info-mac@uw-beaver (01/30/85)
From: Richard Furuta <Furuta@WASHINGTON.ARPA>
A number of the recent messages to info-mac have convinced me that I
should express my opinion on the LaserWriter to try and give some
perspective. Apple's LaserWriter is designed by a company named
Adobe. It is based on the Canon CX marking engine. There are a
number of other laser printers which use this same marking
engine---the HP LaserJet, the Imagen 8/300, and the QMS 800 among
them. Some of the comments on the LaserWriter have centered on its
cost ("high priced for a printer"). When you compare the pricing of
the LaserWriter ($7000) to the HP LaserJet ($3500) that might seem to
be the case. However, the comparison is really not fair---the
LaserJet is a glorified Diablo Typewriter with a limited interface
that prevents you from printing much of what you'd want to be able to
print (like full page bitmaps at printer resolution). A fairer
comparison is between the LaserWriter, the Imagen 8/300, and the QMS
800.
One can argue at length about the relative capabilities of these
printers, and people on the Laser-Lovers mailing list seem to be doing
just that, but the message that comes through clearly is that the
LaserWriter is as powerful as the 8/300 and the 800 in its ability to
represent pages. In fact, much of the discussion is over whether or
not the LaserWriter is >>more<< powerful. The clincher is that both
the Imagen 8/300 and the QMS 800 are priced at about $10000. Apple's
$7000 price for the LaserWriter is a bargain by comparison here. In
fact, you could almost say that the LaserWriter's price is
anti-competetive, being so much lower than the other comperable
printers!
I expect that Apple won't sell very many LaserWriters to the home
market. On the other hand, I expect they'll sell a very large number
of them to businesses and Universities. Many of these won't be hooked
up to Macs (or indeed to microcomputers at all). In fact, Adobe is
selling an interface from 4.2 bsd (Unix) for the printer.
Of particular interest are the options available to people who want to
upgrade from the LaserWriter. In the last few days, a number of other
companies also have announced printers with the Adobe interface. QMS
has the 1200A which retails for something like $30,000, if my math is
correct. This is a 12 page per minute printer (resolution also 300
dpi) with a heavier duty cycle than the Canon CX. Also,
Merganthaler/Linotype has announced some phototypesetters with the
same interface at 600 dpi, 1200 dpi, and 2500 dpi (I don't know the
prices). Adobe is working hard to make their printer language a
standard, used in many different manufacturers products. This
standardization will work to the Macintosh owner's benefit.
And the other implication for Macintosh owners is that a large number
of professionally designed fonts will become available for the
Macintosh in the coming year. (It's my understanding that Apple will
be marketing sets of fonts with printer and screen representations
for prices in the $80 to $100 range.)
--Rick
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