1200x1200dpi or 2400x600dpi laser printer?

[sk8terg1rl]

Hi group,

I'm looking to buy a monochrome laser printer but I'm not sure which
resolution to go for. Presumably the nxm dpi notation is for the dots
per inch in the x-axis (perpendicular to paper feed) and the y-axis
(parallel to paper feed)?

Surely then it is best to have the x & y resolutions identical?

Thanks everyone
skate xx

 

[GT]

Hi group,

I'm looking to buy a monochrome laser printer but I'm not sure which
resolution to go for. Presumably the nxm dpi notation is for the dots
per inch in the x-axis (perpendicular to paper feed) and the y-axis
(parallel to paper feed)?

Surely then it is best to have the x & y resolutions identical?

Higher resolution means more dots per inch - in any direction!

However at those resolutions, you probably won't notice a difference - the
human eye is very forgiving. More important - how fast are they. What are
the running costs. What are the startup times. How often do you need to
replace drum and other bits. How sharp is black text.

Get a sample print from both printers before buying anything. You could buy
a printer that does 12,000 x 12,000*, but if plain text is grey and fuzzy,
its no use!!

*No such printer exists - used only to make a point!

GT

 

[kony]

Hi group,

I'm looking to buy a monochrome laser printer but I'm not sure which
resolution to go for. Presumably the nxm dpi notation is for the dots
per inch in the x-axis (perpendicular to paper feed) and the y-axis
(parallel to paper feed)?

Surely then it is best to have the x & y resolutions identical?

It doesn't necessarily matter. The printer driver scales
that appropriately. Each print engine has it's own unique
traits, built to a given price-point and even then that
price-point is often obfuscated by the printer
manufacturers' hopes to make most of their profit on
replacement toner cartridges. IOW, even two seemingly
identically spec'd printers may not have output that looks
the same. Actually eyeballing the output counts for more
than anything, or at least a review by someone who has
reviewed other contemporary models for a fair comparison.

Thanks everyone
skate xx

2400 sounds a bit high for a laser, it might be wishful
thinking if the price is similar to the 1200x. Even as low
as 300-600 DPI on a several year old monochrome laser will
have excellent, crisp text output. Greyscale / dithering
varies more per model, if that feature is important for
pseudo-photo quality greyscale then it is worth the time to
read some reviews of particular models... both you are
considering might do reasonably well (for a B&W laser that
is), or rather poor at greyscale. Often the problem is
banding, there is a "fine line" (pardon the pun) between
having as many dots per inch as possible, and having those
dots melt together into indiscrete, more (semi-)solid areas.

Don't expect much for picture printing though unless it's a
fairly high(er) end printer and if that is the purpose
you're probably better off to also use an inkjet for these
jobs.

 

[sk8terg1rl]

It doesn't necessarily matter. The printer driver scales
that appropriately. Each print engine has it's own unique
traits, built to a given price-point and even then that
price-point is often obfuscated by the printer
manufacturers' hopes to make most of their profit on
replacement toner cartridges. IOW, even two seemingly
identically spec'd printers may not have output that looks
the same. Actually eyeballing the output counts for more
than anything, or at least a review by someone who has
reviewed other contemporary models for a fair comparison.




2400 sounds a bit high for a laser, it might be wishful
thinking if the price is similar to the 1200x. Even as low
as 300-600 DPI on a several year old monochrome laser will
have excellent, crisp text output. Greyscale / dithering
varies more per model, if that feature is important for
pseudo-photo quality greyscale then it is worth the time to
read some reviews of particular models... both you are
considering might do reasonably well (for a B&W laser that
is), or rather poor at greyscale. Often the problem is
banding, there is a "fine line" (pardon the pun) between
having as many dots per inch as possible, and having those
dots melt together into indiscrete, more (semi-)solid areas.

Don't expect much for picture printing though unless it's a
fairly high(er) end printer and if that is the purpose
you're probably better off to also use an inkjet for these
jobs.

Thanks Kony and GT. I'll be buying this over the 'net and I don't have
a car to carry the thing, so unfortunately I won't be getting a test
page. So at best I can only rely on recommendations from the regulars
here.

The models I was looking at were:
Samsung ML2010 Laser 22ppm 1200 dpi x 600 dpi USB £44.98
Samsung ML-2570 Laser Printer 24ppm 1200 dpi x 1200 dpi USB/PAR £50.11
Canon Lbp2900 Laser 12ppm - A4 Usb 2mb 2400x600 Dpi Uk £59.50

I don't really want to spend more as I'm a student and will just be
using this printer for printing out journal papers and proofread my
upcoming thesis. Can't wait till I get a salary!

Thanks again
skate xx

 

[ElJerid]

Hi group,

I'm looking to buy a monochrome laser printer but I'm not sure which
resolution to go for. Presumably the nxm dpi notation is for the dots
per inch in the x-axis (perpendicular to paper feed) and the y-axis
(parallel to paper feed)?

Surely then it is best to have the x & y resolutions identical?

Thanks everyone
skate xx

Regarding print quality, there is a lot more to consider tha just dpi. For
exemple, it makes no sense to be able to print a huge number of dpi's if
each dot is too big and overlaps the others.
So it's even important to look at the smallest addressable area.
On top, some manufacturers can modulate the size of their dots in order to
achieve a better fill of the areas between the dots, which results in better
blacks and less stair effects.

 

[GT]

It doesn't necessarily matter. The printer driver scales
that appropriately. Each print engine has it's own unique
traits, built to a given price-point and even then that
price-point is often obfuscated by the printer
manufacturers' hopes to make most of their profit on
replacement toner cartridges. IOW, even two seemingly
identically spec'd printers may not have output that looks
the same. Actually eyeballing the output counts for more
than anything, or at least a review by someone who has
reviewed other contemporary models for a fair comparison.




2400 sounds a bit high for a laser, it might be wishful
thinking if the price is similar to the 1200x. Even as low
as 300-600 DPI on a several year old monochrome laser will
have excellent, crisp text output. Greyscale / dithering
varies more per model, if that feature is important for
pseudo-photo quality greyscale then it is worth the time to
read some reviews of particular models... both you are
considering might do reasonably well (for a B&W laser that
is), or rather poor at greyscale. Often the problem is
banding, there is a "fine line" (pardon the pun) between
having as many dots per inch as possible, and having those
dots melt together into indiscrete, more (semi-)solid areas.

Don't expect much for picture printing though unless it's a
fairly high(er) end printer and if that is the purpose
you're probably better off to also use an inkjet for these
jobs.

Thanks Kony and GT. I'll be buying this over the 'net and I don't have
a car to carry the thing, so unfortunately I won't be getting a test
page. So at best I can only rely on recommendations from the regulars
here.

The models I was looking at were:
Samsung ML2010 Laser 22ppm 1200 dpi x 600 dpi USB £44.98
Samsung ML-2570 Laser Printer 24ppm 1200 dpi x 1200 dpi USB/PAR £50.11
Canon Lbp2900 Laser 12ppm - A4 Usb 2mb 2400x600 Dpi Uk £59.50



Then you should seriously look into running costs. The purchase price is
only part of the story! With regard to print quality, can you get to a big
shop to see output from them? A PC-World perhaps? Try the manufacturers
websites - they might have a facility to send out sample prints.

 

[kony]

Thanks Kony and GT. I'll be buying this over the 'net and I don't have
a car to carry the thing, so unfortunately I won't be getting a test
page. So at best I can only rely on recommendations from the regulars
here.

The models I was looking at were:
Samsung ML2010 Laser 22ppm 1200 dpi x 600 dpi USB £44.98
Samsung ML-2570 Laser Printer 24ppm 1200 dpi x 1200 dpi USB/PAR £50.11
Canon Lbp2900 Laser 12ppm - A4 Usb 2mb 2400x600 Dpi Uk £59.50

I have an ML-2010, among other printers, and it does fine at
text and some types of charts but can't dither very well,
does suffer from banding in some photo-quality (attempts).
I don't use it anymore though, after I ran through the
starter cartridge I found it a higher cost per page than an
older printer I eventually got around to repairing.

The 2570 would be an upgrade over the 2010 but for most
purposes you wouldn't notice much difference, read over the
specs to see if anything seems worth the extra cost but for
your purposes I would say only the toner factor mentioned at
the end of my post would be relevant, though if you were
running Windows Vista, I don't know if (any of) these are
supported yet, with a proper driver.

The Canon looks like the worst value of the 3, since it has
least memory and it's cartridges, while slightly cheaper,
only hold a mere 2000 pages worth of toner, while the
Samsungs hold 3000 pages worth. The ML-2010 ships with a
starter cartridge which, unlike the replacement cart, only
has 1000 pages of toner in it. I'd expect the same for the
2570 but am not certain of it, and I don't know if the
low-end Canons ship with a starter cart or full cart.

I don't really want to spend more as I'm a student and will just be
using this printer for printing out journal papers and proofread my
upcoming thesis. Can't wait till I get a salary!

These are all low-end printers with a bit worse dithering
quality than possible with a higher priced lasers. They
would all do great at text output so I would get the ML-2010
unless you can confirm the 2570 ships with a full 2010D3
cartridge instead of the 2010D1 starter cartridge (D1 being
the starter cart with only 1K pages worth of toner).

 

[kony]

Regarding print quality, there is a lot more to consider tha just dpi. For
exemple, it makes no sense to be able to print a huge number of dpi's if
each dot is too big and overlaps the others.
So it's even important to look at the smallest addressable area.
On top, some manufacturers can modulate the size of their dots in order to
achieve a better fill of the areas between the dots, which results in better
blacks and less stair effects.

AFAIK, none of the low end printers can modulate dot size,
and I don't even think any higher end can, that this is
something only an inkjet (might do).

 

[CBFalconer]

.... snip ...

The models I was looking at were:
Samsung ML2010 Laser 22ppm 1200 dpi x 600 dpi USB £44.98
Samsung ML-2570 Laser Printer 24ppm 1200 dpi x 1200 dpi USB/PAR £50.11
Canon Lbp2900 Laser 12ppm - A4 Usb 2mb 2400x600 Dpi Uk £59.50

I believe the Samsungs are much less likely to give you trouble.
Canon is extremely secretive.

 

[ElJerid]

AFAIK, none of the low end printers can modulate dot size,
and I don't even think any higher end can, that this is
something only an inkjet (might do).

If I remember correctly, RET technology was first used on HP
mono-laserprinters and allowed to place smaller toner dots in any quarter of
a normal dot area. Don't know however how this technology has evolved
actually.
When applied later on to color printers (inkjet and laser), RET involved
also the mixing of colors in a single dot by modulating the ink or toner
quantity (and thus the covered area) per drop.
If I' m wrong, read my first message as:
"On top, some manufacturers use proprietary techniques to control the dots
in order to achieve a better fill of the areas between the dots, which
results in better blacks and less stair effects."

 

[kony]

If I remember correctly, RET technology was first used on HP
mono-laserprinters and allowed to place smaller toner dots in any quarter of
a normal dot area. Don't know however how this technology has evolved
actually.

I was under the impression the limitation was DPI, that it
can't be done and still achieve the higher DPI that modern
printers do. AFAIK that limitation is around 2400 DPI
still, at that density it can only produce one sized dot, or
claim a lower DPI which in optimal circumstances could
emulate 2400 DPI.

When applied later on to color printers (inkjet and laser), RET involved
also the mixing of colors in a single dot by modulating the ink or toner
quantity (and thus the covered area) per drop.

Colors can't be "mixed" on a laser, each is entirely opaque.
However, supposing a situation like a 1200 DPI printer, it
could place any combination of colored dots in a dithered
matrix within that DPI ceiling.

If I' m wrong, read my first message as:
"On top, some manufacturers use proprietary techniques to control the dots
in order to achieve a better fill of the areas between the dots, which
results in better blacks and less stair effects."

AFAIK, the printer driver is designed such that it (or in
the case of more mid-to-high-end models, it can be done
onboard the printer) takes the original *image* and
determines the output most similar based on the capabilities
of the print engine. IE, it can't always be 1:1 dots but in
most cases the image resolution is lower than the DPI
capability of the printer so it is just determining the
optimal dithering that particular print engine can
accomplish.