andrewsr@u2.rutgers.edu (Rich Andrews) (02/15/91)
I am considering getting a Postscript printer for my amiga. The models that I am considering are: the TI miscolaser, NEC silentwriter 2 model 90, QUME 410 or scriptTEN. Suggestions? (Budget = ~$2000) How well does some of the packages for the amiga (ProPage 2.0, ProDraw, Pagestream 2.1) use these printers? Could I buy PS fonts and download them instead of buying extra hardware (how well does that work). Could I get a parallel PS printer to work under A-Max? I would be interested in using FreeHand, PageMaker, etc. What drivers would I need. How well does A-MaxII handle the parallel connection? Thanks for any pointers. -Rich -- // Rich | "have you ever noticed that opinion without knowledge is \X/ Andrews | always a shabby sort of thing?" - Socrates
Graham_Parkinson@mindlink.UUCP (Graham Parkinson) (02/15/91)
I've been using the NEC Silentwriter 290 for about a month on my Amiga and like it's speed. There is a utility that allows flipping between the LJ and the PS modes via batch file. It runs on the IBM however it can be made to work on the Amiga by capturing the binary ouput and sending it from an Amiga batch file. The other newer NEC model 90 may be a better deal as it has automatic emulation control depending on what is sent to it. You should also look into the Postscript printer driver for the Amiga put out by Soft Services in Turku Abou Finland. It converts all amiga preferences output into postscript! It's going through a revamp of it's graphics abilities but it now sells for $40 US fro Soft Services Tel +011+358-21-6375762 Ask for Leonard - he speaks perfect English - Tell him Graham sent you! -- ****************************************************************** * Graham Parkinson - Frontier GeoSciences, Vancouver BC CANADA * * uunet Graham_Parkinson@Mindlink.UUCP * ******************************************************************
JKT100@psuvm.psu.edu (JKT) (02/15/91)
Actually, if you get software to support them, there are good alternatives
to Postscript printers out there these days. While Postscript printers
have dropped in price, the alternatives are even cheaper. And if you do
things right, they do not make you sacrifice quality or print time.
What I use is A-Max II and an HP LaserJet IIP. With MS Word or QuarkXpress
running under A-Max, you can print to the parallel or serial port to the
LaserJet IIP with a special printer driver. These software printer drivers
are available from several companies. The popular packages are "MaxPrint,"
"LaserJet Express," and "Freedom of Press 3.0." The result is output that
matches Postscript output. I've put pages printed with the above setup
next to the same pages printed from an Apple LaserWriter IINTX and the
quality was identical. All the above support Adobe type 1 fonts also.
In fact, you do not even need a setup this expensive. These packaes support
the entire LaseJet line as well as the DeskJet line from HP. They also
support Canon's BubbleJet line among others.
Of course, any postscript printer connected to the parallel port will work
in both Amiga and A-Max mode, but this is too expensive for most budgets.
Unfortunately, the Amiga is not quite as easy to use for Desktop publishing.
The operating system has no provision for screen or printer font support.
All printer and font support must be handled by the application itself.
PageStream 2.1 and ProPage 2.0 will print to the same printers as listed
above, but not with the grace and ease that the Mac allows. The Amiga is
a great graphics machine, but DTP is still the Mac's forte' and nothing
compares (IMHO). Luckily the Amiga's versatilty lets you jump to Mac mode
for DTP and then return for other tasks.
Kurt
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|| 184 W. Valley Hill Rd. || deny it's what the fighting's ||
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|| jkt100@psuvm.psu.edu --------------------------------------||
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-----------------------------------------------------------------------whirt@cup.portal.com (William Bill Hirt) (02/16/91)
In message <1991Feb14.070253.15390@vicstoy.UUCP>, andrewsr@u2.rutgers.edu (Rich Andrews) writes: >I am considering getting a Postscript printer for my amiga. The >models that I am considering are: the TI miscolaser, NEC silentwriter >2 model 90, QUME 410 or scriptTEN. Suggestions? (Budget = ~$2000) One other printer you might want to consider is the HP IIP. I have a IIP with a Pacific Page Postscript cartridge. It emulates Adobe PS version 51.9. We have a QMS PS 2220 at work with genuine Adobe Postscript 51.0 and I haven't found anything yet which prints on one and won't print on the other. Street price on the IIP is now under $800. The Pacific Page cart is about $350 and comes with the standard 35 Postscript type families. You need to add a 2 meg card to the IIP for Postscript work. I got a 4 meg card (populated) for under $500 for my IIP. Another $150 or so mail order can get you the under the printer 250 page sheet feeder tray. I have a friend which has the HP Postcript cartridge for the IIP and has found it to work well with ProPage for several months now. The advantage of the Pacific Page cart over the HP cart is that you can send a software reset to the printer to switch between Postscript and HP PCL mode. The HP cart requires you to remove it to drop back to PCL mode. If you look around, you may be able find a close-out LaserJet II for around $1000. Adobe makes a Postscript cartridge for the II that sells for between $250-275 mail order. The Adobe cart only works on the LaserJet II. HP's cart works on the IIP, III, and IIID and is a licensed version of Adobe Postscript. >How well does some of the packages for the amiga (ProPage 2.0, ProDraw, >Pagestream 2.1) use these printers? Could I buy PS fonts and download >them instead of buying extra hardware (how well does that work). I have used ProPage 2.0 to print to my IIP with the Postscript cart. The change in ProPage 2.0 is that you must use the Postscript fonts in your document. Before, ProPage would convert the CompuGraphic fonts to the approriate Postscript fonts at print time. Why they changed this I have no idea and I have yet to get a response yet from Gold Disk why this change was made. The Gold Disk CompuGraphic font series has a Postscript font downloader included in each font package. ProPage can also be told to download any fonts you are using in your document at print time. There are a number of Type 1 Adobe fonts around from IBM and Mac land that you can use. The main thing is creating the AFM and metric files for use in ProPage. There are several PD and shareware programs which do this. The other thing is you need to have enough additional memory in the printer to hold all your non-resident fonts while doing your print job. If you plan to to use a lot of downloaded fonts, 4 megs of printer memory would be a lot better than 2 megs. A 2 meg expansion on a IIP gives you 2.5 megabytes of memory which would probably be sufficent 99% of the time. >Could I get a parallel PS printer to work under A-Max? I would be >interested in using FreeHand, PageMaker, etc. What drivers would I >need. How well does A-MaxII handle the parallel connection? The IIP and the Pacific Page cart support serial communications if you need to go this way with Amax. Bill whirt@portal.com Bix: whirt GEnie: whirt Sysop 1:280/304@fidonet.org
whirt@cup.portal.com (William Bill Hirt) (02/17/91)
[Portal is having big time problems with Usenet. My first post appears to have been eaten by Portal's mailer. So this is a duplicate, I'm sorry] In message <1991Feb14.070253.15390@vicstoy.UUCP>, andrewsr@u2.rutgers.edu (Rich Andrews) writes: >I am considering getting a Postscript printer for my amiga. The >models that I am considering are: the TI miscolaser, NEC silentwriter >2 model 90, QUME 410 or scriptTEN. Suggestions? (Budget = ~$2000) One other printer you might want to consider is the HP IIP. I have a IIP with a Pacific Page Postscript cartridge. It emulates Adobe PS version 51.9. We have a QMS PS 2220 at work with genuine Adobe Postscript 51.0 and I haven't found anything yet which prints on one and won't print on the other. Street price on the IIP is now under $800. The Pacific Page cart is about $350 and comes with the standard 35 Postscript type families. You need to add a 2 meg card to the IIP for Postscript work. I got a 4 meg card (populated) for under $500 for my IIP. Another $150 or so mail order can get you the under the printer 250 page sheet feeder tray. I have a friend which has the HP Postcript cartridge for the IIP and has found it to work well with ProPage for several months now. The advantage of the Pacific Page cart over the HP cart is that you can send a software reset to the printer to switch between Postscript and HP PCL mode. The HP cart requires you to remove it to drop back to PCL mode. If you look around, you may be able find a close-out LaserJet II for around $1000. Adobe makes a Postscript cartridge for the II that sells for between $250-275 mail order. The Adobe cart only works on the LaserJet II. HP's cart works on the IIP, III, and IIID and is a licensed version of Adobe Postscript. >How well does some of the packages for the amiga (ProPage 2.0, ProDraw, >Pagestream 2.1) use these printers? Could I buy PS fonts and download >them instead of buying extra hardware (how well does that work). I have used ProPage 2.0 to print to my IIP with the Postscript cart. The change in ProPage 2.0 is that you must use the Postscript fonts in your document. Before, ProPage would convert the CompuGraphic fonts to the approriate Postscript fonts at print time. Why they changed this I have no idea and I have yet to get a response yet from Gold Disk why this change was made. The Gold Disk CompuGraphic font series has a Postscript font downloader included in each font package. ProPage can also be told to download any fonts you are using in your document at print time. There are a number of Type 1 Adobe fonts around from IBM and Mac land that you can use. The main thing is creating the AFM and metric files for use in ProPage. There are several PD and shareware programs which do this. The other thing is you need to have enough additional memory in the printer to hold all your non-resident fonts while doing your print job. If you plan to to use a lot of downloaded fonts, 4 megs of printer memory would be a lot better than 2 megs. A 2 meg expansion on a IIP gives you 2.5 megabytes of memory which would probably be sufficent 99% of the time. >Could I get a parallel PS printer to work under A-Max? I would be >interested in using FreeHand, PageMaker, etc. What drivers would I >need. How well does A-MaxII handle the parallel connection? The IIP and the Pacific Page cart support serial communications if you need to go this way with Amax. Bill whirt@portal.com Bix: whirt GEnie: whirt Sysop 1:280/304@fidonet.org
laird@think.com (Laird Popkin) (04/24/91)
In article <39358@cup.portal.com> whirt@cup.portal.com (William Bill Hirt) writes: >(Rich Andrews) writes: > >>I am considering getting a Postscript printer for my amiga. The >>models that I am considering are: the TI miscolaser, NEC silentwriter >>2 model 90, QUME 410 or scriptTEN. Suggestions? (Budget = ~$2000) > >One other printer you might want to consider is the HP IIP. I have a IIP >with a Pacific Page Postscript cartridge. It emulates Adobe PS version 51.9. >We have a QMS PS 2220 at work with genuine Adobe Postscript 51.0 and I >haven't found anything yet which prints on one and won't print on the >other. Street price on the IIP is now under $800. The Pacific Page >cart is about $350 and comes with the standard 35 Postscript type families. >You need to add a 2 meg card to the IIP for Postscript work. I got a 4 >meg card (populated) for under $500 for my IIP. Another $150 or so mail >order can get you the under the printer 250 page sheet feeder tray. > >I have a friend which has the HP Postcript cartridge for the IIP and >has found it to work well with ProPage for several months now. The >advantage of the Pacific Page cart over the HP cart is that you can >send a software reset to the printer to switch between Postscript and >HP PCL mode. The HP cart requires you to remove it to drop back to PCL >mode. > >If you look around, you may be able find a close-out LaserJet II for >around $1000. Adobe makes a Postscript cartridge for the II that sells >for between $250-275 mail order. The Adobe cart only works on the >LaserJet II. HP's cart works on the IIP, III, and IIID and is a licensed >version of Adobe Postscript. > If you're looking specifically for a Postscript printer, I would advise against the IIp. Why? First, it is pathetically slow when compared to any other Postscript printer -- the primary factor seems to be that the IIp has a very slow processor in it (it was designed mainly for priting simple text). Second, it's quite expensive to expand RAM and can't be expanded otherwise. A Postscript printer that I would recommend highly is GCC's BLP II, which comes with 2 Mb RAM expandable to 4 by adding off the shelf SIMMs, and it also has a SCSI port for adding a hard drive. Best of all, it lists for under $2K. To use it from an Amiga you need to add a serial or parallel port to the printer ($100 or so for both) because it comes standard with only AppleTalk (aka LocalTalk). Or get a LocalTalk port for your Amiga (I've been looking for one, incidentally, if anyone has any info I'd like to hear it). >>How well does some of the packages for the amiga (ProPage 2.0, ProDraw, >>Pagestream 2.1) use these printers? Could I buy PS fonts and download >>them instead of buying extra hardware (how well does that work). > >I have used ProPage 2.0 to print to my IIP with the Postscript cart. The >change in ProPage 2.0 is that you must use the Postscript fonts in your >document. Before, ProPage would convert the CompuGraphic fonts to the >approriate Postscript fonts at print time. Why they changed this I have >no idea and I have yet to get a response yet from Gold Disk why this >change was made. > >The Gold Disk CompuGraphic font series has a Postscript font downloader >included in each font package. ProPage can also be told to download >any fonts you are using in your document at print time. There are a >number of Type 1 Adobe fonts around from IBM and Mac land that you can use. >The main thing is creating the AFM and metric files for use in ProPage. >There are several PD and shareware programs which do this. The other thing >is you need to have enough additional memory in the printer to hold all >your non-resident fonts while doing your print job. If you plan to to >use a lot of downloaded fonts, 4 megs of printer memory would be a lot >better than 2 megs. A 2 meg expansion on a IIP gives you 2.5 megabytes >of memory which would probably be sufficent 99% of the time. Of course, if you have a cheap 20 Mb hard drive on your printer, you only need to download the fonts once <grin>. >>Could I get a parallel PS printer to work under A-Max? I would be >>interested in using FreeHand, PageMaker, etc. What drivers would I >>need. How well does A-MaxII handle the parallel connection? > >The IIP and the Pacific Page cart support serial communications if you >need to go this way with Amax. > >Bill - Laird Popkin
dltaylor@cns.SanDiego.NCR.COM (Dan Taylor) (04/25/91)
In <1991Apr23.235348.9765@Think.COM> laird@think.com (Laird Popkin) writes: >If you're looking specifically for a Postscript printer, I would advise >against the IIp. Why? First, it is pathetically slow when compared to any >other Postscript printer I'm getting 4ppm under PostScript & WordPerfect on my Amiga. I know this isn't blazing, but it doesn't seem "pathetic". >Second, it's quite expensive to expand RAM and can't be expanded >otherwise. 4Mb RAM for < $400. Not that bad. Also, Pacific Page sells various interface cards for it. >A Postscript printer that I would recommend highly is GCC's BLP >II, which comes with 2 Mb RAM expandable to 4 by adding off the shelf >SIMMs, and it also has a SCSI port for adding a hard drive. Best of all, >it lists for under $2K. This sounds pretty good. Who is "GCC"? What paper trays, interfaces, print speed, etc. do you get for <$2000? >Of course, if you have a cheap 20 Mb hard drive on your printer, you only >need to download the fonts once <grin>. True, but what's the price hit? (Not a flame, just a question.) >>The IIP and the Pacific Page cart support serial communications if you >>need to go this way with Amax. Serial is nice for "tinkering" with the interpreter, too. I have a startup file that prints letterhead automatically on the first page, graphics and all. A IIP is limited by having only one cartridge slot, although with PS I'm not sure you NEED another. Might be nice to have HPGL. But, it is designed as a "Personal" laser printer. It's easy to clean, swap toner, etc., and HP's manuals are quite good. Also, since there is price competition on sales, and multi-vendor add-on support, you might factor these into your decision. Whatever you buy, I think your Amiga and PS will get along nicely. Dan Taylor