You are working at your computer and trying to print out important documents and all at once you find you are out of ink. Years ago that would have presented a big problem. Printers used ribbons or daisy wheels to print on paper. Let's take a look at the evolution of printer ink cartridges.
In 1984 ink jet printers and printer cartridges were introduced. Printing documents was now easier and so was changing printer cartridges. After years of changing ribbons, adding toner ink to reservoirs within the computer.
The dot matrix method used a ribbon. The industry found new ways to make printing easier and more convenient. There is the drop on demand method where the ink squirts onto the paper through tiny nozzles. The amount of ink dropped the page is controlled by the software driver that controls which nozzle fires and when.
By 1990 ink jet print cartridges was widely accepted. Printer cartridges can now print in color as well as in black and white for document. Inkjet printer cartridges can print on just about any sized paper, on fabric and on film. Ink jet printers are used in a variety of settings worldwide and is a popular choice for printing.
Each brand of printer uses a specific type of cartridge. Ink jet cartridges are given an identification number and the models that can use this particular cartridge, is listed. There are a wide variety of cartridges available and you should check your printer's manual to see exactly what cartridges are available to you.
If you are trying to save money, you can purchase refill kits that allow you to fill the cartridges yourself. Not everyone is a fan of these kits however, the quality of the printing isn't as good, and in some cases the cartridges when re-installed can fail to operate.
You can get reconditioned and refilled cartridges from some retailers and sometimes from the manufacturer. Compatible cartridges are cartridges that are made according to the exact specs of the original manufacturer. The drawback here is that not every cartridge has a compatible one.
In choosing a printer check the type of cartridge it will use. You will need to determine if the cartridge is appropriate for the type of printing and the volume of printing you will be doing. You will have to do some research and you can find much of this information on the internet, through the manufacturer or through stores that deal in the particular printer you are looking at.
Discount ink cartridges are available online. All you have to do is type ink cartridges or printer cartridges into your search engine. Some sites offer amazing discounts. Again you are going to have to search for the deal that is best for you. Pay attention to the cartridge top when purchasing them. Check the sides of the box for a list of models the cartridge will work in.
There is a time line below that has some really interesting facts.
This would make a great list of answers for a trivia game. I cannot imagine the hard work that created the ink jet printer cartridge, as we know it. It is easy to understand why cartridges are expensive.
1452 - Gutenberg used oil-based ink, moveable type, and an old winepress to make the first printing press.
Martin Luther began the Protestant reformation making extensive use of the printing press.
1714 - The typewriter was born. Schematics that were done by Mills were discovered however, there is no proof that any typewriters were actually made.
1874 - Christopher Sholes, Samuel Soule, and Carlos Glidden made a keyboard that became known as the “qwerty” because of the first five keys on the top row of the keyboard.
1894 - Franz Wagner developed a typewriter that is very similar to the ones made today. He created a design that let the typists watch as they were typing. Previously, paper would go through a roller as you typed and you could not see what you typed until you were done.
1897 - Underwood (by John Underwood) was the prototypical typewriter of its day.
1939 - Charles Carlson developed electrography, which is the first dry writing technique developed in the United States.
1949 - Haloid Company began to commercially developed electrography for the first time.
1959 - Xerox 914 hit the market and forced other businesses to update their communication systems.
1969 - Xerox first introduced dry printing (laser printing) by Gary Starkweather.
1078 - Xerox put out the world's first business laser printer the Xerox 9700. It copied documents at the speed of 120 ppm (pages per minute)
1979 - The IBM 3800 could print out 20,000 lines per minute.
1980's - The use of toner cartridges became obsolete.
1984 - Hewlett-Packard released the first home-based desktop laser printer.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
LCD Monitor – Better Than CRT Monitor
LCD monitors or Liquid Crystal Display monitors are replacing the old CRT or Cathode Ray Tube screens and are far superior in a vast majority of applications.
There are several advantages of LCD Monitors over the old CRT Displays. While LCD Monitors are compact and lightweight and consume less power approximately 20W whereas the CRT monitors are bulky and heavy consuming upto 150W. An LCD Monitor produces perfectly sharp images with perfect image geometry whereas in CRT the sharpness is limited and it tends to blur more at high brightness and with the aging of the tubes and suffers from geometric distortions.
LCD monitors have a consistent tonal scale and can display text with excellent contrast whereas the CRT monitors display strong bright areas which can cause other regions of the picture to dim and also has poor text contrast because of limited bandwidth.
LCD monitors do not normally flicker whereas a faint flicker can always be observed in a CRT monitor.
There are also some inherent disadvantages of LCD monitors over that of the CRT monitors. The contrast or the color changes with the viewing angle in a LCD monitor whereas in a CRT monitor it is always a consistent image irrespective of viewing angle. LCD monitors may cause motion blur and has a poor black on dark images. Whereas the CRT monitors usually portray motion well and also has good black contrast.
When viewing photos or videos on a LCD monitor it may appear flat and the peak brightness is limited by the back light. A CRT monitor displays movies/video/photos with a sparkle and life to images with very high peak brightness.
If LCD Monitor screens are damaged, it may develop stuck pixels whereas no such pixel based problems are present.
In LCD the natural interface would be digital e.g. DVI interface and the image can be sub-optimal with analog interface whereas CRT’s are naturally suited to analog interface.
On the basis of image-quality LCD monitor is best suited for technical/CAD applications and office uses such as large, detailed text-based but -non-critical color graphics while CRT still has the upper hand for high-end photography or art work and for television displays.
Unlike CRTs that are actively displaying the light through coated phosphors, an LCD actually takes white light and filters it to get the desired colors. To do this for each given pixel there are three sub pixels one for red, green and blue light. When the sub-pixel is off, the filter will block that particular color of light. When the sub-pixel is on, it will open the filter to let a desired amount of light through.
There are several advantages of LCD Monitors over the old CRT Displays. While LCD Monitors are compact and lightweight and consume less power approximately 20W whereas the CRT monitors are bulky and heavy consuming upto 150W. An LCD Monitor produces perfectly sharp images with perfect image geometry whereas in CRT the sharpness is limited and it tends to blur more at high brightness and with the aging of the tubes and suffers from geometric distortions.
LCD monitors have a consistent tonal scale and can display text with excellent contrast whereas the CRT monitors display strong bright areas which can cause other regions of the picture to dim and also has poor text contrast because of limited bandwidth.
LCD monitors do not normally flicker whereas a faint flicker can always be observed in a CRT monitor.
There are also some inherent disadvantages of LCD monitors over that of the CRT monitors. The contrast or the color changes with the viewing angle in a LCD monitor whereas in a CRT monitor it is always a consistent image irrespective of viewing angle. LCD monitors may cause motion blur and has a poor black on dark images. Whereas the CRT monitors usually portray motion well and also has good black contrast.
When viewing photos or videos on a LCD monitor it may appear flat and the peak brightness is limited by the back light. A CRT monitor displays movies/video/photos with a sparkle and life to images with very high peak brightness.
If LCD Monitor screens are damaged, it may develop stuck pixels whereas no such pixel based problems are present.
In LCD the natural interface would be digital e.g. DVI interface and the image can be sub-optimal with analog interface whereas CRT’s are naturally suited to analog interface.
On the basis of image-quality LCD monitor is best suited for technical/CAD applications and office uses such as large, detailed text-based but -non-critical color graphics while CRT still has the upper hand for high-end photography or art work and for television displays.
Unlike CRTs that are actively displaying the light through coated phosphors, an LCD actually takes white light and filters it to get the desired colors. To do this for each given pixel there are three sub pixels one for red, green and blue light. When the sub-pixel is off, the filter will block that particular color of light. When the sub-pixel is on, it will open the filter to let a desired amount of light through.
PC Recycling Programs
Years ago, your clients never would’ve had a problem finding "takers" for old PCs. After your clients got four or five productive years out of PC systems, they may have given the PCs to employees or sold them to employees for pennies on the dollar. Alternatively, many others donated PCs to local schools, charities or nonprofit organizations.
Changes in PC Recycling
In the past several years, this has all changed. In the U.S., about sixty percent of households own at least one PC. Schools and charities have become so deluged with PC donations that many get more selective on the equipment they’re willing to accept.
In many areas, it’s even illegal to dispose of a PC in a dumpster. Rather, the PC needs to be recycled. So how do you accomplish this?
Finding a PC Recycling Program
Several PC recycling programs and resources can help you and your clients comply with various environmental regulations as you dispose of long obsolete hardware.
• Dell Asset Recovery Services -- http://www.dellfinancialservices.com/solutions/asset_recovery.asp
• EIA Environment: Consumer Education Initiative (CEI) -- http://www.eiae.org/
• Gateway.com: Recycle/Donate Your Old PC -- http://www.gateway.com/home/programs/tradein_recycle.shtml
• HP Environment: Return and Recycling -- http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/community/environment/recycle.htm
• IBM PC Recycling Service -- http://www.ibm.com/ibm/environment/products/pcrservice.phtml
• International Association of Electronics Recyclers -- http://www.iaer.org/
• National Safety Council (U.S.) EPR2 Project Electronic Equipment Recyclers -- http://www.nsc.org/ehc/epr2/cntctlst.htm
If You Still Can't Find One
If any of the PC recycling resource addresses above are invalid by the time you’re using this list, start at the home page of the website and look for links related to asset management, disposal or recycling. You can also try the website’s search function or site map to look for PC recycling information.
Copyright MMI-MMVI, Small Biz Tech Talk. All Worldwide Rights Reserved. {Attention Publishers: Live hyperlink in author resource box required for copyright compliance}
Changes in PC Recycling
In the past several years, this has all changed. In the U.S., about sixty percent of households own at least one PC. Schools and charities have become so deluged with PC donations that many get more selective on the equipment they’re willing to accept.
In many areas, it’s even illegal to dispose of a PC in a dumpster. Rather, the PC needs to be recycled. So how do you accomplish this?
Finding a PC Recycling Program
Several PC recycling programs and resources can help you and your clients comply with various environmental regulations as you dispose of long obsolete hardware.
• Dell Asset Recovery Services -- http://www.dellfinancialservices.com/solutions/asset_recovery.asp
• EIA Environment: Consumer Education Initiative (CEI) -- http://www.eiae.org/
• Gateway.com: Recycle/Donate Your Old PC -- http://www.gateway.com/home/programs/tradein_recycle.shtml
• HP Environment: Return and Recycling -- http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/community/environment/recycle.htm
• IBM PC Recycling Service -- http://www.ibm.com/ibm/environment/products/pcrservice.phtml
• International Association of Electronics Recyclers -- http://www.iaer.org/
• National Safety Council (U.S.) EPR2 Project Electronic Equipment Recyclers -- http://www.nsc.org/ehc/epr2/cntctlst.htm
If You Still Can't Find One
If any of the PC recycling resource addresses above are invalid by the time you’re using this list, start at the home page of the website and look for links related to asset management, disposal or recycling. You can also try the website’s search function or site map to look for PC recycling information.
Copyright MMI-MMVI, Small Biz Tech Talk. All Worldwide Rights Reserved. {Attention Publishers: Live hyperlink in author resource box required for copyright compliance}
Learn How To Repair Your Hard Drive Problems Fast
Since computer users are human, the user can be the primary cause of computer failure. And we operators of our computers are in most cases but that, we operate the computer but know very little concerning software and hardware components and peripherals.
Since this is the case, you should ASSUME NOTHING when diagnosing any computer problem. We diagnosed a new PC with a video display problem. After briefly looking at the video card it took a while to see that the video card was not pushed into the adapter slot completely.
Even though I looked at the card, I failed to check it thoroughly. This cause me to spend more time on troubleshooting that was not needed.The thought of a hard drive failure strikes terror in the heart of every computer user.
This is because a hard drive failure may lead to invaluable data loss. Here are the most common procedures you should perform when you experience hard drive failure.
General Hard Drive Troubleshooting
The hard drive can display problems such as "retry, abort, ignore" or "cannot read sectors" while operating. This is an indication that there may be bad or unreadable spots on the drive. Reformatting and reinstalling the operating system can normally correct this problem. This will cause you to loose all data on your drive so it is important to always have a good backup of yourfiles daily.
There are good good utilities you can purchase that can repair hard drive problems without destroying data. The utility Spinrite is a good utility and only cost $200.00 which is a good price if you want to avoid the hassle of reformatting the drive and restoring the operating system. Here are some general hard drive problems you should start from and we'll be more specific later.
Use Operating System Utilities
First you may be able to correct those bad spots and errors from your hard drive by performing those PC maintenance in the operating system. Windows has Disk Defragment and you should run disk defragment after running Scandisk since scandisk will need to fix any problems it finds. After scanning the drive and defraging the files, run Disk Cleanup to ensure all junk files have been delete.
Check Drive cables and connections
If there is on indication that the drive is receiving power (you don't hear that familiar clicking noise or the drive light is no working) check the 4 wire connector coming from the power supply.
If the connection is secure, you can remove the power supply connector and do two things. You can check to see if there is voltage with a multimeter. But its much faster to connect another 4 wire connector to the drive to see if the drive works. There are normally extra connectors from the power supply or you can use the connection to the cdrom drive to test for voltage from the power supply.
If the connection indicates no or very little voltage (4 volts or less) from the power supply, the power supply may be going bad. Now check and double check all connections, especially if you are someone else have recently worked inside the computer.
If the drive will not boot up...?
Boot the computer with your bootable DOS disk. If you don't have one made, STOP and make one NOW by clicking on Start, Settings, Control Panel, Add and Remove Programs and Startup Disk.
Try to access drive C: by typing DIR C: and press Enter. If you see the directories on drive C: try to make the drive bootable by typing sys a: c: and press Enter. The system files should be restored and the drive may be restored to boot on its own.
If this fails, you may have to reformat and partition the drive with the setup utility that came with your drive or computer.
If the Drive boots but hangs up at boot...?
Turn the computer off, open the system unit and disconnect the ribbon cable at the motherboard end. Turn on the PC AND You will get an error message that the drive is bad and in most cases will go into your BIOS. Change the hard drive type to AUTO and shut off the computer.
Reconnect the ribbon cable and see if the hard works properly. The drive settings should be restored and should operate fine.
A hard drive that fails to boot up may also have a bad controller. If the controller is mounted on the hard drive, there is not much you can do except replace the drive.
Since this is the case, you should ASSUME NOTHING when diagnosing any computer problem. We diagnosed a new PC with a video display problem. After briefly looking at the video card it took a while to see that the video card was not pushed into the adapter slot completely.
Even though I looked at the card, I failed to check it thoroughly. This cause me to spend more time on troubleshooting that was not needed.The thought of a hard drive failure strikes terror in the heart of every computer user.
This is because a hard drive failure may lead to invaluable data loss. Here are the most common procedures you should perform when you experience hard drive failure.
General Hard Drive Troubleshooting
The hard drive can display problems such as "retry, abort, ignore" or "cannot read sectors" while operating. This is an indication that there may be bad or unreadable spots on the drive. Reformatting and reinstalling the operating system can normally correct this problem. This will cause you to loose all data on your drive so it is important to always have a good backup of yourfiles daily.
There are good good utilities you can purchase that can repair hard drive problems without destroying data. The utility Spinrite is a good utility and only cost $200.00 which is a good price if you want to avoid the hassle of reformatting the drive and restoring the operating system. Here are some general hard drive problems you should start from and we'll be more specific later.
Use Operating System Utilities
First you may be able to correct those bad spots and errors from your hard drive by performing those PC maintenance in the operating system. Windows has Disk Defragment and you should run disk defragment after running Scandisk since scandisk will need to fix any problems it finds. After scanning the drive and defraging the files, run Disk Cleanup to ensure all junk files have been delete.
Check Drive cables and connections
If there is on indication that the drive is receiving power (you don't hear that familiar clicking noise or the drive light is no working) check the 4 wire connector coming from the power supply.
If the connection is secure, you can remove the power supply connector and do two things. You can check to see if there is voltage with a multimeter. But its much faster to connect another 4 wire connector to the drive to see if the drive works. There are normally extra connectors from the power supply or you can use the connection to the cdrom drive to test for voltage from the power supply.
If the connection indicates no or very little voltage (4 volts or less) from the power supply, the power supply may be going bad. Now check and double check all connections, especially if you are someone else have recently worked inside the computer.
If the drive will not boot up...?
Boot the computer with your bootable DOS disk. If you don't have one made, STOP and make one NOW by clicking on Start, Settings, Control Panel, Add and Remove Programs and Startup Disk.
Try to access drive C: by typing DIR C: and press Enter. If you see the directories on drive C: try to make the drive bootable by typing sys a: c: and press Enter. The system files should be restored and the drive may be restored to boot on its own.
If this fails, you may have to reformat and partition the drive with the setup utility that came with your drive or computer.
If the Drive boots but hangs up at boot...?
Turn the computer off, open the system unit and disconnect the ribbon cable at the motherboard end. Turn on the PC AND You will get an error message that the drive is bad and in most cases will go into your BIOS. Change the hard drive type to AUTO and shut off the computer.
Reconnect the ribbon cable and see if the hard works properly. The drive settings should be restored and should operate fine.
A hard drive that fails to boot up may also have a bad controller. If the controller is mounted on the hard drive, there is not much you can do except replace the drive.
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