Patent · US Expired

Method and apparatus for reformatting print data

US4978971A · kind A · utility

34Cited by
11References
37Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateNov 6, 1989
Grant dateDec 18, 1990
Priority date
Expiry dateNov 6, 2009

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
  • CPC primaryH04N2201/04794
  • WIPO fieldAudio-visual technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

Print heads are formed with spaced subheads having nozzles such that all of the lines or pixel rows on a print medium such as a sheet of paper are printed by scanning of the print head along the face of the sheet. The head structures include three subheads, each having nozzles for printing one or more adjacent lines with the subheads being spaced the same number of lines apart as the number of lines each prints; and three subheads spaced the equivalent of seven lines apart, each subhead having three nozzles spaced at the equivalent of alternate lines. The heads are advanced between scans by an equivalent number of lines generally equal to the number of nozzles in the head, whereby all print lines are addressed only once. Apparatus for printing includes the use of pointers in registers to keep track of head structure and location on a print medium for calculating print addresses. A partial page memory is used which wraps around to the beginning from the end. A positive printer carriage position encoder uses an index marker located in the middle of a strip of incremental markers. Sensing of the index marker resets an up/down counter with a value that gives a positive value for all co…

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.