CD And DVD Duplication - Outsource It Or Produce In House?
Sometimes a prospect will say to me: "I don't understand why I should use a CD duplication company.
CD media and duplication towers are so cheap now that I can do it all myself.
" And I say: "I can buy flour and eggs and bake myself a cake for less than a pound.
But I still buy it at the supermarket.
" Here are few points to consider before you decide to produce everything in house or use the services of a CD/DVD duplication company.
Print quality The cheapest method of full colour printing is inkjet.
You can buy inkjet printable media online and produce a very good print result.
In fact, the print engines on many desktop printers are similar, if not the same, as the automated inkjet printers used by many professional duplication companies.
However, this might be great for one or two hundred discs but not much more.
When you need larger quantities of discs, you need to strongly consider having a screen printed or offset (litho) printed disc.
The print quality of these two processes completely blows inkjet away for most designs.
Also, you don't have to be concerned about waterproof or ink fading issues that still arise with inkjet media.
Yes, you can buy more expensive waterproof surface treated media now but if ink is not covered with a UV treated lacquer, fading can still be a problem.
Time One full colour, full coverage inkjet CD can take up to 3 minutes to print.
If you're using one of the cheap desktop printers with a long tray, add another minute messing about with the tray.
If you are only producing one or two discs at a time, this time scale may not be a problem for you.
However, if you need fifty or hundred, you might not be happy loading and unloading a desktop printer for two or three hours.
You could be spending that time doing something far more important on your business (preparing a sales letter for example) instead of mundane, manual work.
If you do produce fairly large numbers of printed discs and decide to choose an automated system, think carefully about it.
Many companies advertise that you can load their printers and just walk away.
This is not the case.
CDs get jammed, printers stop or misalign for no reason and robotics can fail.
You might think that you don't need to monitor the process but you do.
A professional duplication company can really remove this headache.
Cost The costs of the CD/DVD printers vary depending on functionality (example including automated dropping of the media or duplication).
At the time of this article, a manual desktop colour printer with CD printing functionality could cost as little as £80 (approx $160USD).
Those printers have the wonderfully "stable" trays that you place the CD in and push back into the printer.
A more robust printer such as the Microboards GX Publisher would set you back £500 ($1000USD).
Add another few hundred pounds if you need a DVD duplicator.
There is a point where the equipment becomes too expensive and you have to decide if the number of discs you produce actually justifies the purchase of these machines.
My advice: if you produce less than 500 discs per month across a number of projects, have the time and patience to oversee the process yourself and are not too concerned about print quality, then produce in house.
Otherwise, spend some time selecting a professional CD/DVD duplication company that you can trust with your work.
CD media and duplication towers are so cheap now that I can do it all myself.
" And I say: "I can buy flour and eggs and bake myself a cake for less than a pound.
But I still buy it at the supermarket.
" Here are few points to consider before you decide to produce everything in house or use the services of a CD/DVD duplication company.
Print quality The cheapest method of full colour printing is inkjet.
You can buy inkjet printable media online and produce a very good print result.
In fact, the print engines on many desktop printers are similar, if not the same, as the automated inkjet printers used by many professional duplication companies.
However, this might be great for one or two hundred discs but not much more.
When you need larger quantities of discs, you need to strongly consider having a screen printed or offset (litho) printed disc.
The print quality of these two processes completely blows inkjet away for most designs.
Also, you don't have to be concerned about waterproof or ink fading issues that still arise with inkjet media.
Yes, you can buy more expensive waterproof surface treated media now but if ink is not covered with a UV treated lacquer, fading can still be a problem.
Time One full colour, full coverage inkjet CD can take up to 3 minutes to print.
If you're using one of the cheap desktop printers with a long tray, add another minute messing about with the tray.
If you are only producing one or two discs at a time, this time scale may not be a problem for you.
However, if you need fifty or hundred, you might not be happy loading and unloading a desktop printer for two or three hours.
You could be spending that time doing something far more important on your business (preparing a sales letter for example) instead of mundane, manual work.
If you do produce fairly large numbers of printed discs and decide to choose an automated system, think carefully about it.
Many companies advertise that you can load their printers and just walk away.
This is not the case.
CDs get jammed, printers stop or misalign for no reason and robotics can fail.
You might think that you don't need to monitor the process but you do.
A professional duplication company can really remove this headache.
Cost The costs of the CD/DVD printers vary depending on functionality (example including automated dropping of the media or duplication).
At the time of this article, a manual desktop colour printer with CD printing functionality could cost as little as £80 (approx $160USD).
Those printers have the wonderfully "stable" trays that you place the CD in and push back into the printer.
A more robust printer such as the Microboards GX Publisher would set you back £500 ($1000USD).
Add another few hundred pounds if you need a DVD duplicator.
There is a point where the equipment becomes too expensive and you have to decide if the number of discs you produce actually justifies the purchase of these machines.
My advice: if you produce less than 500 discs per month across a number of projects, have the time and patience to oversee the process yourself and are not too concerned about print quality, then produce in house.
Otherwise, spend some time selecting a professional CD/DVD duplication company that you can trust with your work.
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