Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!apple!ames!sun-barr!newstop!sun!concertina!fiddler From: fiddler%concertina@Sun.COM (Steve Hix) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Amiga to Imagewriter Help Message-ID: <124474@sun.Eng.Sun.COM> Date: 11 Sep 89 23:26:00 GMT References: <10260019@eecs.nwu.edu> Sender: news@sun.Eng.Sun.COM Lines: 64 In article <10260019@eecs.nwu.edu>, grassm@eecs.nwu.edu (Mark O. Grasse) writes: > > I need help with a printer set-up for my Amiga 2000. > > I have access to an Apple Imagewriter printer and no documentation for it. Free, I hope. You didn't say which version of the ImageWriter (it makes a difference). > I need to know: > a. what type of cable do I need. Are they hard to find? Depends on which version IW you got: ImageWriter I : Plain DB25 - DB25. The printer's connector is female. ImageWriter II: DB-25 - mini DIN8 connector. Some dealer that handles various differing brands of computers may have a bunch of cables made up and shrink-wrapped. Look for an "Apple //e to ImageWriter printer cable". > b. Do I connect to the serial or parallel port? Serial only. Apple hasn't sold a parallel printer for years...at least since before they gave up on the Apple ///. > c. Is this printer Postscript capable? Only if you have a program that does its own PostScript processing and then writes direct graphics commands to the printer to display it. No. > I have the 1.3 printer driver for it. Is there any other info anyone > has on set-up or tips? In another life I wrote various manuals at Apple, including some printer setup stuff...why, I don't know; I'm a software writer. The Imagewriter I/II is a 9-pin serial dot matrix printer. Similar to the old C. Itoh ProWriter series, Epson FX, etc. The best you can get out of it is 144 dpi. It has six or so built-in fonts...which all look like 9-pin printer fonts. Output from a Mac looks much better than what you get from the same printer hooked up to an Apple //--, 'cause the Mac uses the printer as a graphics output device. (Some software lets you select a lower-quality draft mode when you're in a hurry.) Unless it's free, or very cheap, you can do as well or better with newer and less expensive printers. (I'm just using mine until I can afford a PostScript-compatible laser printer...I hope soon, though: the printer is a pre-Imagewriter [different case, same innards] that was once an engineering prototype.) The ImageWriter I was made for Apple by Tokyo Electric (C.Itoh), as is the IW2 (probably). ------------ "...I was to learn later in life that we tend to meet any new situation by reorganizing: and a wonderful method it can be for creating the illusion of progress, while producing confusion, inefficiency and demoralization." - Petronius Arbiter, 210 B.C.