Digital BW, The Print

I purchased an Epson 7600 for about $200 that came with 7 large bottles of UT7 black ink.  I have dedicated the printer to print black and white with the ink and refill carts.  

Now for the hard stuff.  I cant seem to get a print that I like. I need to know the steps that I need to take to make quality prints from my b&w TIF files. I have printed some test images and I use the curve profiles that have been created to work with Photoshop. So far so good but the photo black prints I make with my color 7600 seems to have blacker blacks and overall are much better. The test prints work well and I can see the differences in the prints from Warm to Neutral as set in the Photoshop curves. 

The paper I use for B&W is matte. I have even tried semi gloss but the images look washed out or mostly grey.  Playing around with the photos I realize I get better prints from TIF files and not JPGs.  

I use Qimage to print the curve adjusted files.  

So here are my questions:

1. What paper should I be using with the UT7 ink on this printer?

2. How do you setup Quadtone RIP to work with this printer and 7 inks?  I did a quick look and was lost. I am to understand that this program is what everyone uses.

3. Am I expecting too much for the 7 ink system to look as good as Photo black?

4. Is there a simple step by step process to make a nice print?

5. Should I just dump the UT7 and go with another 7 ink black system?


Thanks for any info you can provide.

This printer has been sitting since I cant figure out a nice way to print. I would hate to convert it back to color.


Dwight