CompTIA A+ 1101 Printers

Laser Printers

- combines a laser, high voltage, charged ions, powdered ink, heat, and paper

- fast and high quality, but complex

Laser Printing Process (Simple)

1. the image is drawn with a photosensitive drum using a later

2. the drum picks up toner and transfers it to the paper

3. the fuser assembly uses heat and pressure to melt the toner and to permanently bond it to the paper

Laser Printing Process (Detailed)

1. Processing

- build the entire page in memory

2. Charging

- prepare the drum with a negative charged electrostatic charge

3. Exposing

- write the image with the laser

4. Developing

- add negatively charged toner to the imagining drum

5. Transferring

- move the toner from the drum to the paper

6. Fusing

- heat and pressure

7. Cleaning

- remove excess toner

Transfer Belt and Roller (Laser Printer)

- takes toner from individual colors and combines them into a single page

Pickup Rollers

- picks up a single piece of paper

- works in conjunction with the separation pad

Inkjet Printers

- relatively inexpensive and quiet

- provide color and high resolution

- use expensive, proprietary ink that eventually fades

Ink Cartridges (Inkjet Printer)

- printer pulls from a set of cartridges and drops ink on the page

Carriage and Belt (Inkjet Printer)

- moves ink cartridges over the paper

- the belt moves the carriage back and forth

Thermal Printers

- feeds specially coated white paper in, heats certain parts of the page, and turns them black

- no ink is needed

- very quiet

- paper is very sensitive to light and heat

- adding tape to the paper makes it turn white

Feed Assembly (Thermal Printer)

- pulls paper through the printer

- long cylinder with gears that turn

Impact Printers

- use a print head with small matrix of pins, to press against a ribbon, and make a mark on the paper

- pins can be seen as dots

- great for multiple pages

- low cost per page (only need the ink inside the ribbon)

- noisy

- poor graphics

Printer Ribbon (Impact Printer)

- made of fabric

- one large ribbon

- constantly cycling

- contains the ink

Tractor Feed (Impact Printer)

- pulls the paper through the printer

- continuous paper feed

- perforations between pages

- uses holes on the left and right sides of the paper, instead of using friction

Resin Printing

- creates smooth and finely detailed 3D prints

- liquid resin is hardened using a light source (ultraviolet light or a laser)

- lasers are added on to the bottom

- the entire print hangs from the build platform

- resin must be handled and disposed of properly