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Hello, all. My name is Rick and I am new to vinyl cutting. My wife has a Cricut and it seems like I took over it because of my sudden fascination in the vinyl cutting/business. I now plan to get [way] more serious and want to invest in a more advanced cutter. I am a serious believer in "buying once" instead of purchasing mediocre machines that will just lead me to purchasing "the one I need". With that said, I have been looking in to Roland and Graphtec, which appear to be leaders in the industry. I was sold on Roland first because, well, its ROLAND, but then I saw many YouTube videos on Graphtec and loved the on-board screen and looked very easy to configure. I should mention that I am in IT and pretty savvy when it comes to computers and menus, but I am all for ease of use. I recently went to a local supplier and they were recommending the Roland (GS-24) because software was easier to use, and the machine itself had American measurements, unlike Graphtec (CE6000-60 Plus) which uses metric measurements in their system. Not sure how true that is and if that is really an issue, but I made a mental note, nonetheless. NOTE: The local shop had the Roland on sale for right under $1600 (with stand), and the Graphtec was right under $1800. Maybe they were just trying to push Rolands out due to the sale they had going. So my questions are below. Please answer all or any of them. Anything helps a newbie like me and will be greatly appreciated: 1.) Which cutting/design software is more intuitive and also has more advanced features between Roland and Graphtec? 2.) Is there a third-party cutting/design software that is being used by people in the industry, instead of the factory-supplied, that will work on both machines? I am not talking about Corel Draw or Adobe Illustrator. 3.) Is the metric measurement on the Graphtec really something to be concerned about? 4.) GRAND QUESTION: Which is a better cutter overall (i.e., able to cut more intricate details, on-board screen is easier to use, more reliable)? I realize that my last question is very vague. If anyone knows of any pros/cons on both, please let me know. Thanks in advance for your help! I'm eager to see your comments. -Rick

So I am having issues with my cutter cutting my file twice and I don't know how to fix it. Every time I cut, it goes over each line twice, making the time for cutting twice as long as its supposed to be. Is this normal? How do I fix this? I have a brand new SC Series 24 inch cutter with SCAL3Pro as my software on an updated Mac computer.

I just received two 48" rolls of white reflective vinyl in the mail from 3M and I only have 24" cutters. Is there any way to cut it down so I can use it? Thanks for any help. Joey