"THE INKSIDER" _______________________________________ July 2001 Newsletter #6-717 ======================================= This newsletter only goes to people who subscribe to it. Unsubscribe instructions are at the bottom of the newsletter. This newsletter is brought to you by Atlascopy.com. Company Goal: Offer you, the consumer, a cost savings alter- native to expensive OEM cartridges. Our cartridges are 50 to 80 percent less expensive than OEM's. We also have Refill Kits, which can save you up to 90 percent. ================================================== 1. Industry News from each Major Manufacturer 2. Atlascopy.com New Products 3. General Tips ================================================== Industry News from each Major Manufacturer Every newsletter will have news from each Major Manufacturer. This section will talk about new products and new methods to refill. Federal Trade Commission has ruled that competing products, including recycled cartridges can be used without voiding the warranty of your printer. ********** Hewlett Packard ********** Hp has announced a price drop in two of their printers. The DeskJet 930c had $20 shaved from the price. It now can be bought for $129.99. The other printer is the DeskJet 950c, it also has dropped $20 dollars from its price. This printer now sells for $179.99. Prices may vary depending on retailer. ********** Lexmark ********** Lexmark has a new line of Multifunction printers. The X73 and X83. Both should have a street value under $175.00. They will use the Lexmark 12A1970 black (what a surprise!) and the 12M0120 color cartridges. Lexmark has introduced a new line of laser printers. They are calling them the Lexmark T Family. The T family consists of 4 laser printer; T520, T522, T620, and T622. The Lexmark T family offers a compelling value proposition for customers who want to maximize functionality but minimize expense. This new product line offers duplex, distributed finishing, and multifunctionality. For more information on these laser printers: http://www.lexmark.com/printers/laser/OptraT/optratfam.html ********** Canon ********** The Washington Times ran an article that states : Canon S600 Inkjet puts laser printers to shame. Out of the box, the Canon S600 offers 1,200-by-1,200 dots-per -inch (dpi) printing, enough to produce black text that rivals the sharpness of the Hewlett Packard LaserJet 3150 (a multif- unction unit that includes a scanner and fax machine) with which it shares desk space. In terms of color, the 'standard' setting is enough to produce very nice printouts of, say, a 10-slide Microsoft PowerPoint slide presentation (two to a page) in five minutes. The resulting printout is photo-sharp and impressive overall. Where the S600 can truly shine is in printing photos, where it can be set to print 2,400x1,200 color dpi for 2,880,000 dots. Canon says this bests other inkjet printers offering 2,880x720 color dpi 'only 2,073,600 dots' by adding more than 800,000 dots per square inch. This means the Canon printer places more ink on the paper, extending what the firm calls the 'color gamut' for deeper colors. In plainer language, this is a printer that can go from running off the kid's homework to household budget reports to family photos from a vacation trip, all without losing out in the speed race. Canon says the printer churns out pages at a rate of 15 pages per minute in black and 10 ppm in color. Photo prints at 8x10-inch size are created on plain paper in approx- imately 90 seconds, the firm says, a speed comparable to dedicated inkjet photo printers The article is no longer on The Washington Times web site but we will re-print it here for a short time for our readers. http://atlascopy.com/twt.htm ********** Epson ********** Epson was a little weak this week on news. Pardon the pun. But here is something nifty that you might not have seen yet. Epson America, Inc. has entered the small but growing wireless printing market with a new wireless print server. The company is demonstrating its wireless Ethernet printing -- which is expected to be available in the second quarter of 2001 -- at the Macworld Conference and Expo in San Francisco. Epson said its new print server will let users print wirelessly to Epson networkable inkjet printers that are 150 to 300 feet away via a local area network (LAN) connection. Using the 802.11b chipset standard, data will be transferred to the printer at up to 11 megabits per second (Mbps). In addition, the system allows users to print from different floors or rooms because the 802.11b communication standard does not require a clear line of sight. ================================================= Ever wonder what certain words mean, when reading your printer manual. Each week, I will give a couple of new words to better help you when looking for a new printer or for supplies for your printer. --- Print Job --- A print job is a unit of work to be run on a printer. A print job can consist of printing one or more files, depending on how the print job is requested. The system assigns a unique job number to each job it runs. --- Queue --- The queue is where you direct a print job. --- Print Spooler --- The spooler is not specifically a print job spooler. Instead, it provides a generic spooling function that can be used for queuing various types of jobs, including print jobs queued to a printer. In Windows you can see the print spooler by clicking on Start, Settings, Printers then double click on the default printer. The default printer is the one that has the little check mark next to it. Of course if you only have one printer driver installed there will only be one to choose from. ================================================= Atlascopy.com New Products This section will promote the new products being offered to the consumer from Atlascopy.com. We encourage you to take a look at our website because we update regularly. We are still waiting for the CD labeling products to come in. We will carry a "CD Labels Fun Pack". This is pretty cool. It's holographic Rainbow, Galaxy, Crystal, and Starburst. 2 CD and 4 Spine Labels per Sheet, 2 Sheets of Each Metallic Media, (8 Sheets Total) Size: 6.25 x 11 (~15.95) Also, "CD Label Starter Kit". Includes FREE SOFTWARE to design and print custom CD Labels. 2 CD and 4 Spine Labels per Sheet, 2 Sheets of Each Media, (10 Sheets Total) plus CD Label Software Size: 6.25 x 11 (~19.95) keep Checking the web site under media. Looking for Greeting Card stock or Photo Glossy paper check out our Media and Paper section. Our films and papers are designed to perform equally well with Repeat-O-Type Brand inks and those offered by the printer manufacturers. http://atlascopy.com/media.htm We are now selling OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) products. We are selling Epson, Canon, Lexmark, Compaq, Nec, Hewlett Packard, Brother, and Xerox cartridges. OEM cartridges can be found here: http://atlascopy.com/cartridges/ ================================================= General Tips Each newsletter will have a few tips to help you in the re- filling process. You can Email questions to atlas@dvol.com. What Is a Printer Driver? In general, it is the "middleman" between your PC, your printer, and you. It is a software program that translates the language of an application on your PC to the language of the printer. What Your Printer Driver Does. The printer driver has two major jobs to do: it acts as a translator and also as a supervisor. As a translator, it converts the text or graphic image that you've created into a pattern that the printer can understand. In inkjet technology, it does this by transforming the text or image into a pattern of dots. The dots are put on the paper in four separate color planes, one for each color (CMYK--cyan, magenta, yellow, and black). They are then superimposed to create the right color. Since computer monitors use just three colors (RGB--red, green, and blue), the printer driver first has to convert the monitor's color scheme to the printer's. After it has translated all the data, the printer driver switches into supervisor mode. Here, it tells the printer what to print and how to transfer it onto the page. It does this by specifying which print head nozzles to fire at which time to get the right pattern. It also synchronizes the carriage mechanism and the paper feed with the firing of the print head. Sometimes the print driver will not print the exact matching colors that you see on your monitor. Most drivers have a way to make color adjustments. Each is specific to your printer but once you set it up you rarely have to fuss with it. Look under "Color Management" in your drivers properties. ================================================== That's all for now. See ya next week! ================================================== Tim Lancaster http://atlascopy.com atlas@dvol.com