Ilfosol 3 or Ilfotec DD-X

[cherryrig]

I'm going to start developing B&W film at home hopefully.

I'm weighing up whether to get Ilfosol 3 (which used to be Ilfosol S yea?) or DD-X.

The film I have at the moment is all this below -

Delta 3200, Tri-X 320 and 400

Which would be the better developer? Quite a lot of places say to get DD-x developer for 3200, so should I get that as the other films still work well in that developer?

Cheers

 

[Steve Smith]

DD-X will be good for just about anything.
I used to use Ilfosol but now I use DD-X all the time.

Steve.

 

[jmcd]

I just tried out the new Ilfosol 3 with a couple of rolls of Delta 100, which I have been getting very good results with in combination with ID-11 at near the manufacturer's recommend times. I couldn't see much correlation with the new Ilfosol 3 temps and times, comparing them to other developers, and the times are on the short side. At any rate, I went with the manufacturer's recommendation and cooked my negs thoroughly, such that they are rendered bulletproof. The times were already short enough (about 5 minutes) that I will probably not experiment much more with Ilfosol 3.

 

[cherryrig]

I'll just stick with the DD-X then. Do it 1+4 as well, should last a while

 

[ooze]

According to Ilford, Ilfosol is better suited to slow and medium speed films. So, just from this statement DD-X seems better suited to the films you have at hand.

I'm trying out Ilfosol 3 with Delta 100 these days and the manufacturers recommendations are spot on for my taste.

 

[Aurum]

I'm working my way through a bottle of Ilfosol 3.

Worked fine so far on:
120 format Delta 400, Kodak 400-TX
35mm Format HP5, SFX, FP4, oh and some C41 colour film I was messing about with.

I use it 1+14 for more manageably long development times. Quality and density of the negs look fine to me, they scan well with minimal grain, and good contrast and density. I used manufacturers recommended times and they were fine

Hmm that reminds me, I still have 3 rolls of 120 Delta 400 to cook, while I remember

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

Both are great. DD-X is probably the most versatile of them. It's one of those developers that I feel isn't brilliant at any particular thing, but does very little wrong. It's probably nitpicking, but I would expect Ilfosol to yield slightly sharper negs, while DD-X gives higher speed and finer grain.
I've tried both Delta 3200 and Tri-X 400 in DD-X and the negs print very nicely and without much effort.

- Thomas

 

[nsouto]

has anyone here had any experience with both those developers and very low speed, very small grain films like the efke and adox ranges?

 

[Tom Stanworth]

DDX produced great speed (box speed or more) and with fine grained films produces fine grain. Ilfosol produces noticeably better acutance IMO, but you will lose film speed. I would use this for slow films as I would be shooting on a tripod in any case. FX39 is great with fine grained films and produces stunning acutance. Same goes for Pyrocat.