chris@SRI-SPAM.ARPA.UUCP (06/18/86)
If anyone on the net has had any experience (good or bad) with a 24 ppm laser printer I would appreciate hearing from you. We're looking for a 24 ppm laser printer that is compatible with Interleaf's wps and can sit on an either net. We currently have four Imagen 8/300 that we're please with but need a faster printer for large documents. Thanks in advance, Chris
GFoster@A.ISI.EDU (Glen Foster) (06/19/86)
DARPA has an Imagen 24/300. Same processor as the 8/300 with a Xerox XP24 marking engine. We have not been too happy with the beast. The XP24 is write-white and there have been a lot of complaints that "the print isn't dark enough." With the same fonts as the 8/300's, the stroke weight on the glyphs are just enough lighter to give a slightly washed out appearance without most users being able to exactly determine why. We find that the machine is only slightly used, most users choosing the appearance of the 8/300's over the speed of the 24. Increasing the "darkness" does not improve the appearance. I don't mean to be too hard on the machine's output quality, if the users didn't have an 8/300 to compare with, I don't think there would be any complaints. The machine has also experienced several major hardware problems (marking engine only, the image processor has been fine.) We have had to have the laser assembly and the power supply replaced in the six months we've had it. Because Imagen's local representative (Electronic Marketing Associates in Rockville, MD) seems to be swamped with repair calls, our total down time has been two months out of six. Maybe we just got a lemon, another 24/300 with which I am familiar has been trouble-free. The printer seems to support the Interleaf wps software just fine except for paper tray selection. The 24/300 has three trays from which to select and our efforts to set them up as different paper sources has been, so far, unsuccessful. There has not been a lot of pressure to implement this because of the quality issue so we haven't pursued it diligently and it may be possible. On balance I would look hard at other offerings before choosing another Imagen 24/300. Good luck, Glen -------