New C9600/C9800 Series Printers from OKI Printing Solutions Set the Standard for Tabloid Color Printing; Latest Versions of Tabloid Color Printers Include Suite of Enhancements That Enable in-House, Commercial-Quality Color Printing.

MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. -- Oki Data Americas, Inc., a leading provider of innovative products, services, and solutions marketed under the OKI(R) Printing Solutions brand, today introduced two new series of digital LED tabloid color printers: the C9600/C9800 Series.

Serving as replacements to the C9300/C9500 Series, the C9600/C9800 Series digital color printers provide in-house printing capabilities, allowing customers to eliminate outsourcing, thereby saving time and money.

"Large workgroup environments demand high-volume printing solutions that offer superior reliability, productivity, and efficiency, and the C9600/C9800 Series digital color printers directly meet those needs on graphics-quality level," said Candice Dobra, Director, Printer Marketing for Oki Data Americas. "The impressive media-handling capabilities and improved print quality catapult these products ahead of the competition, reinforcing our dedication to color leadership."

The C9600/9800 Series digital color printers deliver output at up to 36 pages per minute (ppm) in color and 40 ppm in monochrome(1) and print the widest variety of media in the class, including cover stock up to 270 grams per square meter (gsm) and banners up to 12.9" x 47.24."

The C9800 Series digital color printers are designed to enable commercial print shop performance, consistency and accuracy for color-centric workgroups. Powered by EFI(R) Fiery(R) Technology, the C9800 Series provides print control and job management functionality to optimize document workflow and ensure consistently exceptional results through EFI Colorwise(TM) Pro tools and EFI Command Workstation(TM)4. The estimated street price of the C9800hn is $6,889 while the C9800hdn has an estimated street price of $7,189. They will be available through OKI Printing Solutions authorized solution providers.

The C9600 Series tabloid digital color printers are the ideal solutions for busy workgroups that need flexibility in their printing requirements. When printing presentations, reports, brochures, promotional materials or banners, the C9600 Series printers perform efficiently and affordably. To ensure color consistency and accuracy of output, the C9600 Series printers are available with color matching software from OKI Printing Solutions. The estimated street price of the C9600n is $3,399, while the C9600hdn has an estimated street price of $4,099. They will be available through OKI Printing Solutions authorized solution providers.

A Closer Look at Key Enhancements

The C9600/C9800 Series represent a new milestone in excellence, enabling large workgroups that require high-quality, high-volume color printing to benefit from enhancements that include:

--The EFI controller advantage. For the C9800 Series, parent company Oki Data Corporation partnered with EFI, the world leader in imaging solutions for network printing, to boost performance of the C9800 Series. EFI's expertise in color printing combined with superior digital LED technology from OKI Printing Solutions gives users fast, accurate color and exceptional document management capabilities.

--Unmatched media flexibility. Printing capabilities have been dramatically enhanced, with the C9800/C9600 Series allowing end-users to print on media up to 270 gsm, an increase from 200 gsm on the C9300/C9500 Series. From card stock to glossy media to banners, customers can print on a fuller range of media than ever before.

--New, multilevel LED printing. Digital LED's speed, compact size, lack of moving parts, and ease of registration enables superior output quality, durability and efficiency over laser printing. The new multilevel LED print-head technology within the C9600/C9800 Series allows for better customer print quality, such as sharper details and higher color fidelity.

RFID technology. Consumables now include RFID technology, which will ensure that the appropriate branded toners and image drums are used with the C9600/C9800 Series, thereby optimizing its performance and ensuring engine reliability.

--Greater ease of use. An improved control panel with LCD display and a smaller footprint make these printers even more user-friendly. A new image drum basket on the C9600/C9800 Series allows for all four toner drums to be lifted in one motion to access the transfer belt and fuser in case of a paper jam. These improvements reduce downtime and support costs while increasing productivity.

"Across the board, the C9600/C9800 Series represents a new standard in tabloid color printers," said Dobra. "OKI Printing Solutions is proud to usher in a new era of color excellence that makes professional graphics-quality color printing more accessible and affordable."

The launch of the C9600/C9800 Series today builds on parent company Oki Data Corporation's history of leadership and innovation in color printing. It is based on the 7th generation of printing technologies advanced by Oki Data Corporation, such as digital LED technology and Single Pass Color(TM).

Like all OKI Printing Solutions products, the C9600/C9800 Series digital color printers are backed by total support from OKI Printing Solutions authorized solution providers. In addition, OKI Printing Solutions provides live, toll-free technical support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, with agents based in North America.

C9800 Series specifications
Print Speed: up to 36 ppm color, up to 40 ppm monochrome(1)
Processor: 1 GHz
Print Resolution: 1200 x 1200 Multilevel LED technology
Duty Cycle: 150,000 pages per month
Connectivity: USB 2.0 high-speed, IEEE 1284 Bi-directional
Parallel, 10/100-TX Ethernet standard
Emulations: PCL(R) 5c, PCL 6, Adobe PostScript 3(TM) standard;
Direct PDF Printing (Windows environment only)
Color Control Utilities: EFI Colorwise Pro tools

C9600 Series specifications
Print Speed: up to 36 ppm color, up to 40 ppm monochrome(1)

Processor: 720 MHz
Print Resolution: 1200 x 600 Multilevel LED technology
Duty Cycle: 150,000 pages per month
Connectivity: USB 2.0 high-speed, IEEE 1284 Bi-directional
Parallel, 10/100-TX Ethernet; Optional Wireless NIC
Emulations: PCL(R) 5c, PCL 6, Adobe PostScript 3(TM) standard;
Direct PDF Printing (Windows environment only)
Color Control Utilities: color matching software from OKI Printing
Solutions

About Oki Data Americas:

Oki Data Americas, Inc., headquartered in Mount Laurel, N.J., and a subsidiary of Oki Data Corporation of Japan, markets under the OKI Printing Solutions brand PC peripheral equipment including digital color and monochrome printers, serial impact dot matrix printers, multifunction products and facsimiles. Known for durable and reliable products, Oki Data Americas is ISO 9001:2000 certified and also offers a full line of options, accessories and consumables. Its entire line of products complies with the EPA's Energy Star(R) Program. Oki Electric Industry Co., Ltd., parent company to Oki Data Corporation, is a $7.0 billion multinational corporation with headquarters in Tokyo and is a world leader in information processing systems, telecommunications and electronics.

For more information about Oki Data or OKI Printing Solutions products and services, and Single Pass Color technology, visit the OKI Printing Solutions Web site: www.okiprintingsolutions.com

OKI Reg. Oki Electric Industry Co., Ltd. Energy Star Reg. T.M. U.S. EPA, Single Pass Color T.M. and design Reg. T.M., Oki Data Corp., PCL, Reg. T.M., Hewlett-Packard Co., PostScript 3 T.M., Adobe Systems Inc., EFI, Fiery, Command Workstation, ColorWise, and Spot-On are registered trademarks of Electronics For Imaging, Inc. in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and/or certain other foreign jurisdictions.

(1)Published performance results are based on laboratory testing; individual results may vary.