What is a EXP file?

Getting it onto the machine

USB stick, root folder.

How the file is built

The simplest of the six, and that is the whole story: two signed bytes per stitch and 80 01 for a colour change. No header, no length fields, nothing that can drift out of step.

Colours

EXP carries no colour names either. Like DST, the order to change is in the file and the thread is on the machine.

What goes wrong with a EXP file

• There is no header and no footer. The file IS the stitches, so no width, no thread list and no name is stored anywhere. The machine works out the frame itself and the operator picks the colours at the head.
• A stitch is two signed bytes, −128 to 127 in tenths of a millimetre: 12.7 mm, against DST's 12.1.
• 80 01 is a colour change, followed by a stitch of zero. Because nothing but the stitches is stored, an EXP file cannot be wrong about itself – but it cannot tell you anything before you sew it either.

If your machine is not listed

Use DST. Every commercial machine reads it, and most home machines will too – it is the format the trade falls back on. The stitches are identical in all seven; only the wrapper differs, so «which format?» is a question about your machine and never about quality.

Why make it here

• You see the whole mark before you pay – every stitch, at the size you asked for. If it is not right, do not buy it.
• Nobody touches the file afterwards. What is on screen is what the machine gets, and it is worked out in seconds, not in a day.
• The same stitches come out in all seven formats. Change your machine and you do not start over – you pick another format.
• From $0.40 a file on a yearly plan. Studio’s first month is $9 for 20 files, then $29 a month – cancel any time.

Drop a logo, look at it closely, and take the EXP only if it is right.

What you can send in