I’m spending afternoon installing Mac OS X 10.5.8 on an external boot drive along with my second install of CS4 so that I can print photographs for a client. Despite liking the way my Epson printer USED to work before the Mac OS X 10.6 update, I’m now seriously considering making my next large format printer purchase this fall from HP or Canon.

Epson, if in fact you do not plan to support certain serious printers with drivers for newer versions of major operating systems used by your customers, there is a right way and a wrong way to deal with this.

RIGHT WAY:

On your web site, post a list of printers (and other products) that lists the point in time after which you will no longer provide support and updates. This should be done at least one year prior to ending support. At the end of the support period you should release one final update bringing the drivers to current levels of compatibility. With this information your customers can make decisions about how to deal with the EOL of the products. A real professional courtesy would be to contact owners of these machines using the contact data you have. If handled correctly, you would benefit from considerable good will from customers treated with this sort of respect, and many would make plans to update to newer versions of your products. This is how responsible companies handle product natural obsolescence.

WRONG WAY:

Post incorrect and non-functional instructions and drivers at your site. Post no information about your plans to provide (or not) drivers and updates. Be sure to be completely silent about your intentions. When users discover – with absolutely no warning from you – that their printers that worked yesterday do not work today because you won’t take a bit of time to update drivers… ignore them. (I’ve sent two emails to Epson through the support area of their web site… with no response.) When a customer of yours finally does connect with a real person, be sure to insultingly tell them that they shouldn’t expect support of their too-old non-professional product – that will give them a nice feeling about how your company supports its customers as they consider making future printer purchase. This is how companies who don’t care about their customers handle natural product obsolescence.

(Update: As a temporary solution to the problems that I’ve been having with Epson print drivers and Mac OS X 10.6, I have installed the older Mac OS X 10.5.8 and a copy of CS4 on an external drive. I reboot off the external drive to print…)