davidl@orca.UUCP (David Levine) (08/12/83)
I'm a micro owner who is growing tired of dot-matrix output and has come into a
little money. I'm looking for a reasonably fast letter-quality printer in the
$1200 or less range. The more features the better, but I would prefer a
reliable plain-vanilla printer to an unreliable gadget loaded with
bells and whistles. I have a homebrew CP/M system with five serial ports
and no parallel, so the printer must be available with an RS-232 port.
So far the Daisywriter 2000 with a 48K buffer, lots of features, and a print
speed of about 35 CPS, looks like the best printer for my needs. The
Mannesman-Talley at about $800 is slower and reportedly nearly as nice, but I
think I can afford the $1200 or so the mail-order places charge for the Daisy
(I couldn't afford the list price). Now there seems to be an alternative.
InfoWorld, Vol. 5 #32, discusses a new printer: the Olivetti PR 2300. This is
an ink-jet printer available for a single-unit price of $560. Print quality is
"almost as good as a daisy-wheel when used with a high-quality keen-edge bond."
It has gobs of features and is fast and quiet. (I don't know whether this beast
is available yet or not. The information in this paragraph is from a letter I
got from a friend, not from the article in InfoWorld.)
I'm looking for recommendations, preferably from those with real experience
with the printers they're talking about. Please send information to me by
mail, and I'll summarize to the net if I get enough info to bother with.
-- David D. Levine (...decvax!tektronix!tekecs!davidl) [UUCP]
(...tekecs!davidl.tektronix@rand-relay) [ARPA]