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From: gardiner@umn-cs.cs.umn.edu (David Gardiner)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: PacificPage, Parallel vs. Serial
Message-ID: <1990May4.154152.7326@cs.umn.edu>
Date: 4 May 90 15:41:52 GMT
Sender: gardiner@cs.umn.edu (David Gardiner)
Distribution: usa
Organization: University of Minnesota, Minneapolis - CSCI Dept.
Lines: 67

The general consensus is that parallel is faster than serial.  I
am trying to find the thing I read that indicated otherwise.  I'm
also trying to contact Pacific Data Products.  If there are any
surprises I will post.

There was enough interest in PacificPage to justify posting a review.
Hence, press "n" now if you don't care...

It is great.  The quality of the output is outstanding, as good
as any true PS printer I have seen (I use an Apple Laserwriter
all the time at school).  It is a bit slow, though.  If you are
going to print out a great deal of text, you will probably not
be happy.  But, since you already have an HP Laserjet, you just
press ON LINE, CONTINUE-MENU and the printer resets as a Laserjet.
Same thing to toggle it back to PS.

It is best suited for printing a relatively small number of pages of
graphics.  It is much faster doing graphics than native PCL (twice as
fast or faster).  Plus you can use all PS software (EPS files, etc.).
We use it with Windows.  One real plus is that the Windows postscript
printer driver works well.  When you send something to print, the
system is only hung up for a few seconds.  Then the spooler handles
it.  You go on your merry way, with no noticeable performance
degradation (at least on our 20 MHz 386).  As compared to the Windows
PCL driver, which hangs up the system for eternity.

A page can take from 30 seconds to 30 minutes (or more) to print,
depending on how complex it is.  Big bitmaps are the worst.  I don't
think that a regular PS printer handles those too quickly
either.  But, since you can use the system while the file prints,
the speed has not been much of a problem for us.  We are generally
printing out one or two pages of graphics at a time.

If you are using Word 5.0, forget it.  The Postscript driver on that
product is horrible.  It downloads the header FOR EVERY PAGE.  Plus it
hangs up the system the whole time.  Bad news.  Maybe Microsoft has a
better driver now -- that would be worth a check if you really want to
use Word 5.0 with a PS printer.  This problem is due to Word, not
PacificPage.

MS Works is a bit better, although I found that I had to manually
(or bat file) download the PS header file prior to starting
Works.  This seems like a big thing for MS to forget, so maybe I missed
something.  If you have trouble printing to a PS printer with Works,
try downloading the PS header first.

I have not found any incompatiblity problems with PacificPage.  The
only "gotcha" is that you need a Legal paper tray if you want to print
out legal sized pages.  You can't hand-feed them (they stop part way
through -- no software solution at this time).

Note: You need to have 2.5 Meg of printer memory to use PacificPage
(that is, normal system plus a board w/ 2 Meg).

Prices for a new setup: $1000 for a IIP, $400 for memory board and
memory, $600 for PacificPage.  Total: $2000 (+- $100 or so).  

I have no affiliation with Pacific Data Products other than being
a satisfied customer.

David Gardiner


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David Gardiner        University of Minnesota Computer Science Dept.
gardiner@umn-cs.cs.umn.edu