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Exploring Different Printers Essay example

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Exploring Different Printers

Printers allow you to transfer images/text from your PC to paper, and can do so, using a variety of colour. In general, there are three different types of printers,two of which we are going to review. The three different types of printer are: a Dot Matrix Printer, an Ink Jet Printer, and a Laser printer.

Laser Printers:

The way laser printers work, is by using a print engine. This works by shining a very thin pattern of light, on to a type of metal drum. Black ink (toner), will stick to the parts of the drum that has been exposed to the light. The paper then rolls over the drum, and the image is transferred from the drum to the paper, but before the paper …show more content…

The set back is, that they are expensive to buy, and very expensive to run, as toner cartridges expire after about 6000 prints. Most laser printers are used for printing text and pictures in black and white, because although the colour cartridges give excellent quality, they are VERY expensive. This printer could be very useful when doing my future fashions project. The high-quality prints could be used to make leaflets/flyers, which could be used for advertisement purposes.

Dot Matrix Printers ===================

A dot matrix printer is quite a contrast form a laser printer, as it uses simple technology, to that of a laser. The dot matrix printers have a head, which moves backwards and forwards across the paper. On the head there could be either nine or 24 steel pins, that imprint the image/text onto the paper, using an ink ribbon between the two.

Dot matrix printers are quite cheap to buy, because they were the first types of printer to be invented. When the ink ribbon needs changing, they are cheap to purchase, making them cheap to run. These printers also allow you to make a carbon copy. When the steel pins hit the paper on the top, the pressure made, imprints a replica on the page below. The disadvantages of the dot matrix printer are that they can be very noisy. The qualities of the dot matrix printers are also very

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