Order (About $400K)…_ XP600 Head Ink Density and Speed Tests Across Resolutions

This is a story from my previous job.

A steel company had asked for a UV printer with custom specs, and we’d delivered a customized unit that they were using happily. About two years later, they visited a competitor and a Chinese manufacturer to purchase two more units. Our company had told them upfront that the price wasn’t negotiable, and they said they’d think it over — this was through their business division head.

Two weeks passed after the meeting with no word, so I called. It turned out they’d already signed with a competitor for two units. Looking back, I wondered if I’d been too complacent as a salesperson…

“Director, our product carries ten years of accumulated know-how, so it’s genuinely excellent. Aside from SwissQ — which costs twice as much and does have better quality at the same speed — I’d say ours is the best among products using Konica heads.”
“Actually, we went with Company X. We looked at their specs and watched it print in person, and it was twice as fast. That’s why we chose them.”
“Director, that product also uses a dual-row Konica head array — the same head, and the same number of heads as ours. No one gets double the productivity out of the same head while keeping the same quality.”
“But the carriage speed was almost twice as fast — doesn’t that mean twice the productivity?”
“Director, every head has a carriage speed that matches its resolution. If their carriage was moving twice as fast as ours, did you happen to check how many passes it was printing? They likely couldn’t push out that much data at double speed, so my guess is they were running roughly half the passes we use. And higher carriage speed can also cause serious ink misting — that’s worth checking too…”

As the conversation got more technical, it seemed like he’d stopped really listening.

“If you run into any questions using it, feel free to reach out. Even though it’s not our product, I’ll help however I can.”

And that’s how I left it.

💬 After the equipment was delivered, there ended up being no real speed difference. They’d traded fewer passes for a faster carriage… If anyone claims double the speed on the exact same head as a competitor, it’s worth knowing that math simply doesn’t add up.

VI. UV Printer Basics · Troubleshooting · Product Guides
We have organized our UV Printer content below. Click an item to read the full post.
1) Ink Supply
23 articles on ink supply issues, including cleaning and pumping
2) Print Head Issues
12 articles on head-related problems, from replacement methods to symptoms
For deeper printhead study: Printhead Basics — 10 Articles
3) Electronics / Software Issues
4) Mechanical Issues
5) Sai Flexi RIP Installation, Spot Color, Troubleshooting
6) UV Printable Products — Full Summary

VII. ARTJET UV Printer

After selling and maintaining ARTJET UV printers for over 5 years, we have learned one vital lesson.
The most important factor next to product stability is accumulating troubleshooting data.
Problems can occur with any equipment depending on the environment, working conditions, and user skill level. What matters in the field is not “trouble-free equipment,” but:
How fast and how accurately you can find the cause and solve the problem when it occurs.
ARTJET continuously collects and organizes real-world problem data from the field to support faster and more accurate problem resolution.
🎥 View Print Quality Samples
💰 Pricing & Sales Conditions
(Note: Exterior design has been updated)
🧾 Full List of UV Printable Products

UV Printable Products

* Note: Exterior design has been updated.
※ This article is based on actual field cases. Results may vary depending on the environment and equipment configuration.

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