Buying a pressman should n’t be difficult , but often , it is . That ’s partly because of the vast abundance of technologies , manufacturer , and models to select from .
In guild to make an informed determination , you involve to consider issue far beyond the introductory price of purchase and owning the printer and focus on factors like speed , newspaper capacity , and ink technology .
Inks can be particularly esoteric ; the terminology smother printing ink is often confusing and manufacturing business do n’t always offer a good overview of the strength and weaknesses of the choices useable .
dread not , however , for this handy guide will throw away light on the most rough-cut ink engineering , and provide basic info on how they do work and which tasks they ’re well suited for . Hopefully , this scout will to steer you in the right direction and help you eliminate enceinte classifications of printing machine from consideration so you could concentrate on the choices most utilitarian to you .
Ribbon inks
It ’s only fitting that we start with what is credibly the oldest of all the mechanical ink applied science : the trust thread . This remnant of the typewriter era somehow does n’t want to disappear completely , despite the advent of more modernistic ink - transfer methods .
Once very popular , laurel wreath today are limited to specialty applications . For model , old - school cloth ribbons are still used in environments that emphasize reliability at the expense of quality , such as receipt printing .
However , other decoration type , likethermal transfer ribbons , can raise very high timbre output and can often print peculiarity dyestuff , like metal foil , that are not easily duplicate with other technologies .
Thermal paper
thermic paper is infuse with a chemic substance that turns dark when expose to hotness . It has a number of advantages over traditional printing technology because there ’s no need to keep an ink artificial lake filled . That makes the mechanical intent and use of the pressman both simple and passing quiet .
For this reason , thermic paper is often used in applications where reliability and ease of upkeep are predominate ; at the consumer point , this usually means label printers , like the ones made byDymoandBrother .
On the downside , thermal paper is expensive and can generally print only in one color . Another major disadvantage is that its character lessen quite rapidly in the mien of a hot open — like , say , the dashboard of a railroad car on a raging , sunny mean solar day , to which I personally have lost several rolls of labels .
Liquid inks
If you ’re using an inkjet printing machine , you ’re using liquid ink , whose formulation is often not very dissimilar from what you would happen in , say , the fountain playpen of yesteryear . Inside the pressman , the ink is force by a diversity of method through very tiny nozzles in the printing head , thus “ painting ” dot on report that finally mold an image or text .
Most consumer inks are water - free-base dye , ideal for covering where high - quality outturn is all-important , such as photographs and drawing . Because of their formulation , however , these inks suffer from two major defect : first , they be given to phlebotomise into the newspaper publisher ; and secondly , they are not colorfast and often fleet over clip .
The prosperous way to solve the first job is to use the correct paper . Special inkjet - specific pedigree are fabricate so that they do not easily absorb water supply , thus pull the ink to dry out on the control surface and form crisper image .
For the second job , you will want to look into archival quality ink , invent with particular pigment that resist evanesce and rely on a solvent other than water to make them waterproofed . In addition , there are composition stocks specifically designed to resist yellowing and degradation for archival purposes . These tend to be sold with higher quality and more expensive photo printer .
Solid inks
Solid ink was primitively developed by Tektronix , a caller that was eventually acquired by Xerox , which today make printers based on the engineering .
self-coloured ink is a candlewax - like pith sold in diminished block — one case for each of the elementary process colors that form look-alike on paper ( cyan , Battle of Magenta , lily-livered , and contraband , or CMYK ) . Inside the printer , the ink is melted and squirted onto an oiled roller using a technology standardised to that of offset printers .
The main advantages of unanimous ink printing are that it is fast , reliable , and environmentally friendly — inks are non - toxic and dependable to handle . However , the initial investment is usually higher than that of a laser printer .
Although their pic quality is not quite as good as an inkjet , square inks can be used to publish mellow - resolution color graphics and generally make excellent office machines due to their low maintenance monetary value . ( My office has had one for the last 10 years , and we ’ve never had to service it beyond replacing the consumables . )
Toner
Toner is the ink of laser printer ; typically , it is made by bond a pigment to a polymer to create a fine gunpowder with picky electrical prop .
Inside the printer , a optical maser beam “ paints ” the image to be give on a drum , loading it with an electrostatic burster . The drum then rotates over the toner reservoir , picking up particles of ink that are afterwards transferred to paper and melted in place .
Toner is excellent in term of enduringness and timber , especially for program like printing text and business line art . Once it ’s fused to the newspaper , it does n’t fade or fall off well . It does n’t fare as well for photographs , however , where inkjet printer provide finer resolving power and , therefore , good production .
Dye sublimation
The final type of ink technology we ’re give-up the ghost to expect at is dye sublimation , in which a special dye is chop-chop heated so that it go from a substantial to a gaseous res publica without passing through a limpid form . The resulting “ cloud ” of dyestuff is then lodge onto the paper , where it forms a dot of color .
Unlike inkjet technology , the pane printed by a dye - sub printer have fuzzy edge that conflate into one another , result in the high-pitched - quality yield of photographs , particularly when used with specialized newspaper .
Combined with the high price of ownership , however , that same feature makes dye sublimation less than idealistic for print capacity that has very needlelike edge , like textbook or transmitter graphics .
A printer for every purpose
One interesting facet of the printer grocery store is that many specialised ink technologies are becoming much more affordable to consumers and ecumenical business . That make possess several specialized printer a much less unhinged idea than it once was .
Still , not everybody has the budget or forbearance ( not to mention desk place ) to deal with multiple impression devices . In that causa , the idealistic approach is to discover the printer that best fit thetypicalprint problem that you have to do most often . For the odd job that does n’t fit your overall applied science choice , you could always consult a local specialist or go online .
