As part of a revamp of its entire toner press line, Konica Minolta introduced the new entry-level AccurioPress C5080 series, which together with an ecosystem of ancillary units offers a complete solution for a wide range of commercial print tasks. Michael Walker learned what’s new One Piece of an Ever-Expanding Range Toner presses have been with us for quite a while and still represent the bulk of digital press installation by far. One company that’s been part of that for over two decades is Konica Minolta, which installed some 18,000 units in the Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) region over the last four years, around 13,000 of which were colour devices. So, it’s an established player in a mature market, and as might be expected, revision cycles have been slowing. The new AccurioPress C5080 series was announced in May 2026, five and a half years after its predecessor, the C4080 series which arrived in December 2020, but that was less than two years after the introduction of the C3080 range. The C4080 series did very well, with nearly 18,000 units installed across EMEA and the US. You might wonder at first glance what’s different about the new range, as the same speeds – up to 81 A4 pages per minute from the C5080, 71 from the C5070 and 65ppm from the C5065 – are offered. But it turns out that a lot has changed between iterations, with a host of changes designed to improve quality performance, reliability, and ease of operation. Behind the Scenes The C5080 series is part of a complete revamp of Konica Minolta’s toner press line that began in 2025 with the introduction of the C14010 and C12010 production machines. The company will address the mid-range C7X00 line by the time you read this, and here is embodied in the entry-level offering. This revision of the whole range centred around the introduction of new, ‘intelligent’ media sensors which measure six criteria for each sheet. These include exact size, thickness, moisture content, surface type, stiffness, and paper weight. These functions are split across two physical but closely coupled units, the IM-104 and IM-105 (IM here standing for intelligent media). The IM-104 handles nearly all of the measurements, including also paper resistance, and so identifies paper type, weight, and size automatically, adjusting print settings without requiring operator intervention. It can also flag and divert out-of-spec sheets to a purge tray to keep things running in the event of a paper jam or double feed. The IM-105 unit measures the exact paper dimensions and so enables the press to compensate for out-of-true size or shape within a given paper size, ensuring that cut and crop marks will be correctly placed for finishing operations such as guillotining. This unit also works with the optional Intelligent Quality Optimiser IQ-601 to correct for trim variations so that front-to-back registration is maintained. The IQ-601 is the other part of the range-level upgrade. It replaces the IQ-501 ‘Colour Care’ unit which arrived in 2018, and which automated colour profiling and other colour management operations. Senior product manager at Michael Walker is a trade journalist, technical writer, and editor with over 37 years’ experience in the print, prepress, photography, and digital imaging sectors, with a particular interest in the digital transformation of processes. In addition to editing Desktop Publishing Today and Digital Printer magazines, he is co-author with Neil Barstow of Getting Colour Right (Ilex Press, 2004) and Practical Colour Management for Photographers and Digital Image Makers (2009, self-published e-book) and winner of a Communicators in Business Gold Award. Speed: Up to 81 A4ppm and 39 SRA3ppm in colour Volume: Up to 844,000 A4 prints per month Paper Length: Up to 1,300mm Paper Weight: Up to 360gsm Statistics UNDER THE HOOD | KONICA MINOLTA ACCURIOPRESS C5080 33 www.printmonthly.co.uk Issue 363 - November | December 2026
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