Pica and elite can be reduced to about 60% of their normal width with the condensed mode. This mode is particularly useful for printing wide spreadsheets because condensed elite allows you up to 160 characters on an 8-inch line and 272 on a 13½-inch line.

Condensed can be selected with SelecType, by setting a DIP switch (see Appendix E), or with a software command. Even if you turn condensed on with the DIP switch, you can still turn it off with SelecType or the software command.

Condensed pica gives more characters on a line.

Condensed elite gives you even more.

Widening or narrowing the characters also widens or narrows the spaces between words and letters. Because word processors usually create a left margin by printing spaces, you may need to change the number of characters on a line to keep the margins correct if you change widths. For example, a left margin of five pica characters is the same as one of six elite characters.

Special Effects and Emphasis

The EX offers two ways of emphasizing parts of your text and also allows you to use underlining, superscripts, and subscripts. These features can be controlled only by software commands, but many application programs can produce them if they are properly installed.

Emphasized and double-strike modes both slow the printer down slightly to produce bolder text. In emphasized mode, the EX prints each character twice as the print head moves across the paper, with the second slightly to the right of the first. This produces darker, more fully-formed characters.

In doublestrike mode, the EX prints each line twice, with the second slightly below the first. This makes the characters bolder. While NLQ is in use, however, double-strike is ignored because NLQ characters are already formed by two passes of the print head.

For even greater boldness, emphasized and doublestrike can be combined. The samples on the next page show the effect of combining the two modes in draft printing.

EX Printer Features

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