BLARSON@USC-ECLB.ARPA.UUCP (01/12/87)
Very soon we will be getting a Xerox 4050 50 page per minute laser printer. for use on our Primes. Its main use will be for reports, but I would also like to be able to do some nice-looking text on it. (The 4050 was chosen over the 8700 purely on space considerations.) At first the interface will be via tape since the 4050 doesn't have any reasonable interface. It will be hooked to some kind of a protocol converter box so it can understand data-products parallel ascii as soon as possible. Does anybody have experience with such a protocol converter on a large xerox laser-printer? I never was completely happy with the serial-parallel conversion box we got for our 2700-I's. Is there a Tex driver available for the 4050? Would it be hard to adapt to the prime version of Tex? (I'm also curious about scribe, but it would probably involve to much money to update our ancient and useless Prime version.) Bob Larson Arpa: Blarson@Usc-Eclb.arpa Uucp: sdcrdcf!usc-oberon!castor!blarson -------
DMurray.WBST@XEROX.COM.UUCP (01/27/87)
Re: connections to a 4050. How about Ethernet? You might also contact the following: 1 - Skip Grandy at Univ. Pittsburg 412-624-6355. He has a high speed serial connect from Vax to 8700 (similar only, but he has lots of lore) 2 - ACC, a company who makes protocol converters, 805-963-9431 3 - SPUR, similar to ACC. Interesting that you use Prime. Have you called them? I know our ublishing Unit has a Prime and prints on a 9700, but am not sure how they are connected. Try calling 619-271-4050, but since its a development unit, don't expect hand holding or "customer support". (I probably shouldn't have given you the phone number.) As to software... There is a Tex DVI-to-Interpress converter from Berkeley (Mike Harrison, VORTEX project). I believe there is Scribe-to-Interpress via Unilogic. You can get Unix Titroff-to-Interpress and a complete Interpress Toolkit from the Xerox Systems Institute (or me). Not sure what else might be of interest. Dan Murray Imaging Systems Laboratory Xerox