Buying a new cutter, Other that Roland, any other recommendations?

[Jim Doggett]

Simple stuff here, 24" cutter, no printing. I was looking at buying the Roland GX24.

Are there any other suggestions on what in comparable to it?

Roland is great machine and reliable as heck.

But Graphtec FC / Vinyl Express Q Series is all of that and quite a bit more: sublime cut-quality for graphics that weed faster and easier than any other cutter made. Really nice, and also very capable. For Anchor rubber sand-blast, or 3M Diamond Grade reflective, it's the only cutter I'd recommend.

Summa is great too, with wonderfully accurate tracking and great contour-cutting alignment.

So any of the above are superb choices. But based on what you're doing, I'd think the Roland would make you happy, and a Graphtec FC or Vinyl Express Q Series would make you really, really happy.

My $0.02,

Jim / SignWarehouse

 

[round man]

Having done support for a couple of local shops and repairing plotters for the past couple of years not to mention tinkering with them since they hit the market in the early 90's I would suggest a graphtec for the price,...in my experience with them they are of much higher quality than the new rolands they sell now,unless you buy one of the higher end rolands which for the money you can still get a better more reliable graphtec,..and they come with excellent support and a free plugin to cut directly from corel and adobe illustrator,...just my 2 cents here,....

 

[AUTO-FX]

I just bought a Strong Signs Flycut FY850 33" plotter with optical alignment. It was $790 incl shipping. Once I have it and have tested it, I will post my findings!
I decided to give this machine a shot because I am having serious financial struggles, my Roland is no longer functioning properly, and this seemed like a decent cheap plotter to get me through a rough spot in my life here.

I would also like to note: I have had a couple of VE Q machines - they are pretty darn good for the $ and I wouldnt hesitate if it's within your budget

 

[binki]

wow, thanks for all the responses. we are doubling (maybe triple) our capacity because of all the work we have. we are adding several machines, 1 or 2 computers, upgrading some software and revamping our storage to get more stuff in our small space.

thanks again for all the help. it is really appreciated.