Océ
The Dutch heretics of the copy press
OCÉ
Built from blueprint chemistry rather than borrowed xerography, Océ’s machines broke the industry’s rules: no ozone, hardly any jams, offset-matte output — and an analog flagship launched after its own digital successor. On purpose.
Venlo, the Netherlands, is home to the industry’s politest heresy. Océ never accepted that toner must be hurled across a gap by corona wires. Its “copy press” process develops the image on a durable organic photoconductor drum and presses it onto the paper by direct contact, at modest heat. The results read like a wish list: near-zero ozone — no copier smell in an Océ room — a lower fusing temperature, paper paths that famously refuse to jam, and a dense matte image closer to offset litho than photocopy.
The office line carried the doctrine into volume: the duplexing 2400 (60 cpm), the 100 cpm 2500, then the digital 3165 of 1997 — 62 impressions a minute at 600 dpi, Image Logic, scan-once-print-many, stapled sets inline. And then, deliciously, the analog 3100 of 1998: 100 cpm, launched a year after its own digital successor and sold alongside it for volume-conservative customers. Everyone else herded the base toward digital; Océ held the door open in both directions.
The niche funding the fight was the plan room. The 7050-series plan copiers were the decade’s default A0 machine, and the digital 9400, 9700 and 9800 (six rolls, scan-to-file) turned the copy room into a drawing archive. Buying Siemens Nixdorf’s printing-systems division in 1996 doubled the company: a copier maker quietly becoming a production-printing house.
THE VERDICT — OCÉ
The ozone row is not a misprint: the machines decline to make any, and zero stars is the highest compliment the category permits.
Océ — Selected Range
| Model | Year | CPM | Notable |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2400 | early 90s | 60 | Duplex; iF award |
| 2500 | early 90s | 100 | Analog flagship |
| 3165 | 1997 | 62 | Digital; Image Logic |
| 3100 | 1998 | 100 | After its successor |
| 7050 series | 80s–90s | A0 | Plate No. 13 |
| 9800 | 1997 | unv. | Six rolls; scan-to-file |
Three ways to buy a machine from Venlo
Océ’s ladder is unlike anyone else’s: barely a bottom rung, a formidable middle built on the copy press, and a summit that isn’t in the office at all — it’s down the corridor in the plan room, folded neatly to A4.
The entry ticket
Honesty first: there barely is one. Océ never made a desktop cartridge machine, never courted the den or the church office, and the documented record below the engine room amounts to a single machine — the 3125C of 1998, a digital colour unit of roughly 12 cpm (unverified) that Océ did not even build, sourcing it from a third party under OEM agreement to plug the colour gap. Against Sharp’s AR-C150 at around 15 colour cpm (1999) — a tandem-engine machine of Sharp’s own devising — the 3125C was a badge politely holding a door. Who bought it: the office already running an Océ engine room downstairs, which wanted occasional colour without admitting a second brand to the building. That is the entire entry ticket, and this magazine respects a company that declines to pretend otherwise.
The engine room
Here the doctrine pays. The 2400 (60 cpm) and the 100 cpm 2500 — both analog, both copy press on the long-lived OPC drum, both with fully automatic duplex as a selling point rather than an option, and both iF design-award winners — gave the departmental floor offset-matte output with no ozone and famously few jams. The buyers were the volume-serious: the legal practice duplicating discovery, the insurance floor that duplexed everything on principle.
Then 1997’s 3165 made the argument digital: 62 impressions a minute at 600 dpi, Image Logic processing, a recirculating feeder, four paper sources holding 3,750 sheets, and stapled sets with cover and insert stock delivered inline — scan once, print many, walk away. Against Minolta’s Di620 at the identical 62 cpm, a digital console with the FN-series finishers, the Océ case was constitutional: the press process’s dense matte page, the straight path, the room that doesn’t smell of copier.
The summit
Two summits, in fact. In the office: the 3100 of 1998, 100 cpm of last-generation analog launched — deliberately — a year after its own digital successor, for customers who wanted volume without novelty. Against Xerox’s 5100 at the same 100 cpm, the 3100 conceded light-lens seniority and answered with copy-press composure. But Océ’s true summit is the plan room: the 7050-series, the decade’s default A0 copier (twin 175-metre rolls, instant-on, copies to paper, vellum or polyester film), then the digital 9400 (1996) and the 9700/9800 pair (1997) — up to six rolls, scan-to-file, online folder, belt stacker. The buyer sketch is every architects’ and engineers’ office in the developed world; the cross-brand comparison is nobody, because the matrix rivals all stop at A3. Many 9800s ran fifteen years. The niche funded the fight.
If you bought one — the shortlist, 1998
| Model | Tier | Why |
|---|---|---|
| 3125C | Entry | Only if the building must stay all-Océ; colour by proxy, and the catalogue’s one concession to smallness |
| 3165 | Engine room | 62 cpm digital, Image Logic, stapled sets with covers inline — and not one corona wire |
| 9800 | Summit | Six rolls, scan-to-file, folder online: the plan room’s next fifteen years, bought once |
“Sirs — fifteen years with a 9800 in the plan room and the only thing that ever jammed was the door to the plan room.” — Drawing office, Adelaide. Venlo declined to comment, politely, as is the house style.
Head to Head — 3165 v Document Centre 265 v 3100
| Océ 3165 (1997) | Xerox Document Centre 265 (c. 1998) | Océ 3100 (1998) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Speed | 62 cpm, 600 dpi digital | 65 cpm (unverified), digital MFP, networked (ST) | 100 cpm, analog copy press |
| Feeder | RADF; 4 paper sources, 3,750 sheets online | DADF | ADF, duplex |
| Finishing | Automatic stapled sets, cover/insert stock | Finisher/stapler | Finisher (unverified) |
| The call | The delicious column is the third one: Océ launched the analog 3100 a year after its own digital successor, on purpose, and sold both side by side. The 265 networked more loudly; the 3165 made the better page; the 3100 let the volume-conservative say “not yet” at 100 cpm. Three answers, two of them from the same polite Dutchmen. | ||
Head to Head — 2500 v Ektaprint 300
| Océ 2500 (early 90s) | Kodak Ektaprint 300 (1986) | |
|---|---|---|
| Speed | 100 cpm, analog copy press, OPC drum | ~100 cpm (6,000/hr), analog copier-duplicator |
| Feeder | ADF, fully automatic duplex | RDF |
| Finishing | Finisher options (unverified) | Inline finisher |
| The call | Rochester’s duplicator creed against Venlo’s heresy, at the same 100 a minute. Kodak fed correctly (RDF; see doctrine, p. Canon) and finished harder; the 2500 ran cooler, jammed less, and produced no ozone whatsoever while doing it. Choose between the correct feeder and the correct physics. | |
BUYING ADVICE, 1990s
Buy Océ from 60 cpm upward and never below it; ask for anything smaller and the catalogue clears its throat and changes the subject to the plan room, where it happens to be entirely right.