hhersh@boxboro.East.Sun.COM (Harry Hersh - Sun BOS Software) (01/24/91)
Can someone help me understand the hardware and software issues in connecting an HP printer to a MAC (Plus or SE)? In particular: 1. My understanding is that the HP provides a parallel interface. Can I connect it via AppleTalk? Through the serial (printer) line? What interfacing hardware is required? 2. Since the HP does not contain a Postscript engine, what software packages are recommended? ATM will handle basic font rendering, but not much else? I've seen reference to MacPrint and Freedom of the Press as providing Postscript interpretation within the Mac for non-Mac printers, but am not sure what the differences are (besides a factor of 3 in price). Are there other packages to be recommended that do the job of making the HP look and act like a LaserWriter NT?
dbeau@dbase.A-T.COM (David Beauchesne) (01/26/91)
hhersh@boxboro.East.Sun.COM (Harry Hersh - Sun BOS Software) writes: >Can someone help me understand the hardware and software issues in >connecting an HP printer to a MAC (Plus or SE)? In particular: >1. My understanding is that the HP provides a parallel interface. Can I >connect it via AppleTalk? Through the serial (printer) line? What interfacing >hardware is required? >2. Since the HP does not contain a Postscript engine, what software packages >are recommended? ATM will handle basic font rendering, but not much else? >I've seen reference to MacPrint and Freedom of the Press as providing >Postscript interpretation within the Mac for non-Mac printers, but am not >sure what the differences are (besides a factor of 3 in price). Are there >other packages to be recommended that do the job of making the HP look and >act like a LaserWriter NT? You say you've got a LaserJet. If you mean you have a LaserJet-'I' vice a LaserJet-II, then the following may be of no use to you. I've got a LJ-II connected to a Mac-IIfx. I have Pacific Data's MacPage cartridge which gives me a PostScript emulator. This is not true Adobe PostScript, but I have yet to find any Mac program that wouldn't work just fine. You do need a minimum of 2.5 megabytes of printer memory to run this. Even more would theoretically allow more fonts and so on. Adobe Type Manager works great and Type-1 fonts are downloadable to MacPage just as if it were a LaserWriter. The printer is connected via a serial cable which is supplied with MacPage, and which runs at 9600bps. AppleTalk would be better (and more expensive). The above will handle your PostScript needs. What about QuickDraw? Also supplied with MacPage is a QD driver. This driver has support for Pacific Data's 25-in-1 cartridge which I also own. I have not tried this yet, as I have no reason to -- MacPage has done everything I've wanted. I owned the 25-in-1 cartridge prior to purchasing MacPage. At that time, I used MacPrint for several months, and was very happy with it. I believe MacPrint is written/published by Insight development. The *only* criticism I have of this hardware setup is _speed_. If memory serves, the LJ-II has a 5-Mhz 68000 processor in it. This means that complex PostScript documents may take a while to print -- but they do print, and they print correctly. I hope this information is of use to you. David Beauchesne P.S. This is the first time I've posted to USENET -- so I hope the message is composed properly and, more importantly, that you get it!
john@newave.UUCP (John A. Weeks III) (01/28/91)
In article <4040@eastapps.East.Sun.COM> hhersh@boxboro.East.Sun.Com (Harry Hersh - Sun BOS Software) writes: > Can someone help me understand the hardware and software issues in > connecting an HP printer to a MAC (Plus or SE)? In particular: Yes, it does work. It is slow, but acceptable for low volume personal printing. Not recomended for commercial usage because of the slowness. > 1. My understanding is that the HP provides a parallel interface. Can I > connect it via AppleTalk? Through the serial (printer) line? What interfacing > hardware is required? It depends on which HP printer. Most of the LaserJets have serial ports in addition to the parallel. HP also has AppleTalk connections available for the HPIIP and the Deskwriter. Anything with a serial plug is the best choice because it will plug directly into a serial port on the Mac. A parallel port means that you will have to get a parallel port adapter for your mac, which is quite expensive and a major hassle. > 2. Since the HP does not contain a Postscript engine, what software packages > are recommended? ATM will handle basic font rendering, but not much else? > I've seen reference to MacPrint and Freedom of the Press as providing > Postscript interpretation within the Mac for non-Mac printers, but am not > sure what the differences are (besides a factor of 3 in price). Are there > other packages to be recommended that do the job of making the HP look and > act like a LaserWriter NT? Nothing will work like a LaserWriter NT unless it has postscript. MacPrint allows you to print from the Mac using a chooser level driver. It converts all text and graphics into the LaserJet language (or the native language of many other printers) and sends it out the serial port to your printer. Freedom of the Press intercepts the Postscript that the Mac sends towards the printer port, runs it through a clone postscript intrepreter, then sends a raster image bitmap out to your printer in the printers native language. A cheaper version called FOP Light is available for less than $100. ATM will dramatically help font quality when using MacPrint. Since FOP uses postscript fonts, ATM will not improve the output. MacPrint is slow, FOP is much slower. FOP also disables AppleTalk. -john- -- =============================================================================== John A. Weeks III (612) 942-6969 john@newave.mn.org NeWave Communications ...uunet!rosevax!tcnet!wd0gol!newave!john ===============================================================================
jkain@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu (Jeff Kain) (01/29/91)
john@newave.UUCP (John A. Weeks III) writes: >MacPrint is slow, FOP >is much slower. If you can settle for the internal fonts or cartridge fonts of your printer (which MacPrint supports) coupled with minimal use of graphics, then MacPrint is much faster than PostScript. But most Mac users tend to output a lot of graphics, in which case MacPrint (actually the serial connection) is very slow. How much do the 57.6 kbps serial->parallel interfaces help in printing graphics and ATM-generated fonts with Laserjets? I've been tempted to buy one, but they're pretty expensive (~$140). Jeff -- "I have a perfect cure for a sore throat. Cut it." -- Alfred Hitchcock jkain@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu
cheshire@Neon.Stanford.EDU (Stuart David Cheshire) (01/29/91)
For all who are interested, call Epson Accessory Marketing, 800 873 7766. I think they can sell you a 57600 serial/parallel adapter made by Jonathon Freeman Technologies for about $75. Only drawback is the thing has ROM and RAM and a processor built into it which give you lots of fancy features which completely screw up your printing, so it comes with a DA which disables all the fancy features to make it actually work. If you can live with having to kill it with a DA every time you turn it on, that is the cheapest 57600 baud interface I know. (If anyone has heard details of a Korean clone without all the stupid features build it please let me know -- I've been trying to track it down). Stuart Cheshire (cheshire@cs.stanford.edu)