Chapter 8: Printers
IT Essentials v7.0
8.1 Common Printer
Features
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Characteristics and Capabilities
Characteristics of Printers
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Characteristics and Capabilities
Printer Speed, Quality, and Color
▪ Speed and Quality
• Speed – measured in pages per minute (ppm)
• Quality – measured in dots per inch (dpi)
▪ Color
• Cyan, magenta, and yellow (CMY)
• Black for inkjets is the base or key color
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Characteristics and Capabilities
Reliability and Total Cost of Ownership
▪ Warranty
▪ Scheduled servicing
▪ Mean time between failures (MTBF)
▪ Total cost of ownership (TCO)
• Initial purchase price
• Cost of consumable supplies
• Price per page
• Pages per month
• Maintenance costs
• Warranty costs
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Characteristics and Capabilities
Automatic Document Feeder
▪ Automatic Document Feeder (ADF)
• Used with some laser and inkjet models
• Feeds paper into the printer
• Might provide collation (ordering of pages)
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8.2 Printer Type Comparison
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Inkjet Printers
Inkjet Printer Characteristics
▪ Easy to use
▪ Cheaper than laser printers
▪ Advantages
• Low cost
• High resolution
▪ Disadvantages
• Some nozzles prone to clog
• Cartridges can be expensive
• Ink can be wet after printing
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Inkjet Printers
Inkjet Printer Parts
Print Head
Carriage/Belt
Roller
Ink Cartridge/
Duplexing Paper
Assembly
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Feeder
Laser Printers
Laser Printer Characteristics
▪ Advantages
• Low cost per page
• High PPM
• High capacity
• High quality
• Fast (uses a laser beam or LEDs to create an
image)
• Print comes out dry
▪ Disadvantages
• High initial cost
• Toner cartridges can be expensive
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Laser Printers
Laser Printer Characteristics
Transfer
Roller Pickup
Rollers
Imaging Drum
Fuser Duplexing
Assembly Assembly
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Cartridge
Laser Printing Process
How Laser Printing Works
7 Steps of the Laser Printing Process
1. Processing – Convert data into a printable form
2. Charging – drum is conditioned for new image
3. Exposing – write the image to the drum using a laser
beam
4. Developing – toner is applied to the image on the drum
5. Transferring – As the paper rolls through, the image is
transferred to the paper due to a charge applied to the
paper
6. Fusing – Heat and pressure are applied to the paper
7. Cleaning – Excess toner removed from the drum
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Thermal Printers and Impact Printers
Thermal Printer Characteristics
▪ Thermal printers are used in retail as part of a cash
register system and within older fax machines.
▪ Heat from the print head makes the image on the paper.
▪ Advantages
• Last a long time due to few moving parts
• Quiet
• No cost for ink or toner
▪ Disadvantages
• Thermal paper is expensive and must be stored at room
temperature
• Images on thermal paper degrade over time, are poor
quality, and cannot be in color
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Thermal Printers and Impact Printers
Impact Printer Characteristics
▪ Impact printers – dot matrix and daisy wheel
▪ Have print heads that strike an inked ribbon with a
specific number of pins
• Higher number of pins means better quality
▪ Advantages
• Ribbons are less expensive supplies than other types
• Can use regular paper or continuous feed paper
• Can print carbon copies
▪ Disadvantages
• Noisy
• Graphics are low-resolution
• Limited color capabilities
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Virtual Printers
Virtual Printer Characteristics
▪ Print to file
▪ Print to PDF
▪ Print to XPS (XML Paper Specification)
▪ Print to image (such as .JPG or .TIF)
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Virtual Printers
Cloud Printing
▪ Sends a print job to a remote printer somewhere on the network.
▪ Some printing companies have software that can send print jobs to their closest location.
▪ Google Cloud Print allows you to connect your printer to the web and you can send something to
your own printer no matter where you are located.
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3D Printers
3D Printer Characteristics
▪ Used to create three dimensional
objects
▪ Use plastic filament or other media to
create the object
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3D Printers
3D Printer Parts
Feeder Axis
Filament
Print Bed
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Nozzle
8.3 Installing and Configuring
Printers
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Installing and Updating a Printer
Installing a Printer
▪ Follow manufacturer’s instructions.
▪ Remove all packing material and keep if a return is
needed.
▪ Sometimes the printer driver is installed before the
printer is connected to the computer.
▪ Connect the cable to the printer and computer or
connect the network cable.
▪ Attach power cord.
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Installing and Updating a Printer
Test Printer Functions
▪ Test all functions
including
• Double-sided documents
• Different paper trays
• Grayscale and color
• Draft mode
• Collation
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Configuring Options and Default Settings
Common Configuration Settings
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Optimizing Printer Performance
Software Optimization
▪ Use the print driver software to
• Configure print spool settings
• Calibrate the printer (color)
• Set paper orientation
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Optimizing Printer Performance
Hardware Optimization
▪ Firmware
▪ Printer memory
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8.4 Sharing Printers
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Operating System Settings for Sharing Printers
Configuring Printer Sharing
▪ Those who connect to the
shared printer must have the
correct print driver.
• Windows can do this
automatically
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Operating System Settings for Sharing Printers
Wireless Printer Connections
▪ Bluetooth
• Pairing between computer and
printer
▪ Wi-Fi
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Print Servers
Purposes of Print Servers
▪ Provide client access to print
resources
▪ Administrate print jobs by storing
them in a queue
▪ Provide user feedback
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Print Servers
Software Print Servers
▪ Use print server software.
▪ Disadvantages
• Sharing a printer might cause slow
downs.
• If the computer sharing the printer is
down, the printer is unavailable to
others.
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Print Servers
Hardware Print Servers
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Print Servers
Dedicated Print Servers
▪ Powerful processor
▪ Adequate storage space for
queued documents
▪ Adequate memory
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