Various Types of Printers

This article is to explain and detail the information about  types of printers. It is nothing but the output peripheral device which is used to produce hard copy of text or images stored in the computer. They are broadly categorised in to two types, they are
1. Impact Type
2. Non-Impact Type

Impact Type

To create text or image by physically make the print head to press the ink ribbon and  cause the ink deposition on the paper in desired form is called impact type. Normally it is quite louder in nature when compared to other  types of printers. The well known example for impact type is Dot Matrix and Daisy wheel . Some of the latest impact based in the market are Line printer (high speed impact printer), IBM electromagnetic table printing machine, and Apple Image writer.

Non-Impact Type

This  produce text or images on paper without striking the paper physically are called as non-impact type. These are not louder when compared to  other types of printers. The well known example of this type is Thermal printer, lasers and inkjets . Some of the latest non-impact printers in market are HP Laser Jet and Apple Laser Writer (The laser printer with built-in postscript interpreter).

Printing Technology

In overall, different printing technology is used for different level of printing. It is also classified on the basic of printing technology. The quality of printing, printing speed, cost of them are mainly based on the technology used .

Non-Impact Printing Technology

The technologies commonly used in modern and personal home based are non-impact type. These technologies can print in both mono chrome and colour. The following category can be classified under non-impact printing.
1. Tonner based (Laser)
2. Liquid ink(Inkjet)
3. Solid ink
4. Dye-sublimation
5. Thermal
6. Inkless
7. UV

Impact printing technology

Some of these devices are rarely used. They are famous for its unique feature, common use in businesses where multi-part forms are printed. These are mostly comes under the impact printers and they gets printed mostly in mono chrome only. following are different  types of printers in impact printing
1. Daisy wheel
2. Dot matrix
3. Pen based plotter
4. Line printer
5. Typewriter-derived
6. Teletypewriter-derived
These are mostly comes under impact printers. These are commonly used for commercial purpose for its special feature to print multi-part forms.

Photo Printer

Today there are several types of printers available in market. Some special types of printers print photos, which you have taken through your instant digital camera; computer and some selected mobile phones. This printer needs special photo paper to print the photos. The quality of the output depends on the resolution of the printer. Most of the print quality is good because of high resolution such as 4800×1200 dots per inch that produce sharp photos.

Portable Digital Photo Printer

Connecting the printer with your computer to print the photos from digital camera is an old fashion. Now there are many famous branded portable or mobile instant photo printers available in market. These printers are compact and very lightweight device. You can connect any digital camera or memory card or USB drive into the printer without the help of PC and get high-resolution photo output in 20 seconds.

Polaroid P-500 Portable Digital Photo Printer

The Polaroid P-500IR portable digital photo printer is a portable printer. It prints photos directly from any digital camera without the help of computer. This printer uses Polaroid Type 500 instant film to print the photos. Therefore, there is no need for batteries or cords. This device supports most of the standard file formats. It produces full colour continuous tone prints. It is lightweight, easy portable and can print in any time anywhere without the hassle of wires. You can print one or more copies of photos without resetting the printer.

Pogo Instant Mobile Printer

Polaroid is the corporation who invented the concept of instant camera. Polaroid Pogo Instant Mobile Printer is a digital photo printer designed by Polaroid Corporation. This device produce full color continuous tone prints using Polaroid 500 instant film. There is no computer required to transfer picture from camera to printer. It is compatible with almost all digital cameras with flash cards.

Using this compatible printer, you can print small photos in only 20 seconds. However, you cannot expect high quality output in this small device. It comes with built-in Bluetooth for wireless printing from your mobile phone. The main specialty in this device is, it does not use any ink, instead of that it uses a special ZINK (zero ink) photo paper that has dye crystals. These dye crystals activated when the paper get warm to produce photo prints.

Polaroid P310 movable 4X6 photograph printer

If you are not looking for the small photo prints then you can choose Polaroid P310 movable 4X6 photograph printer. This printer works without PC and it prints with the help of PictBridge USB or Camera Interface. It is slightly bigger than the other portable model but it produces high quality output. Using this photo printer, you can get brilliant 35mm quality colour photos. These printers are cheap and best for home use and travel people.

Duplex Laser Printing

Today there are many advanced technology used in printers to perform more efficiently in low cost. Laser print is a non-impact printing method used to produce hard copy of the document or image. Duplex is one of the features in printers, which allow the machine automatically print on both sides of the paper. Using this feature, you can minimise the paper consumption. Laser duplex printer uses laser beam and selenium coated drum to draw the document and the drum is rolled into toner. Tonner is nothing but the powdered ink. Now the tonner fused with the paper using electric heat and pressure. Thus, the document gets print on the paper.

 Duplex Laser Colour Printer

Mostly documentation does not need colour printing, if you want to print photos then you needs color printer. Laser color printer produces professional quality output. Today there are many color print machines available in market with affordable price. Using Color Access Control technology, you can control the colour print access. Due to the advancement in technology, the price of this device is reduced. It has the ability to print both sides of the paper automatically. Most of these types are used for commercial purpose.

Today there are high-speed color laser printers available for small office purpose. These machines have built in wireless networking features. It allows you to share the device without the hassle of cables. It also allows the Bluetooth enabled devices such as mobile phone to connect with the printer directly. There is some new laser printing devices come with automatic internal sensors for producing color prints. It optimizes the color density according to the print.

Duplex Laser All in one Printer

The machine that can perform scanning, faxing and photocopying functions is known as all in one or multifunction printer. Duplex laser all in one printer perform double side printing, scanning, photocopying and faxing. Today there are many brands manufacturing this type of device for office and small business use. Normally these powerful multifunction machines are very fast in producing output.

They have built in wired as well as wireless and USB interface for sharing documents through network. Even though all in one printer perform multi functions, the print ink is needed for printing and photocopying purpose only. There is no relation between printer ink and scanning. Today there are many brand producing high capacity toner cartridges to reduce operation cost.

Best duplex laser printer for small office

Laser jet printers are mainly used for business and small office use. They produce fast output with professional quality. Mostly they are compact and reliable one. Today many brand producing this device in affordable price. If you do not need color prints but still need to print more documents, then it is advisable to choose monochrome duplex laser printer for your office. Monochrome device are always cheaper than color one.

 Buying Tips for Duplex Laser Printer

Before choosing a duplex laser printer, you may consider some important features. First and the most important thing is speed. For small office, you need to print an average of 10 to 30 pages per day. For this, you can go for all in one duplex laser printer with 10 ppm (pages per minute) speed. These types of devices are not expensive and good for long-term use.

Next thing to consider is resolution of the machine. The resolution is very important to produce good quality images. You can produce better quality image when the resolution is high. Normally laser printer resolution falls under 600 to 700 dpi (dots per inch). This resolution is sufficient for monochrome printing. When go for high-end production of prints you might have the resolution at least 1200 to 2400 dpi.

If you are going to buy multifunction duplex laser printer then it is important to consider the memory size. Device without sufficient memory will not perform the task efficiently. Next one to consider is warm up time and first paper out time because, in office work the waiting time for printing job will affect the overall production. It is always advisable to choose duplex laser printer for small office, because in office the printing volume is high.