Others say...

"Prints what appears on monitor "
I had pretty good luck loading ColorVision's software for both the Spyder 2Pro and the PrintFIX Pro on my G5 PowerMac -- it was pretty straight-forward, with instructions that are easy to follow. At first, I had a slight problem getting the software to recognize the PrintFix Spectromiter -- it did not work in "Demo" mode -- it works only after typing in the product serial number, and skipping the Demo. Otherwise, I feel confident that these products are providing full control over the print process by setting the gamma levels on the monitor, and developing custom print profiles that are recognized in Photoshop. The instructions are not too elaborate -- but they do include all the critical steps, for example, turning off the existing system setups, and default profiles that will interfere with printing the color patches. Reading the color patches with the Spectro takes a few minutes, but it's worth the time. On calibrating the gamma levels, this too, requires following the not-too-elaborate instructions, to get the system to its default settings, and understanding the light levels within the workspace environment, before moving through the calibration process. It's probably just another one of those products that photographers must have.

"HW is Excellent, SW is Not So Good, Support and Upgrade Paths Horrible"
The hardware in this bundle is terrific and works as it should, provided the SW and your system configuration are in working order. However, the company's Web site provides little or no help, and several e-mail queries to their support department have gone unanswered. There doesn't seem to be a clear upgrade path for software, which may suggest that you'd have to buy new HW to get newer SW down the road.

You might think that this product would support calibration of TVs/video monitors. It doesn't. All the required HW comes with this bundle, but the required computer SW and DVD (for generating calibration imagery on the TV screen) are missing. The worst part is you can't buy the SW bundle separately, which would be reasonable. You have to buy the TV calibration product bundle, which includes the (unneeded) colorimeter.

I would agree with other reviewers that the support is very bad (for a $600 product, no less) and pales in comparison to most shareware SW applications. For this reason alone, I would strongly recommend choosing another manufacturer/vendor for a color workflow calibration/profiling solution.

"Color accuracy for the digital photography hobbyist"
The Colorvision Printfix Pro Suite provides a method to build accurate color profiles for a monitor and printer. The suite includes a colorimeter for measuring the colors of a CRT or LCD monitor, a spectrocolorimeter for measuring the color output of a printer, the Spyder2Pro software for calibrating the monitor and building the ICC monitor profile, and the PrintFIX Pro software for building the printer ICC profile. Use of the PrintFIX product is fairly straightforward but somewhat timeconsuming because every color square on a printed color chart must individually be measured. Nevertheless, this method is the most accurate way of generating a printer profile. The alternate method of using a scanner to measure the color output of a printer is cheaper and easier but less accurate. The product accomplishes what it is advertised to do.

"Tech is by email only"
I have found the initial setup and emplimentation of these program to be difficult. To make matters much worse they only provided tech service by EMAIL. $50 software companies offere better tech service than Colorvision. If you want delayed support then have at it. Have had mine for 5 days so far and have written 4 emails to tech. Listen to this one -- I could not install the Print program in Vista so off to tech I go and they sent me back a link that was on a apple site? Most all the pdf that accompanied the info was regarding Apple.

I will follow up on the review if I ever get the program up and running.

"PrintFIX "
Spyder relatively easy to use. Patches are small and quite close, requiring a bit of patience to read. I've built profiles for my 4x6 Canon dye sub CP510 printer as well as my Canon i960. Both produced excellent results after 2 attempts.