Kyocera 2160 - page 68

The Color Laser Printer Guide: A–Z Guide to Features and Technology

at this level of the market, so you should avoid making

this too much of a litmus test in your purchasing deci-

sion.

Engine speed: This refers to the speed at which a print-

er can output pages. Speeds in the market we cover in this

guide range up to 49ppm in black-and-white. While most

printers run at or near rated speeds, allow for some

warm-up time on the first page.

Ethernet: Most office printers, especially laser

machines, have Ethernet options, enabling them to be

connected directly to a computer network. This allows

more than one desktop computer user to share a printer.

This can be done through internal cards or through exter-

nal dedicated servers. On low-end machines, connectivi-

ty to an external server runs through a USB port. Most of

the time, a printer hooked up in this manner is accessible

only via that computer.

There are two basic flavors of Ethernet supported in

most offices: 10BaseT and 100BaseT. In theory

100BaseT, the industry standard, is ten times faster than

10BaseT, but in practice it is usually only a few times

faster. Still, that increase in speed can be significant.

Wireless Ethernet (IEEE 802.11b) is also available now

on some models, as is gigabit Ethernet (1000BaseT).

External print server: This refers to an electronic

device that allows a printer to be connected to a comput-

er network, usually 100BaseT Ethernet, even though it

doesn’t have a network interface card. The device con-

nects to the printer through its USB port but uses a net-

work connection to connect to the network. Some ven-

dors sell their own external print servers. The best-known

line of external servers is Hewlett-Packard’s JetDirect

product family. The external print server is a substitute

for an internal Ethernet card — not all models in this

guide have the internal slot necessary for a network card.

External servers can also be used for wireless connectivi-

ty,for connection to “thick” or “thin” Ethernet networks,

or for connection to old-fashioned Token Ring networks.

GDI (Graphic Device Interface): GDI describes the

kind of printing that relies on the host computer to

process the image to be printed from a Windows plat-

form. (Note that you may encounter the phrase “host-

based printing” in place of GDI.) The technology uses

the same graphics imaging method used to display a page

on your computer screen. This type of printer typically

has little on-board memory of its own, since all the work

of processing the print job is done on the host computer.

GDI printers are easier (and less expensive) to build,

but they have several drawbacks. They can print only

what you can see on the screen, which is fine for most

office work, but they’re not suitable for more sophisticat-

ed page-layout or illustration files. Second, they can tie

up your computer with a lot of extra processing, whereas

aprinter using either PCL or PostScript has the process-

ing power to do the work itself, freeing up your comput-

er. Also known as “Windows printing” or “Windows

GDI.”

Host-based printing: Printing directly from a computer

using its native graphics interface (namely,the one it uses

to display a page on your computer screen). In Windows

that usually means GDI printing, but it can mean some

other proprietary format.

Interface: Refers to the hardware that allows electronic

devices to communicate. In this guide, we’re primarily

concerned with the connections between printers and

computers — these are usually parallel or USB, though

many now offer Ethernet network connectivity.

Interpolation: Software enhancement of an image

that’s done to improve resolution during printing or scan-

ning. Interpolation essentially consists of laying down

additional dots in the spaces between the dots that make

up an image, based on an analysis of the surrounding

dots.

IrDA(Infrared Data Association): A wireless trans-

mission standard used on some devices. It’s slower than

Bluetooth or Wi-Fi.

Laser: Premium imaging technology,and also the most

widely used in the business world — the same as that

used in laser printers. It involves fusing toner particles to

apage using heat.

LED (Light-Emitting Diode): A variation of laser

technology; we place it in the “laser-class” category. It’s

sometimes regarded as less desirable than laser,but this is

something of an ill-grounded prejudice, as any difference

isn’t noticeable to users in the ordinary course of events.

Our advice is that buyers should regard lasers and LEDs

as effectively one and the same. LED is being used

increasingly in low-cost color machines.

Megabyte (MB): See Byte.

The Konica Minolta magicolor 2500W’s printing can be inter-

polated up to 9,600 x 600dpi quality.