Printers are an essential resource for creating a hard copy - a physical depiction of data on paper - version of documents and collateral for business, academic, and home use. Printers have become an indispensable peripheral in all levels of business and institutional computing. Like any other computer peripheral, there are several types of printers available. Some printers employ technologies that mimic manual typewriter-style functionality, while others spray ink on paper, or use a laser to generate an image of the page to be printed. There are several factors to consider when evaluating printers for procurement and deployment in your computing environment.
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Printing Considerations
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There are several aspects to factor into printer evaluations. The following specifies some of the most common criteria when evaluating your printing needs.
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Types of Printers
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Like any other computer peripheral, there are several types of printers available. Some printers employ technologies that mimic manual typewriter-style functionality, while others spray ink on paper, or use a laser to generate an image of the page to be printed. Printer hardware interfaces with a PC or network using parallel, serial, or data networking protocols. There are several factors to consider when evaluating printers for procurement and deployment in your computing environment. The following sections discuss the various printer types and the protocols that printers use to communicate with computers.
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Printer characteristics
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Here are some of the characteristics of the three most popular printer types.
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Printer Drivers
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A Driver is a piece of software that allows the system or an application to interact with (use) a particular piece of hardware.
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Network Printing
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Network printing is much like the phone service, you only notice it when it's not available. In fact to make it possible to print through a network and not directly to a printer that is installed on a specific computer. To do this you must use printservers. A printserver is simply a program that arbitrates print data from multiple clients for a single printer. There are three methods to make a network printing possible.
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Printer Languages
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Printer languages are commands from the computer to the printer to tell the printer how to prepare the document, which is going to be printed. These commands manage font size, graphics, compression of data sent to the printer, color, etc.
After the computer (print server) sends the spooled print job to the printer, the data is stored in the printer’s memory. Then the printer’s Interpreter handles the print job. It is the main part of the printer device’s software. In the main case the interpreter’s job is to interpret the print data and make it visual on a virtual image in the printer’s memory.
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Printers Overview