ou may not care much for this missing feature but many people and I do. I did not feel too bad though, because I knew it before making a purchase (also the gray balancer). But I'm jealous the other people who live in the other part of the world and have these 2 features. If Epson add it to 2200 like they did to 960, it would be very nice. I try to be optimistic, may be it's the compatibility issue between the Ultrachrome ink and the printable CD in the market. However, the following instruction that you're about to see is not recommended by Epson (but they're not giving us the original tray, too). So you must put an extreme cautions on each steps.

Finally, Thanks to Epson Russia who has the software (Epson PrintCD 1.10E) downloadable in English version. Honestly, I feel the software is pretty mediocre. (actually, I was kinda shock) The interface is just like a software for an elementary school kid (as you can see) and the features is not very sophisticated. Compare to my old software that I used to make a CD label - Print shop Deluxe. This is too far away from that. However, since it allows me to print a curved text and it is just so simple and easy to learn. Maybe it's just good this way. But if you already have your own software and want to stick with it. You can certainly work your way out because this is completely possible. In this case, we're gonna demonstrate it with Epson PrintCD 1.10E.

Notice the plastic bar on the left of your printer (USA- 2200). When you push this bar, the 4 middle rubber roller wheels go up. This is designed for the CD-R printing tray.

Epson 2100 CD tray.	Epson PM4000PX CD tray.	This is from Epson 2100 setup guide.	Epson 960 US CD tray.

Rules and regulations.

We are gonna pretend that our hand made CD tray is just a thick paper that will be fed from the rear- manual feed slot. The US 2200 driver allow only 1 type of paper to use this - Epson Velvet fine art. You actually don't have to choose this paper but you then have to choose the source of paper - manual feed slot and then uncheck - borderless/maximum.

If you've never done this manual feed slot printing before, please refer to the manual p.15. I was struggled a few times because I had the automatic cutter attached. If you have the automatic cutter attached, you need to take it out and turn the printer off and back on again. Read the manual carefully and practice a few time, nothing is complicated.

According to the manual the thickest that the printer will handle is 1.3 mm. This is very limited because the CD-R itself is already almost 1 mm. You have only 0.3-0.4 mm to play around. My first custom made tray utilizing the part from CD jewel case doesn't look good because it's 2 mm thick. Not that printer won't feed but I afraid the rubber and spring won't handle this thick media. So after all, we have to follow Epson's regulation - 1.3 mm.

So, we'll make a custom tray that is not thicker than 1.3 mm. We'll make sure that the CD is completely sunken in this tray (too high - is no good, too low will leave too much distance between the nozzles and the printing area and it indicates that your whole tray is too thick !)

What we needs.

1) A card board paper 1 mm thick ! (where to find it ?, look around your house. I got mine from OfficeDepot) I bought a pack of vellum paper and it has 2 1 mm thick card board inside)
2) A card stock paper that is thinner- anywhere from 65 lb - 110lb
3) Cutter, optional circular cutter
4) double sided sticky tape or glue
5) Printable CD or any CD to use as a template.

How ?

1) Load the 1 mm card board paper by following the manual p. 15. I intentionally load this paper up to 1 inch even though the manual suggests only 1 cm (0.4 inch). The reasons is because I did not find the differences between the final position between these two. The printer will adjust the media automatically before printing. The 1 inch load will benefit when you're feeding the hand made tray because more portion of CD is secured than 1 cm. Either using 1 cm or 1 inch, the mark that indicates the top should be 3.5 mm from the top margin and the left mark is 4.2 mm from the left margin.
The upper picture show the loading of the card board paper and the lower picture show the CD-R tray loading. The 1 inch loading will secure the CD-R and tray better.	>

2) Initiate the Epson Print CD software (or any software you want to use). Choose file -> print or press ctrl+P to bring up this window. Then check Print position confirmation pattern and then click printer setting to bring up another window. Choose velvet fine art (or anything you want) but you must choose manual feed slot and tray 2. (You actually can choose tray 1 but the position of the CD is far away from the top and the left margin, it's easier to control with tray 2 option because the position is closer to the left and the top). Then order the print.

3) You should get the print of 4 marks looks like this picture. Then you find the center of circle by making 2 lines from those 4 marks in the middle and then you the compass to make a circle of 12 cm. Before you make a cut, make sure it's the same size with your real CD template. Click on the picture to see the bigger size.

4) Cut the round with the compass cutter. You have to make the cut slightly bigger than your real CD-R, so it can go right in. Too big will make a loose fitting and too small won't take the CD-R. If you don't have the compass cutter, you can slowly use the regular cutter to cut the circle. Or if you don't want to make your life complicated, you can actually make a square of 12x12 cm instead of the circle. The square will keep the CD-R in the correct position from 4 surfaces while the the round will maintain the CD-R from every wall.

5) Make the same cut (either round or square) on the other 2 thinner card stock papers. These 2 cut papers will be a mirror image to each other - one to be a floor for the CD-R which doesn't have to be pretty. Another one will be on top for a cosmetic purpose and also to enhance the paper thickness to ensure that the CD-R is completely sunken (or not protruding) with in the tray. Then you glue these 3 pieces together (I used the double sided sticky tape). These 2 paper + the card board + layer of glue/sticky tapes should not be thicker than 1.3 mm.

6) Make the round cut from the 1 mm card board to be the core of the CD-R in the tray. This will just help secure the CD in place and also make the printing on the 8 cm CD-R possible without making the 2nd tray. You can use the scissor to cut it.

After you finished all those, you can cut this custom tray to the size that you want. It doesn't have to be 8.5 x 11 inch which is too big. Mine is about 6x9, small and easier to feed thru the manual feed slot.

Printing in process.

Almost done, safe and sound.

Precautions.

As always, to maintain a safe practice.

1) Before you try it, please make sure that the surface of the CD-R is not lumpy. Try put the printable CD-R in this tray while it sits on the table and feel the surface. Ideally, it should be at the same height with the surface of the tray or slightly lower (for safety).

2) When feeding the tray, make sure the surface of the CD-R and the tray are equally aligned and the CD didn't jump off from it's position. This is why I like to feed 1 inch instead of 1 cm.

3) Before you print the first one. Try it on the paper (that cut to fit the tray) or simulated printable CD-R or the real CD-R (if you're wealthy). You may have to make a fine adjustment for it's position. The software allows you to adjust the position in the 10 mm range of each direction (choose file -> adjust print position).

4) Be careful about the ink smudge since this is the pigment ink. The generic printable CD-R are made for the dye based ink. The follow up about the compatibility will be posted here later !

Addendum

Well, my first trial wasn't on the real printable CD because I was waiting for my order to arrive. I tried it on the CD label that stick on the CD and didn't pick up any problems with it. My first trial with the real printable CD later is very disappointed. I got the Imation® 80 min, 48x printable CD. The surface of this CD is kinda matte finish. The texture is kinda rough, not smooth. Since it's not very very shiny or glossy and I believe that the ultrachrome ink will dry on this. But... What a disappointment. The print is not instantly dry and bad enough to leave the wheel marks from the rubber rollers. My first attempt was using the Matte black 720 dpi. Then I tried Matte black 1440 dpi with 20 sec delay time (because I think printing at 720 dpi is too fast). It still didn't solve the problem. The CD when came out it actually feels almost dry to touch and after 1 hour it's nearly completely dry and after 24 hour, it's completely dry. May be this is not the compatible one. There must be the CDs that can take ultrachrome and dry instantly without these roller marks. But it's probably gonna take me long to find that one. Additionally, even with the Epson original CD-R tray is still designed to work with those rubber roller lifted up in the air (see above). So after all, I think I must find the way to make these wheels lifted.

After a night pass by and thinking hard. I found one solution. Very easy to do, nothing to pay and take < 10 min.

Making a forklift from Credit Card

If you're lucky enough and your printable CD-R dry instantly without leaving any roller marks, you can skip this part and kindly let me know which brand are you using so I can post it up here and be useful to the others. But most likely you are gonna have this problem or making this will give you more opportunity to find the printable CD-R that works with your 2200.

You'll need only one credit card or anything just like it. We want something that is cuttable, hard enough to hold those rollers against their little springs and yet thin enough to go into the slot and the credit card happened to fit all that.

1) you make the marks from the real printer. Only on the rollers that will leave the marks which is the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th from your left hand. Notice that the interval between these roller are not the same. Just simply mark it with the magic marker from the real roller. 2) then draw a line about 1 cm from the edge which is long enough to hold the roller but not too long to cause the problem with the tray in motion. Notice that I hand-drawing the base of the fork to enlarge the base to make this thin fork stronger. The width of each fork should be about 2-3 mm. (safer to draw and cut at 3 mm, can always make it smaller with the sand paper)

click on the image to see the bigger picture.

3) Cut along the your drawing with scissor and cutter. It's very easy to cut, with cutter you may have to repeat 4-5 strokes and don't worry about the edges.     4) Use a fine sandpaper - 320 or the manicure tools from your wife will work fine too. Notice that I also make the tip of the fork flatten to aid the insertion of the fork.

To insert this fork, you need to lift up those rollers. You can use your fingers but if you have another credit card of anything that can lift those rollers simultaneously, the insertion is just a snap.

Printing in process (again) with the real printable CD-R and the wheels up !

Perfect print out, no wheel marks again.

And that's it. Now, you can print a beautiful CD with no marks and congratulation again! Voila !

Congratulation !, you made it.

CD-R compatibility

I'll try the different brands of the printable CD-R and keep it posted here. Also when you find the one that works with 2200, please let me know the brand and the source (where did you buy it) and a short description of the results by e-mail. I'll post the list here to help everyone to get this work.

Addendum

10/6/03 : As I posted more and more brand. I noticed the change in the coating. When I first tried this CD/DVD-R printing and got that Imation CD-R back in umm... April ? The coating on that Imation is kinda slippery and yet produce a wash out result. I almost took an effort to try to profile it !, just only I don't own the spectrophotometry yet. Anyhow, I just learn to live with it by crank up the color density in the software driver and seem to work OK but still - WASH OUT.

Later, I got to print DVD-R - now this is July-September. The coating that is on Princo and Verbatim DVD-R seems to be more like a matte paper and the color fidelity is just great and no more wash out. But still requires time to dry (at least 24 hr) and worse with MB. And still water-sensitive even with the pigment inks.