postscript laser

[Phil Jenkinson]

After much deliberation we bought the OKI 7300, in retrospect we should have got the A3 model. The Oki beat all the other colour lasers we looked at even though it was more expensive.
I would definitely go for the postscript drivers, especially if your using Adobe and printing graphics. PostScript is a programming language optimized for printing graphics and text. It was introduced by Adobe. The main purpose of PostScript was to provide a convenient language in which to describe images in a device independent manner. This device independence means that the image is described without reference to any specific device features (e.g. printer resolution) so that the same description could be used on any PostScript printer. In real terms the printer seems to print quicker and the image quality is spot on. I would consider get a memory up grade and also the duplex, also the network card is worth it if you’ve a couple of computers networked.

Phil

[Ian Stewart-Koster]

If you ever want to do screen printing with half tones, you need post script.
If you want to produce black & white pictures (photos) which will photocopy well from a master, you need post script.

Post script allows you to set the line screen frequencies, angles, and dot shape of the pictures. Everything prints as black dots, this just gives you heaps of control over the size & shape of them etc. Quality is great. I prefer it ti the PCL (printer control languages) used on laser printers.

We have an oldish Lexmark Optra S 1855 with duplexer & 48 meg ram. I still like it, in spite of its idiosyncrasies, it’s good, quick, & high quality.

[Alan Drury]

An eps file if imported or placed in Quark/publisher or virtually any DTP programme will view on screen only as a low resolution bitmap, it will print at its highest quality only to a postscript device. Postscript will allow the linescreen to be changed so you can change the size of the dots, and as imagesetters are postscript devices you can proof stuff a bit more reliably. I use postscript printers and print through Corel Draw which enables a great deal of flexibility. I agree with previous posts and would get extra memory but it does depend what you want to use it for if just for printing out your sign design then maybe not worth it if you are going to print to film for screen or litho printing or you send stuff to image setters then definately go for postscript. If you intend to print to film colour printers I think work on different temperatures to mono so may not be so successful.

[jkape]

thank you everyone !

I should be going for the postscript model as I do need to have as high quality as possible.
Thanks again

Iosif

[Kevin.Beck]

have you got a supplier and a price for the 5300 model?

cheers

[Phil Jenkinson]

Becky,

Are you offering one or do you want one?

We got ours from http://www.shopoki.co.uk (based in manchester) it was the cheapest plus they gave free memory upgrade to 128mb (which we then upgraded to 512mb) and a free b/w laser B6100!

Phil

[Aitor Asencor]

quote :

If you ever want to do screen printing with half tones, you need post script.
If you want to produce black & white pictures (photos) which will photocopy well from a master, you need post script.

Post script allows you to set the line screen frequencies, angles, and dot shape of the pictures. Everything prints as black dots, this just gives you heaps of control over the size & shape of them etc. Quality is great. I prefer it ti the PCL (printer control languages) used on laser printers.

That’s a wrong concept. You don’t need postscript to produce photos.

You can’t change angles, frequencies… in a laser printer, they are always the same and they are predefined. For that, you need a high level RIP.

Postscript is used by programs as coreldraw, freehand and illustrator.
Also needed for postscript fonts.

Without postscript installed all the postscript items will be rendered in low resolution.

Aitor

[jkape]

In Greece it ‘s 1300 +vat for the basic 5300 model
It is quite a bit cheaper 300euros at least in the UK which is nice ! The only thing is transport really . Thakns for the tip anyway I’ll see if I can get a quote on transport fees

Thanks
Iosif

[Alan Drury]

Sorry I don’t agree with Aitor, I use a HP5000 – A3 laser for producing films for litho and screen printing and I am always changing lpi setting from dots you can hardly see to footballs. I can also change the shape of the dots too, all this is done within Corel Draw. You don’t need postscript to print photos but the dot pattern is not the same, postscript enables you to enlarge the dots by reducing the line screen not the resolution and a larger dot will photocopy better. There is also correlation between resolution/lpi and the number of greyscales basically a lower lpi on lower resolution devices will give more greyscales thus a smoother image.Corel Draw will separate to a non postscript printer but certain features like I believe overprint will not work, if you have Acrobat you can get round this. I could go on and if anybody has a speciific question about Corel/postscript/Acrobat I will answer if I can.
Alan

[Ian Stewart-Koster]

Thanks Alan- I was going to reply disagreeing with Aitor also- but you summed it all up well.
No you don’t need post script to print photos, but to print ones that will photocopy well on average quality copiers, (eg producing a newsletter master copy to be later photocopied) post script printed photos will copy and print better as the machine picks up & prints the black dots rather than shades of grey.
I alter the dot size, shape and line-screen angle & frequency, frequently too, depending on the screen-printing screen mesh being used, when making a screen positive of a photographic image.

Personally, I find that post-script printed pages look better quality than PCL printed pages when done here on the machine we have.

Best wishes