ray@vantage.UUCP (Ray Liere) (08/06/89)
We have a LaserJet II and use soft fonts.
At the time we set up the system, wisdom was that soft fonts were
better than cartridge fonts due to there only being two slots on
the LJ, and so using soft fonts kept one from having to switch
cartridges if you needed to use more than 2 cartridges' worth of fonts ...
We are now in the position of not having enough memory for some items that
we print -- that is, there is not enough memory to hold the needed downloaded
fonts.
IT SEEMS TO ME that, rather than buying more memory, I would be better off
buying one or two of the "super font cartridges" that have appeared on the
market recently. This would free up LJ memory (and perhaps I would not need
to buy any more of that). It would also free up disk space (where I am
storing the soft fonts -- on the host system).
Most of these super cartridges claim to be 100% compatible with the HP
ones -- just more fonts in each cartridge. So ... if the software I use now
handles HP cartridges, then it seems to me that it should handle the super
cartridges as well.
I suppose there could be differences in quality among the various cartridge
manufacturers (in terms of "how good" the characters "look").
I would sincerely appreciate your comments, experiences, "you are missing
this point", etc.
Thanks very much.
Ray Liere
Vantage Consulting and Research Corporation
voice: (503)657-7294
uucp: uunet!nwnexus!vantage!ray
-or-
hplabs!hpfcla!hpubvwa!hpupora!vantage!ray
Internet: vantage!ray@nwnexus.WA.COMkg@elan.elan.com (Ken Greer) (08/08/89)
From article <5130001@vantage.UUCP>, by ray@vantage.UUCP (Ray Liere): > We have a LaserJet II and use soft fonts. ... > We are now in the position of not having enough memory for some items that > we print -- that is, there is not enough memory to hold the needed downloaded > fonts. > > IT SEEMS TO ME that, rather than buying more memory, I would be better off > buying one or two of the "super font cartridges" Depends on your software. If it handles soft fonts well, I'd go with an extra memory board. The super catridges do have lots of fonts, but the soft font sets have lots more! If you get a super cartridge, those are all the fonts you'll ever have. If you go with the extra memory, you'll solve your problem, and also have the flexibility of using oodles of other fonts. I recall an extra MB of LJ ram costs about what these catridges go for, so I'd go for the RAM. 1MB extra ought to do it for most folks. Ken Greer Elan Computer Group, Inc. 888 Villa St. 3rd Floor Mt View CA 94041 Phone: 415-964-2200 Internet: kg@elan.com UUCP: {ames,hplabs,uunet}!elan!kg
jimb@athertn.Atherton.COM (Jim Burke) (08/08/89)
In article <5130001@vantage.UUCP> ray@vantage.UUCP (Ray Liere) writes: >Most of these super cartridges claim to be 100% compatible with the HP >ones -- just more fonts in each cartridge. So ... if the software I use now >handles HP cartridges, then it seems to me that it should handle the super >cartridges as well. >I would sincerely appreciate your comments, experiences, "you are missing >this point", etc. > My only experience with the "super cartridges" is with the 25-in-1 cartridge from Pacific Data Products. I found it to be an outstanding value in terms of price and performance (quality of printing). I used it with WordPerfect 5.0 - WP does not have a driver for the 25-in-1 but a driver comes with the cartridge for several popular software packages. No complaints whatsoever. I compared the TimesRoman 12 point font with an HP cartridge with the same font and I actually prefered the PDP cartridge's output, although the difference was barely detectable. -- ****** Views expressed herin are my own ******* Jim Burke (408) 734-9822 (temp) | I'll stop posting when they pry my jimb@Atherton.COM | cold, dead fingers from the smoking {decwrl,sun,hpda,pyramid}!athertn!jimb | keyboard.
pim@cti-software.nl (Pim Zandbergen) (08/09/89)
In article <608@elan.elan.com> kg@elan.elan.com (Ken Greer) writes:
<From article <5130001@vantage.UUCP>, by ray@vantage.UUCP (Ray Liere):
<>
<> IT SEEMS TO ME that, rather than buying more memory, I would be better off
<> buying one or two of the "super font cartridges"
<
<If you go with the
<extra memory, you'll solve your problem, and also have the flexibility
<of using oodles of other fonts. I recall an extra MB of LJ ram costs
<about what these catridges go for, so I'd go for the RAM. 1MB extra
<ought to do it for most folks.
One should bear in mind, that no matter how much RAM you have stuffed
in your LJ, you cannot have more than 32 soft fonts resident.
There is no such limitation for cartridge fonts (that I know of).
--
Pim Zandbergen internet : pim@cti-software.nl
CTI Software BV uucp : ..!uunet!ctisbv!pim
Laan Copes van Cattenburch 70 phone : +31 70 542302
2585 GD The Hague, The Netherlands fax : +31 70 512837mlawless@ncrwic.Wichita.NCR.COM (Mike Lawless) (08/10/89)
In article <5130001@vantage.UUCP> ray@vantage.UUCP (Ray Liere) writes: >IT SEEMS TO ME that, rather than buying more memory, I would be better off >buying one or two of the "super font cartridges" that have appeared on the >market recently. >Most of these super cartridges claim to be 100% compatible with the HP >ones -- just more fonts in each cartridge. So ... if the software I use now >handles HP cartridges, then it seems to me that it should handle the super >cartridges as well. I would be careful if I were you. I called Microsoft with some questions about such super cartridges. I had noticed that Windows (and applications running under Windows) has a LaserJet driver that only knows about true HP font cartridges. They told me that I could use a super cartridge as long as I accepted the limitation of only being able to use the subset of fonts found in any one or two standard HP fonts at one time. Also, I seem to recall that most of the fonts are supported in ASCII only, and not the HP Roman-8 extended character set. There may be other limitations as well. Another poster noted that PDS apparently supplies drivers for popular software packages with the cartridge, but which ones I have no idea; is a Windows driver included, and if so, does it support everything else the standard LaserJet driver does correctly, including downloading of soft fonts? What about a driver for Microsoft Word (although in this case it is possible to create your own driver, as long as you know what you are doing and have infinite patience.). If anyone out there actually has one of these gadgets, could you please share your comments with the net on these issues. -- Mike Lawless, NCR E&M Wichita, Box 20 (316) 636-8666 (NCR: 654-8666) 3718 N. Rock Road, Wichita, KS 67226 Mike.Lawless@Wichita.NCR.COM {ece-csc,hubcap,gould,rtech}!ncrcae!ncrwic!Mike.Lawless {sdcsvax,cbatt,dcdwest,nosc.ARPA}!ncr-sd!ncrwic!Mike.Lawless
robert@hemingway.WEITEK.COM (Robert Plamondon) (08/11/89)
Some of the "Super Font" cartridges contain unbelievably ugly, blobby,
inconsistant, and inaccurate fonts. The first one I bought was inex-
pressibly vile (unfortunately, I forget the company's name) and I
returned it. I bought an Everex "J" cartridge, which is still quite
inferior in font quality, but is tolerable for what I use it for.
As far as I can tell, all of the third-party font cartridges are
far inferior to HP's cartridges or BitStream's downloadable fonts.
-- Robert
--
Robert Plamondon
robert@weitek.COM
"No Toon can resist the old 'Shave and a Hair-Cut'"ral@mruxb.UUCP (Ronald A. Levenberg) (08/16/89)
Consider that extra RAM in your Laserjet II doesn't just provide the ability to download fonts. This memory is also required to print a full page of 300 dpi graphics. If you are printing graphics from drawing programs like Arts & Letters or from spreadsheets like Microsoft Excel, you'll need the extra memory unless you are willing to settle for lower resolution like 150 dpi or 75 dpi. It seems to me that you'll do better with RAM than a super cartridge. Keep in mind that you can print soft fonts in very large sizes. For viewgraphs (text charts), it's very powerful to use a word processor to produce text charts with 30 pt headings and 22 point bullet lists. Try that with your cartridge!