what are the different types of printers.

*this is a guide from lecture videos and is used to help you gain an understanding of what are the different types of printers and displays.

Printer Technology

Printer types- 3 types use set of tubes: dot matrix uses little pins and it is impact types, ink jet uses tubes by itself and are great color printers, thermal printers uses heating wires and not much benefit except price, it is not good for permanent items

Laser printers- popular and detailed process
1. Processing and stored on RAM, uses PCL, lays down negative charge on
2. Exposing, where laser hits it
3. Developing, brings toner
4. Transferring, puts extremely positive charge on the paper
5. Fusing, uses heat and pressure to get rid of static charge
6. Cleaning, scrapers to clean off goo and residue
7. Returns back to charging

Printer Connections
You can either plug into system and system shares printer
Or plug printer directly into network, wired or wireless.

Wired Connections- Parallel and Centronics is the oldest type of printer connection with a 30 pin connector and plugs into printer and the parallel plugs into the PC, USB is the preferable option

Networking printer options
Ethernet connection- don’t have to plug into computer but can plug into network directly. Doesn’t need a computer running
Print server- can plug into network and the USB printer can also be plugged in. can do a wired or wireless connection

Wireless connection- everything built in

Different Types of Printers

Maintaining Impact Printers
Handles old style papers called tractor feed paper
Print head- has pins inside that are pushed by actuators
Uses ink ribbon, ink ribbon can be rewound to use more
Adjusting screws allow you to adjust the platen
Inside Printhead you can get dirt and can get it clogged, clean it with rubbing alcohol

Never use an airgun on a printer but if you do take it outside, use an antistatic vacuum

Maintaining Inkjet Printers
Inkjets make nice prints but are not very expensive so people do not maintain
Use software that is provided from printer, align the printheads and clean printheads
Trick is to print with it, do not let it sit or you risk clogging a print head! Also watch out for paper dander, and use an airgun if needed

Maintaining Laser Printers
Maintenance kits- given from manufacturers to maintain your printer
Toner cartridge- stick with the original one
Don’t let the photosensitive drum get mistreated or you will need to replace the toner cartridge
Get an ozone filter, it is dead once you get a lot of paper jams
If you don’t have a rolling charge working, it won’t work properly
If your laser isn’t working, nothing will show up
If your printed paper has a lot of static, check your static eliminator
Laser printers have RAM inside of them, ensure you have enough memory
Don’t go cheap on paper, the low end stuff produces problems

Troubleshooting Print jobs
Control panel -> Device and Printers
Print spooler- shows print jobs in queue for that particular printer
Big issues are usually from the network and not the local printer
Print management in Windows 7 is a great tool to give you an idea of what is on your system
If a printer goes offline, the print jobs will stack up and you will need to delete them

How Computer Displays Work

Pixel- made from liquid crystal display, a pixel is split into 3 pieces of LCD, if you adjust the electricity over the filters you can get any kind of color from the rainbow
Problem is you need millions and millions of pixels, the larger the amount of pixels the finer the resolution

CCFL- backlight for LCD which results in colors

Uses AC adapter which converts into DC power and into the circuitry of the screens
Native resolution- amount of pixels made into the screen
Inverter- convert DC power to AC, look here if your screen monitor goes black

Plasma and DLP Displays

Plasma display- very small fluorescent bulbs that act like pixels, advantages is that they have a better black color over LCD, downsides can be screen door effect if you look closely, and they use more electricity

LED- use LED backlight instead of LCD CCFL backlights

DLP- bank of mirrors that act like pixels, each mirror can be controlled through a mesh of wires
Basically DLP is flashing bright light against bright mirrors
Used in rear projection screens and projectors
DLP needs bright light bulbs
Two forms- color wheel or prism types

VGA AND DVI
VGA- or known as vcsa, was predominant video output, analog, had to be connected to RAMDAC
DVI- Digital card needs no RAMDAC, can be directly output to monitor itself

DVI-VGA adaptor- video card that only has DVI, can connect with VGA to analog monitor
DVI-I- digital and analog and most common, DVI-D- digital, DVD-A- Analog

Dual link DVI- designed to go to higher resolution compared to single link connectors, there are DVI-I dual link and DVD-D

If you buy a video card and a monitor, ensure they can work well together. Try not to use VGA to DVI converters

Other Video Connections

Composite connector- oldest video connection there is, comes with yellow cable and stereo connectivity. Very old
S-Video connector- uses 6 pin DIM connector, little newer than composite, European
Component or RGB connector- another predate connector, used for old VHS

S/PDIF- powerful connection for audio only, also can use optical connection
Displayport- supports audio, video and data connection if you need to
HDMI- most popular, standard and mini, mini is just a smaller format
Video over Ethernet- very expensive, advantage is distance, done for video shoots

Graphics cards
Don’t buy a video card that your monitor can’t handle
Most video cards have vents, be careful to give your fan the appropriate space
Video cards can be double width
Once video card is booted up, you will need drivers and get the most recent driver update
Reference drivers- aren’t designed for video card rather a specific GPU

Projectors

Watch out for resolution and lumens (brightness that can fire out on the screen) at least 1100 lumens, no less and throw which is how big the image is as you move the projector

Light Bulbs- be careful when you are working with them as they are expensive in projectors

Using multiple monitors
Right click, screen resolution -> extend display
Ensure your graphics card supports 2 monitors

Troubleshooting Video

Vga mode- or low resolution mode. If you have a windows driver problem, then windows will automatically put your computer into this mode and it will be a smaller screen and lower resolution. It is the safe mode.
You may have accidently set it like this or you have a video driver problem. Go into device management to fix

No image on screen- is the monitor on, is it plugged in, check the video card, is the computer turned on or away sleep, and sometimes your video card will push a mode that your computer cannot handle, just boot into low resolution mode and fix it. Your monitor may have also died

Overheat- video card telling you it’s getting too hot, check for dirt and your fan

Dead pixel- stuck pixel is different. Dead shows black, stuck shows color. You need to replace your monitor.

Artifacts- something on the screen that makes your image look weird. Check your connections like HDMI, your video card driver is doing something your computer can’t handle. Heat, video RAM can go bad, or there is no problem at all.

Color patterns incorrect- check your on screen display settings, check your connections

Dim image and flickering image- check the brightness on your monitor, check if you need to replace the monitor, check the connections

Distorted image and distorted geometry- called overscan, when using big TV’s as monitors, go into on screen display to fix. Projectors have issues and can fix with pincushioning

Burn in- something that shows up on monitor that is permanent. Bad thing that burns an image into your monitor. Don’t see this issue much anymore. We have image sticking instead and it is repairable
Oversized images and icons- computer may have booted into VGA mode. Change the icon size, and change the DPI settings