avery@netcom.UUCP (Avery Colter) (11/19/90)
It is about 8:11 AM as I write the following.
I have completed a comparison of the new Imagewriter v4.0 driver shipped
with System Disk 5.0.3 to Claris's Imagewriter.CL
I have run two sets of printouts. Here are the numbers, and annotations
for each.
The first document is a resume', consisting of various sizes and tabulations
of Helvetica-typefaced text.
The times given are in minutes.
CL:
Better Text: 5:57
Better Color: 2:35
IW v4.0:
Best: 2:44
Standard: 1:58
Fast: 0:45
Text Only: 0:44
Qualitative Results:
"Best" on v4.0 is the same as "Better Text" on CL in terms of quality of print.
"Standard" is the same as "Better Color".
"Fast" is the same as "Standard", but lighter, thinner, and more grainy.
"Text Only" might be a good setting for letters and such, but there are
pitfalls to be aware of. A combination of tab settings, typestyles, sizes,
and margins which work on the screen might not work in "Text Only", causing
premature nextlines or overwrites depeninding on whether you have the printer
set to issue linefeeds after all carriage returns - if not, the usual case, then
your page may be littered with cases of two or more lines of text written on
the same line of the page. This mode only prints one of two sizes of text, and
the larger one is especially prone to these overruns. So, I would advise using
"Text Only" with files whose main bodies of type are in 12-point or smaller,
and which don't have a lot of narrowly separated tabulation fields. Otherwise,
tabs are obeyed where possible, as are calls for centering, justification,
bold, italics, and underlines (didn't test for superscripts or subscripts).
The second test was done on a NAAFA flyer I had tossed together, using
several bitmapped graphics of their insignia, with their address and number in
Bookman and Zapf-Dingbats typestyles tossed in. (Persons curious about NAAFA
and their hand in the until recently underground
"Resistance Against Weight-Fascism" may feel free to inquire at any time :) ).
I was thinking about using my DESKPICTURE, depicting a blonde chubling,
as the test case (I lovingly call this file "RubenDesque" ;} ), but since
AWGS is again refusing to accept foreign graphics.....
Here are the numbers for this GR document (which, by the way, is a Postscript
printer's worst nightmare, takes 45 minutes to ram all this bitmapping through
a Laserwriter).
CL:
Better Text: 5:30 (:45)
Better Color 3:33 (:34)
IW v4.0:
Best: 4:51 (:39)
Standard: 4:27 (:34)
Fast: 1:45 (:33)
Text Only: N/A
The numbers in parenthesis indicate the time it took for the driver to print
the first line of the page.
Again, "Best" and "Better Text" are equivalent, as are "Standard" and
"Better Color", with the exception that the new driver's settings produce
darker print than the older driver's settings.
"Best" and "Better Text" rounded the graphics the best, but sometimes
oversmoothed in between narrowly separated bitmap sections, producing
a "cobwebbed" effect in those areas. "Standard" and "Better Color" didn't
smooth so well, but as a consequence left finer edges in the narrow areas.
"Fast" made a copy exactly like "Standard", expect it was light and grainy.
"Text Only", of course only printed the text objects.
--
Avery Ray Colter {apple|claris}!netcom!avery {decwrl|mips|sgi}!btr!elfcat
(415) 839-4567 "Fat and steel: two mortal enemies locked in deadly combat."
- "The Bending of the Bars", A. R. Colter