englandr@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Scott Englander) (11/04/88)
Thanks to all who responded to my query. We still have not decided yet, but your responses help to narrow down the choices a little further. Here is a summary of what you all had to say: =============================================================================== From: englandr@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Scott Englander) Subject: Seeking recommendations for PostScript printer Date: 26 Oct 88 17:31:05 GMT Organization: Princeton University, NJ Our department is planning to purchase a PostScript printer to serve ~15 IBM PCs and 3 Macs on an AppleTalk/Phonenet network. We have narrowed the list down to the following: Apple LaserWriter IINTX NEC SilentWriter LC 890 QMS PS-800II QMS PS-810 Qume CrystalPrint / Jasmine DirectPrint Has anyone had experience with these printers or these companies? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: kweeder@sun.soe.clarkson.edu To: englandr@phoenix.Princeton.EDU Scott, In article <4129@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> you write: >Our department is planning to purchase a PostScript printer to serve ~15 >IBM PCs and 3 Macs on an AppleTalk/Phonenet network. We have narrowed >the list down to the following: > >Apple LaserWriter IINTX >NEC SilentWriter LC 890 >QMS PS-800II >QMS PS-810 >Qume CrystalPrint / Jasmine DirectPrint We have the PS-810 and use it much the same way (Laserwriter support for our Macintosh and HP-laserjet and HPGL emulation for our PC). We've found the machine trouble free and very satisfactory. QMS even sent us a software pack with utilities (like for downloading files to the printer from the Mac which lacks handy type and copy commands) to make life easier. The only thing I'd suggest is that you make sure you get the newer Cannon engine in your printer (the one that comes in the PS-810). It prints better and last longer than the older Cannon engine. Good Luck, Jim Kweeder kweeder@sun.soe.clarkson.edu ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: xdaa374@ut-emx.UUCP (William T. Douglass) Organization: UTexas Computation Center, Austin, Texas Posted: Wed Oct 26 20:24:56 1988 In article <4129@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> englandr@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Scott Englander) writes: >Our department is planning to purchase a PostScript printer to serve ~15 >IBM PCs and 3 Macs on an AppleTalk/Phonenet network. We have narrowed >the list down to the following: > >NEC SilentWriter LC 890 >Has anyone had experience with these printers or these companies? > I strongly advise against the NEC printer. We have been using one for a little over a year, & the quality & speed for graphics output is very poor (text-only is ok.) The real bug-a-boo, though, is@service for the damn thing. NEC seems to have a dearth of qualified dealers & a lack of parts. We were told that the torer discharge unit is backordered, and may take up to SIX months to arrive! Screw that, I say. Also, we cannot find a dealer in central Txas who will take out a maintenance contract on the printer. Nobody, even the company who sold it, wants to be saddled with obligatory repair service for the 890. Bottom line - too many problems, imcompetent service, and only so-so capabilities. Stay away. -- Bill Douglass, TCADA ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 26 Oct 88 14:26:53 PDT From: radek@pyrps5.pyramid.com (Radek Aster) Of course Apple's LaserWriter is the 'original' it is certainly not the cheapest nor is the performance that great. My recommendation would go for the QUME Crystalprint. It's performance rivals all others primarily because it is not another "me too" clone made by ADOBE but is powered by a "cutting edge" RISC processor. The processor is made by WEITEK and boasts 4 MIPS. This gives the QUME Crystalprint a 10 times greater performance than the Apple Laserwriter when printing graphics and 4 times greater performance when printing text. Also, unlike other Postscript clones, the QUME Crystalprint comes with an Appletalk port, so it can plug directly into a MAC Appletalk network. i.e. plug and play. The only potential drawback is that since it is not an ADOBE clone, it is not exactly like an Apple LASERWRITER, namely the shadeing algorithms are different as are some of the font names. However, unless you care about what I consider moot considerations, the QUME Crystalprint is THE way to go. Furthermore don't be put off by the fact that the Crystalprint is ONLY a six page per minute printer. When printing graphics most postscript printers never even reach the speed at which their engines are spec'd. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Date: Thu, 27 Oct 88 09:28:46 edt From: Paul M. Hudy <egapmh@uncecs.edu> Hello, NTX all the way. Why go away from the the standard? There may be reasons, but if it is on your considered list why ask for trouble by choosing one of the others. There are some differences in printer drivers, but *everyone* writes for Apple - its kind of like the IBM graphics printer. (That is if they write for postscript at all - a problem with some MSDOS software) We have the NTX hooked to 5 MACs and 3 PCs via phonenet Aand TOPS - it works great. The NTX is very fast and very sturdy. PC Appletalk comes with some nice utilities for printing PC files to the Laserwriter, also. Good luck, Paul <egapmh@ecsvax.UUCP> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: les@chinet.chi.il.us (Leslie Mikesell) Date: 27 Oct 88 16:49:37 GMT Organization: Chinet - Public Access Unix In article <7336@ut-emx.UUCP> xdaa374@emx.UUCP (Bill Douglass) writes: >thing. NEC seems to have a dearth of qualified dealers & a lack of parts. This is a local situation. I can get a repairman in a few hours (in a suburb of Chicago) and parts have not been a problem. >Also, we cannot find a dealer in central Txas who will take out a maintenance >contract on the printer. Nobody, even the company who sold it, wants to be >saddled with obligatory repair service for the 890. Again - no problem here although the economics of services contracts leaves me inclined to take my chances. I suspect the problem is travel time from the service center to your site. Actually, we have had no problems with the 890 anyway. Our service calls have mostly been for ROM upgrades to 860's to fix the HP emulation with downloaded fonts (which was done free under warantee). Les Mikesell ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: mark@drd.UUCP (Mark Lawrence) Date: 27 Oct 88 22:22:08 GMT Organization: in *this* company!? %% In article <4129@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> englandr@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Scott Englander) writes: %% >Our department is planning to purchase a PostScript printer %% >[we are considering the] NEC SilentWriter LC 890 %% > xdaa374@emx.UUCP (Bill Douglass) wrote: %% [reasons deleted]I strongly advise against the NEC printer. Hmmmm, we have had exactly the opposite experience. The graphics have been excellant (after we had the service organization look into a problem with thick vertical bars that tended to fade towards the top). We bought it at Entre' and they have retained an excellant service organization for the Oklahoma green-country area. Getting the thing to talk serial to the Sun was a problem but easily remedied once we understood what was going on (the printer only drives the return signal to +4 volts or so. Our Unix box wants +12). We are very happy with it. Mark ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- From: james@bigtex.cactus.org (James Van Artsdalen) Date: 28 Oct 88 13:04:38 GMT Organization: Institute of Applied Cosmology, Austin TX englandr@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Scott Englander) writes: > NEC SilentWriter LC 890 Some friends of mine who own a local software store use one of these and have had very good luck with it. I've used it as both a Postscript printer and HP laserjet. I've also used both the parrellel port and AppleTalk, and everything works like advertised. Very good print quality. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 27 Oct 88 09:02:26 EDT From: "D.J. Murdoch - Statistics" <dmurdoch@watdcsu.waterloo.edu> Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario In article <4129@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> you write: >IBM PCs and 3 Macs on an AppleTalk/Phonenet network. We have narrowed >the list down to the following: > >Apple LaserWriter IINTX >NEC SilentWriter LC 890 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ >QMS PS-800II >QMS PS-810 >Qume CrystalPrint / Jasmine DirectPrint > >Has anyone had experience with these printers or these companies? > At my last job with the federal government, we did a lot of mathematical writing. We had an HP Laserjet with the Math font cartridge, and it worked reasonably well. When buying a second printer, I believed the ads for the NEC LC 890 that said it was HP compatible, and called NEC and was told that HP font cartridges wouldn't work, but NEC had an equivalent to the Math (and most of the others). When the printer arrived, I was surprised to find that it didn't have any place to put a cartridge at all - only their non-Postscript printers accept cartridges. While postscript is much more capable than the HP language, it did leave us without any drivers for a few months. (I left the government then, so I can't say how well it's working now.) Duncan Murdoch ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 27 Oct 09:17:31 1988 From: jvd@houxs (John A Van Dyk +1 201 949 0224) Scott, I saw your message in comp.sys.ibm.pc asking information about PostScript laser printers. At work, my department owns a QMS-PS800 II laser printer. It has a dual-tray feed, and it supports the following interfaces (taken from the manual). # Interface Mode 0 RS232/422 Batch 1200 Baud, Parity Ignored 1 RS232/422 Batch 9600 Baud, Parity None, DTR 2 RS232 Diablo 9600 Baud, Parity None, DTR 3 Appletalk Batch Appletalk 4 Centronics Batch Parallel 5 Centronics Diablo Parallel 6 Centronics HP LaserJet+ Parallel 7 Centronics HPGL Plotter Parallel 8 RS232 HP LaserJet+ 9600 Baud, Parity None, DTR 9 RS232 HPGL Plotter 9600 Baud, Parity None, DTR It is currently hooked up to a 9600 baud datakit (ISDN) port, and is used in conjunction with a system running unix and using the Unison print spooling software. The two disadvantages to the printer are: 1) It is noisy 2) It 'forgets' that it has two trays when the lid is opened (i.e., paper jam, replace toner cartridge), or it is turned off. The printer must then be reconfigured via IBM-PC formatted software that comes on 5 1/4" and 3 1/2" disks. The process takes about one minute, maximum. I have heard from former co-workers that the newer model, or the single tray model, I'm not sure which, is quieter. The phone number for the QMS company is 1 (205) 633-4300. You should be able to acquire more information from them. I haven't seen the Apple LaserWriter IINTX, but there is a good review of it in the May, 1988 issue of BYTE magazine (Vol 13, No. 5). I hope this helps you. John Van Dyk AT&T Technologies ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 26 Oct 88 14:00:11 PDT From: Anant Kartik Mithal <akm@drizzle.cs.uoregon.edu> Organization: University of Oregon, Computer Science, Eugene OR In article <4129@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> you write: >[I tried to post this before to the above groups and comp.laser-printers, >but it didn't work, perhaps because the latter is moderated and that >held up posting to all groups.] > >Our department is planning to purchase a PostScript printer to serve ~15 >IBM PCs and 3 Macs on an AppleTalk/Phonenet network. We have narrowed >the list down to the following: > >Apple LaserWriter IINTX >NEC SilentWriter LC 890 >QMS PS-800II >QMS PS-810 >Qume CrystalPrint / Jasmine DirectPrint > >Has anyone had experience with these printers or these companies? > >Responses by e-mail will be summarized and posted. > The September 88 issue of Byte reviews a number of these printers. Kartik ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 27 Oct 88 10:21:45 PDT From: optilink!cramer@kontron (Clayton Cramer) I have experience with the Apple LaserWriter IIntx, and it seems to work quite well. The print isn't quite as dark as it was on the original LaserWriter Plus, but it does OK. Keep in mind that if you will printing any significant amount of graphics that cover a lot of area, the write white engine of the LaserWriter IIntx won't do a great job -- the blacks won't be black. Some of the other PostScript printers out there have write black engines, and do a much better job for this sort of thing -- the AST TurboLaser/PS for example -- but a good many of the ASTs have a problem with "bearding" characters, perhaps because of an adjustment problem. Since you intend to use your PostScript printer with PCs, I have taken the liberty of including a commercial blurb. ====================================================================== Niche Marketing has been publishing an Epson MX-80 to PostScript translation filter for PC-DOS for some time now, called EPSONSIM. (Epson America has taken offense to our use of the word "Epson", so the product is now ESIM. We are most embarrassed at the unthinking use of someone else's trademark). Unfortunately, being a filter, it was a little clumsy to use. We now have a TSR version that intercepts outgoing printer commands and transparently translates Epson MX-80 control codes to PostScript. This is useful for products like Lotus 1-2-3, dBASE III, and DOS that do not support PostScript. Other changes we've made over previous releases include: faster and much more readable graphic modes; corrections to some tab expansion bugs; corrections to some of the more esoteric line feed control sequences. The filter version has all these bug fixes as well, and includes both DTR and XON/XOFF serial I/O support. The TSR version also provides printer redirection capabilities so you can, for example, attach your PostScript printer to LPT1, and continue to use LPT1 for those applications that know PostScript, and redirect output sent to LPT2 through the Epson translator before sending it to LPT1. This makes it possible to have applications that only know the Epson MX-80 print to LPT2, while retaining normal PostScript operation on LPT1. ESIM, including the TSR version, can be purchased for $75 from: Niche Marketing 7198 Camino Colegio Rohnert Park, CA 94928 (707) 795-7342 California residents please include 6% sales tax. Shipments outside of the USA add $5 for customs declarations. Shipments within the USA are sent first class mail at no extra charge. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Date: Thu, 27 Oct 88 17:14:40 CDT From: Mark Lawrence <uunet.uu.net!apctrc!drd!mark> We have the NEC LC-890. We are very happy with it AFTER we got it hooked up to our Unix box (a major hassle). We had no problem getting it to work with our PCs either using the serial hookup or the parallel hookup. NEC has been very good to respond promptly to our requests and dissatisfaction (this might be better attributed to the quality of the local service organization they've retained to represent them, though). Mark -- - Scott