Hello! I am looking into buying or renting a probe to use with lightspace. I could probably get away with spending a thousand pounds if I would purchase one. I know this would not get me very far in the high quality probe land, so I was thinking of renting one instead. Is that a good idea? Does such a service exist in London? I would certainly have to rent lightspace out because I cannot afford to buy it. I would need to calibrate my Sony a250, a samsung LED client TV and an Eizo CG277.

Unfortunately, we do not know of any 'probe rental' services...

I would spend £1000 on an i1 Display Pro Tristimulus, and i1 Pro 2 Spectro.
That would be the best use of such an amount.
You then use the Spectro to pre-calibrate the Tristimulus, and use the Tristimulus for the actual profiling.

See: http://www.lightillusion.com/probe_use.html

Steve

Well we've got the old i1Pro in the office, but it's been probably 5-6 years that it's been here and i'm not too sure how accurate it is. Would it work as a spectro to calibrate the i1 Display Pro?

I think you would have to have such an old Spectro re-calibrated... it is unlikely to still be accurate, unless it has been stored very carefully.
And the new i1 pro 2 is a lot more stable, so probably worth investing in.

Steve

Would light illusion be able to recalibrate our old i1 Pro for us whilst I try and convince the powers that be that we need to buy a new one?

Unfortunately not - you would have to send the probe back to X-Rite for recertification.

See: http://www.xrite.com/support_repair.aspx

Steve

Thank you for your answers Steve. Just to check something else, the reason that I would not be able to use the i1pro to do the monitor calibration is because it would not give good results in the blacks whilst a correctly calibrated i1 display Pro would?

Yes, and also the i1Pro is also very slow...
That makes calibration far too time consuming.

Steve

Thank you Steve!

Hello again

One more question:

How often would I need to send the i1pro 2 to be recalibrated if I was to purchase a new one and how often would I need to use that to recalibrate the i1 display pro?

The factory recalibration/recertification time depends on the probe's use and how it is stored.
I can be 1 to 5 years... look after the i1Pro 2 well (store in a cool location, with gel packs) and it will stay accurate longer.

You should use the Spectro to pre-calibrate the Tristimulus every time you profile a display - it takes seconds.

Steve