Commodore-Ready Printers A New Generation Much More窶認or Less Tom Netsel, Assistant Features Editor
Sales of more than seven million 64s and 128s have had a major impact on the printer market. The result: Printer
manufacturers now offer 64 and 128 owners a wide choice of Commodore-ready printers that are filled with features un dreamed of just a few years ago. After a disk drive, a printer is the most popular computer peripheral
Commodore-ready daisywheel, dotmatrix, and thermal-transfer print
bought by home computer users. About 65-70 percent of the people
ers to handle their black-and-white
who buy a computer for personal use
accompanying buyer's guide for de
and color printing needs. (See the
also buy a printer, according to Rick
tails about Commodore-compatible
Lamb, product manager for Okidata,
printers.)
a major printer manufacturer.
For Commodore owners, there are more than 100 different printers
on the market, made by 20 different companies, all listing for less than $500. Virtually any of them can be connected to a 64 or 128 with a sep arate printer interface. But it's not
always a simple matter to achieve compatibility among printer, inter face, computer, and software.
Last year, Okidata introduced
a universally compatible dot-matrix printer featuring both a Commo dore serial and a Centronics parallel interface. The Okidata 180 is com patible with every major personal
computer. If, for example, you buy an Amiga or IBM PC, you don't have to buy another printer or interface.
Determine Your Needs
Ask yourself what you want the printer to do. Decide how you plan to use the printer; then pick the one that has the features you need. If you primarily want to print graphics, you have different needs from those of the person who works with spreadsheets and needs a printer with 136 columns.
Daisywheels If you write business reports, term papers, or other important corre
spondence requiring a professional look, a daisywheel printer offers the sharpest type. Your papers will look as though they've been typed on a quality typewriter, but you'll have to wait for them. Daisywheels are notoriously slow. Most daisy wheels priced for the home market operate at speeds in the 10-20 cps (characters per second) range.
That's fast for a human typist, but the daisywheel is the tortoise of the printer world.
Uniquely Commodore
Dot-matrix and thermal printers are the most popular choices among
The printing element of a daisywheel is a flat metal wheel
There wasn't much of a choice, and
Commodore owners. Key ingredi ents to their popularity are versatility and low cost. Cost alone, however, should not be the decid ing factor in choosing a printer. If a
At one time, only a Commodore printer would connect directly to Commodore's unique serial port.
that has approximately 90 spokes. It's about three inches in diameter,
tiple pitches, subscripts and
bargain printer doesn't meet your
and gets its name from the fact that it looks something like a daisy. At the end of each spoke or "petal" is a
superscripts, or a choice of type styles had to buy a printer with a
printing requirements, it isn't much
bossed letter, number, or punctua
of a bargain.
tion mark. As the wheel spins, the
standard Centronics parallel port.
"Too many times the printer-
Then a separate interface was still needed to connect the printer to the
purchase decision is dependent upon how much money is left over in discretionary income," Lamb
special features were limited. Any one who wanted underlining, mul
64 or 128.
As the base of Commodore
says. "The buyer has $120 left, so
owners grew, however, more and
he buys a $120 printer. Often there
more manufacturers began offering ready-to-use printers packed with a full range of features. Now 64 and
is some buyer remorse. After he
128 owners have a wide choice of 12
COMPUTE!'* Gazette
June 1988
characters are pressed against a rib bon, which transfers ink onto the paper. You can buy additional print-
wheels if you want to change to a different style of type or a different
font. Since its basic printing element is a fixed alphanumeric character, the
lives with the print quality for a
daisywheel cannot print graphics.
while, he realizes he needs some thing better."
type, and you don't need speed or
If you're looking for quality