Epson printers

Your Computer

Epson has long been well-known for its high-quality dot-matrix printers - starting with the MX and FX series on which it made its name and moving through the many letter-quality jobs on which it makes much of its current money. Late last year the company moved to update the ageing FX and MX ranges with the introduction of new FX machines (the FX-85 and FX-105) and a new low-cost model, the GX- 80. We've already told you about the new GX machine (Your Computer, December 1985), so you might be interested in more on the FX range - specifically the wide-track FX-105. The first thing that you should know about it is that it's not cheap - at £654 the FX-105 is a substantial investment for any micro user and should be considered very carefully. It does, however, offer a pretty impressive range of features. The extra-wide platen is perfect for printing spreadsheets, ledgers and pre-printed forms, while the hardware-driven Near Letter Quality printing mode makes it an attractive vehicle for writing business letters which don't look as though they've been written on a computer. The Near Letter Quality is made possible by a new Epson print head - which increases print density from a 9 x 9 matrix to an 18 x 18 matrix in NLQ mode. The FX-105 also offers a choice or tractor or cut-sheet feeding - giving you a choice of paper and seeming to eliminate sonic of the "paper-chewing" habits of the MX range. DIP switches are also easy to set (although they don't pass the 'screwdriver test' - one is still required to get at them) and are located beneath a cover at the top of the machine. Speed is impressive - 160 cps (Characters Per Second) in draft mode and 32 cps in NLQ. The latter rate is still a good deal faster than many high-speed daisywheel printers. An 8K on-board RAM buffer gives you a de facto print-spooling system and space in which to store your own user-definable characters - including perhaps a standard letter-heading or your own graphic design. Speaking of graphics, the FX-105 is pretty good at printing them. Eight different modes allow densities from 60 to 240 dots per inch. These graphics can also be combined with text within a document. The FX-105 is certainly a machine which lives up to the Epson reputation and heritage - but unfortunately also lives up to the old Epson price. Unless you need the higher speed or the wide carriage, you should probably be looking at the sub-£500 Epson GX-80 or at one of the many Epson compatibles currently available. One of the biggest decisions which faces anyone considering the purchase of a printer is whether to opt for dot-matrix or daisywheel technology. Dot-matrix printers are usually cheaper, and offer higher printing speeds and a variety of easily accessible typefaces. The quality of print is inevitably poorer than the average daisywheel printer - although the availability of 'Near Letter Quality' modes on some modern printers has slightly alleviated this problem. Daisywheel printers, on the other hand, produce high-quality typewriter-style print (indeed many daisy wheels can be used as typewriters with the addition of an add-on keyboard) and offer a huge variety of typefaces - although they are difficult to access because you must physically change the daisywheel on the print-head. Daisywheel printers are often used by people who don't necessarily want the person receiving their letters to know that they were produced on a computer (such as those writing hundreds of personalised 'form' letters). A difficult decision, but one which you may no longer have to make. Brother, one of the leading Japanese manufacturers of printers, typewriters, calculators, sewing machines, etc, has now come up with a printer that incorporates both dot-matrix and daisywheel printing technology. The resulting machine is known as the 'Twinriter' - a big, powerful printing beast with two print heads and a control panel which looks as if it would be more at home in the cockpit of a 747 than sitting beside your micro. According to Brother, 'the Brother Twinriter 5 (Model HR-35DD) is an innovative combination - a two-in-one daisywheel/dot matrix printer. The two print elements are installed on a single carriage, offering the best features of both - high resolution graphics in six selectable densities can be mixed with letter quality text in the same document'. In short, the machine is not simply an el cheapo daisywheel with a poor quality dot matrix head strapped on top of it. The print heads can, in fact, even operate together on the same line when non-standard characters are Near Letter Quality (NLQ) printed with the dot matrix to complement the main Letter Quality (LQ) printout from the daisywheel. Graphics printing is also excellent so that, for example, you can print a business letter from VIEW on your Beeb and then switch into the AMX mouse painting software and print some dot-matrix graphics to go along with it. During our test, the Twinriter performed faultlessly - switching from daisywheel text to high-resolution dot-matrix graphics with ease. It was also surprisingly quiet in its daisywheel mode (Brother rates it at under 60 Db) and the speed was respectable (between 30 and 36 cps, depending on which daisywheels you're using). The dot matrix printing is ironically slower than the slowest daisywheel operation when Near Letter Quality mode is used (although I personally can't see many reasons for using NLQ mode when daisywheel printing is available to you) - churning text out at only 17 cps. Ordinary Epson- compatible 'draft' printing, however, is a far more respectable 140 cps. The printer is supplied with a parallel interface, although a serial interface is available as an extra option. You should have little trouble connecting it to your micro - we tried it with both a BBC micro and a QL without any problems. DIP switch settings for line feeds, form feeds, line spacing and other esoteric preferences are easily controlled by a bank of switches at the back of the printer. The Twinriter passes the 'screwdriverless DIP switch setting' test as no covers, panels or other bits of plastic have to be removed to get at them. There are, however, three banks of DIP switches - each assigned to cover different tasks. One controls the settings for the optional serial interface (baud rate, data bits, parity, etc.). another the character sets (for both daisywheel and dot matrix operation) and the third decides which modes will be the 'default' setting. Also at the back is a DIN plug for either a cut-feed or tractor-feed mechanism. Our review model came without either of these, and seemed to suffer from slight paper 'drift' as a result. On the whole, however, I can think of no reason not to recommend the Twinriter 5 - except for the (ouch!) price. At £1295, it is not really the sort of machine which is budgetted to sit beside your Spectrum or Amstrad CPC - but it does portend a far more flexible future for printer buyers. THE DAISY DIFFERENCE The two printers featured here both offer an impressive performance but equally they are rather expensive. Unless you have an immediate requirement for the up-market specification offered by the Epson FX- 105 and Brother HR-35DD our advice would be to wail awhile. The price of printers is set to fall dramatically during 1986 - there are going to be plenty of bargains around later this year.

Personal Computer News

Ian Scales

PRINT POWER: EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW If you're looking for hard copy Ian Scales has the answers - and the all-important questions. Printers are one of the first things most users hook up to their micros. Choosing the right one, however, is a fairly demanding business requiring a cool head and a firm grasp of your likely requirements. All printers are not the same. The field can be broadly split into three catagories. At the bottom of the price range there are the alternative types like the ZX printer, at the top of the heap are the letter quality daisywheels, and occupying a large chunk of middle ground are the dot matrix. The first category includes printers like Sinclair's ZX or Apple's Silentype and represent computer manufacturers' attempts to enhance their products with comparatively priced printer offerings. The ZX Printer remains cheap at the expense of paper width, paper quality and print quality. It is useful only to people who want hard copy listings of programs and this is all it is really designed to provide. The problem is that printer prices have refused to descend in pace with the computers they serve. A computer is composed mostly of microchips and the cost of manufacturing them has been steadily coming down over the past ten years. Conventional printers, however, have the handicap of crucial mechanical components and it has not been possible to radically cheapen their manufacture without making them flimsier and less reliable. Electrostatic printers introduce technology with fewer moving parts but at present compromise on print quality to such an extent that they suffer severe limitations. RELEASES Although dot matrix printers are stuck with lots of moving parts they do seem to be experiencing benefits from their mass production. As everyone knows, the more you produce of one thing, the cheaper it becomes per unit. The Japanese manufacturers haven't wasted time in virtually cornering the low-cost printer market and expansion of this market is starting to have a lowering effect on UK prices. The past couple of months have seen some notable releases - especially Epson's new and relatively cheap RX80. At under £300, it and its competitors are viable printers for users with micros in the £300 to £450 price range. Even lower priced matrix printers are available at around £200, although these tend to lose points on quality and flexibility. The dot matrix printer sends a print-head back and forth across the paper. On the head is a row of (usually 7 or 8) pins. The pins are punched through an ink ribbon onto the paper and build up the characters as a matrix of dots. It's a popular method and there is a wide variety of matrix printers on the market in every price bracket, so picking a dot matrix printer is not an easy matter. Potential buyers must arm themselves with a proper understanding of the things before venturing forth with a fistful of notes. The first thing to work out is interfacing. Most printers could really be described as purpose-built computers in their own write. A printer will usually have a small volatile memory (buffer) and a processor to manipulate it and control the print head as it goes over the paper. Far from being directly under the control of the micro, they deal as equals-obeying and interpreting text code. This computer to printer communication is carried out through an interface. INTERFACES An interface is a small group of electronic components which takes the signals from the computer and converts them so they can be sent down a cable to another compatible interface waiting at the other end to convert them back. There are two main types of interface. The first is known as a serial interface - the most common of which is the RS232. This sends pulses one after the other, rather like a one lane roadway. Its alternative is a parallel interface and the most popular of these is the Centronics. The Centronics sends its signals in ranks over a multi-lane roadway rather like tanks in a Russian May-day parade. The advantage here, of course, is speed - you can get more individual bits down in a given time. So the first thing to work out is what interface your computer has and attempt to match this to interfaces on offer on available printers. It is important to distinguish between interfaces available as standard on a printer and those available as extra cost. Some manufacturers give you a choice - either one or the other or the basic price. It may turn out that you have no standard interface on your computer. If so get interface prices before making a purchase, as the expenditure can radically alter the economics of the whole exercise. The Spectrum, for instance, is cheap partly because it has no interfaces. These then have to be added at extra cost before a reasonable printer can be configured. Kempston does a Centronics interface for the Spectrum. But having the right interface unfortunately doesn't guarantee compatibility. Some computers recognise different character codes and this can lead to major problems - always get an assurance from the dealer or, if possible, see the printer running with your model computer feeding the text. SPEED Another criterion that must be considered is print speed. Although 100cps sounds fast, it can still take some time to get through a length of text. Like all features, speed is generally a direct trade-off against price. If you plan to use your printer for business try and work out how much text you are likely to want to put through in a given time in determining your requirements. Remember too that manufacturers' speed claims tend to err on the optimistic side. It seems to be a convention not to take account of the time involved in carriage return. As a rough guide it is wise to knock 20 to 30 cps off the claimed speed. Many users will be interested in graphics capability. This is often very dependent on supporting software - make sure you get all the details sorted out before getting too enthusiastic. Print flexibility is another quality the importance of which will differ from user to user. Do you really need a full European character set or need to run different typefaces on the one page? (it can often look rather gross anyway). The same applies to different pitches and print positions (the maximum number of characters that can be printed on one line by the smallest character set). FEEDING TIME Feed methods are another problem. The dot matrix works best with a tractor feed. The paper is pulled under the print head by a sprocket which marries with a line of perforations on the fan-fold paper. Once the paper is out of the printer the strips of paper down the side of the sheet with the tractor holes can be torn off. Alternative feed methods - sheet feed for instance - tends to increase the price quite dramatically. Unless you want to use letter-head paper sheets, fanfold tractor feed will probably be quite satisfactory. PRINT QUALITY Perhaps the most important consideration, however, is print quality. On the face of it, a dot matrix printer is an ideal method of putting what appears on a screen onto paper. It really uses the same method as the cathode ray tube building up characters from a matrix of dots. The dot matrix printer is conventionally supposed to come underneath the daisy-wheel printers in terms of print quality. Instead of a matrix, the daisywheel uses moulded characters which strike the paper through a ribbon using the same principle as the typewriter. The daisywheel is really a con-job designed for people who want the convenience of computer-generated text but wish to retain the illusion that every letter sent is the result of half an hour's slave labour on an electric typewriter. it is interesting to note that the early typewriters sometimes featured a script-type which was supposed to resemble 'joined-up writing'. The idea was the same - it was designed to appease correspondents used to pen and ink. My guess is that the days of the daisywheel printer are probably numbered. Eventually people will get used dot-matrix text which they already receive in gas bills, circulars and even, sometimes, books. Good dot matrix printing is just as easy to read as that from a daisywheel and it has been completed faster, quieter and comes from a machine that on average costs half the price. When it's finished doing letters, the printer can output graphics in its spare time. One alternative to dot matrix is ink jet. The odd man out in this round-up is Olivetti's JP101. This printer uses a spark to fling ink out of a capsule directly onto the paper. The JP101 does only one line of dots at a time, but does them very fast - this makes it particularly good at graphics. PCN COMPARES THE RECENT CONTENDERS Over the past two months PCN Pro-Tested a representative sample of printers. Below we take a look back. The PCN Printers Pie roughly indicates the trade off between the four major variables. Price is represented by economy so excellent value for money will close up the price/performance gap. THE APPLE Dot matrix Pro-Test: PCN, March 18, 1983 Price: £489 Speed: 100 cps Interface: Parallel Centronics General Features: Seven different character widths and variable proportional spacing. Characters can be printed standard, bold or elongated. Tractor and friction feed are standard and carriage width is 10.5 inches. Contact Apple [redacted]. FACIT 4510 Dot matrix Pro-Test: PCN, April 1, 1983 Price: £498 Speed: 80 cps Interfaces: Parallel Centronics, Serial R5232. General Features: Full European character set. Has proportional spacing and characters can be printed at 10, 12 or 17 per inch. Characters can be printed standard, elongated or underlined. Block graphics plus high resolution graphics. High res densities of 70, 62 and 100 dots per inch. Friction and tractor feed standard. Contact Access Data Communications [redacted]. OLIVETTI JP101 Ink jet Pro-Test: PCN April 29, 1983 Price: £359 inc VAT Speed: 67-80 cps Interfaces: Centronics, RS232 £55 extra General features: Uses spark jet. Perhaps its main advantage is almost no noise. Provides ten, 12 or 18 characters per inch. Has full European character sets, and three types of underlining and bit graphics. Its graphics capabilities are extremely good. Tractor and friction feed is standard. Contact Micro-Peripherals [redacted]. EPSON FX80 Dot matrix PRO-Test: PCN, April 29, 1983 Price: £438 inc VAT Speed: 160 cps Interfaces: Parallel Centronics, IEEE optional extra. General features: Definable proportional spacing. Subscripts and superscripts are good quality - has double strike giving close to daisywheel quality. Provides normal condensed and double-width characters. You can define your own character set and double and even quadruple density bit graphics are available. Tractor/pin and friction feed standard. Contact Epson UK [redacted]. EPSON RX80 Dot matrix Pro-Test: PCN, May 6, I983 Price: £250 to £300 plus VAT (the dealers tend to set their own retail prices - shop around). Speed: 100 cps Interfaces: Parallel Centronics, IEEE and RS232 optional extras. General features: Alternative character set available plus double strike, bold strike and a full range of widths and pitches. Modes may be turned on and off within a line. Bit graphics are available in a wide variety of modes. Tractor feed is standard. Contact Epson UK [redacted]. STAR 510 Dot matrix Pro-Test: PCN May 13, 1983 Price: £289 plus VAT Speed: 100 cps Interfaces: Parallel Centronics General features: A 9x9 matrix provides either 10, 12 or 17 characters to the inch while the line pitch is programmable. Pitch changes may be made within a line. Superscripts and subscripts are generated in unidirectional mode. Bit graphics come in single or double density in a 480 or 960 dot matrix. An interesting feature is the printer's use of a normal typewriter ribbon instead of the usual printer cartridge. Tractor and friction feed is standard. Contact Miro Peripherals [redacted]. QUESTIONS YOU NEED TO ASK PCN Checklist - arm yourself with the right set of questions before you put yourself on the printer market. What do I want to print? Think carefully about print quality and graphics. Will you really print a lot of letters and do you want graphics hard-copy? How important is time? Is it worth £100 to save the odd minute or so in printing time? Compatibility: Will it run properly with my computer? How much will it cost to make it do so? Speed: What is the real speed? . Ribbon: How much do they cost and how long will they last? Feed method: Is the standard tractor adequate or is it worth the extra money to buy a sheet feeder? Carriage-width: Will it take the paper? Flexibility: How many different character sets and graphics modes are available for the money? What will extra features cost? Noise: Make sure you hear it first. Support: Will the dealer fix it if it breaks and how long will he continue doing so? Are there maintenance schemes available?