[comp.sys.ibm.pc.misc] buying printer - HELP!?

mead@uxh.cso.uiuc.edu (08/30/90)

I hope to purchase a printer soon.  This is perhaps the PC domain that
I am most ignorant about.  My brother has a Star NX1000 and it seems to
have a number of features for it's price range (pretty close to the
bottom of the low end, isn't it?).  This is probably the model I am
most favorable towards right now.

I have also considered getting the NX1000 Rainbow (a similar model that
prints seven "vibrant colors including black" :) and the Epson LX810 on
the basis that Epson might be a better company and/or that the Stars'
compatibility might not be 100%.

The color Star uses 'simple "in text codes" (instead of confusing
escape codes).  This will save you time and frustration.' --  I have
written an extremely simple BASIC program to set by brother's Star to
compressed print.  It was not time consuming or frustrating.  Am I
going to lose control or flexibility with these "in text codes"?

I will be need to do the following:

print drafts of program code or text files

print using WordPerfect

print graphics and graphs (using Turbo Pascal and assembler)

Finnally, (this question is perhaps inappropriate here, but ...) I'd
like to use the less expensive black ribbons in the Rainbow most of the
time, does anyone know if this is possible?

Any experiences with these printers would do me a world of good.
Thanks very much for reading this far.

Emailed responses would be prefered, and I'll post a summary.


-alan mead