BUYING A NEW PRINTER
                          (And associated decisions)

                Including a review of the Star LC24-200 Black


                            Paul Statham  Aug 92



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WHY:

   I have had a Star NX1000 Colour, 9pin printer for almost three years now
   and have had no real problems with it.  At the time I bought the colour
   because it was only $100 more than the black only. I was impressed with
   the NX1000 as a low cost NLQ printer. Over the past years I have used
   the colours less and less.

   My only complaints about this printer are the fact that two months after
   I bought it they dropped the price another $100, that the cut sheet
   paper guide was a little flimsy, the cover for the tractor feed used to
   come off at the slightest touch, mainly because of the weight of the
   guide and worst the printer couldn't print anywhere in the first and
   last inch of cut sheet.

   Near the end of the year I will be in the position to buy an Amiga 3000
   and with an increased interest in writing, therefore printing (with the
   exception of publications like Megadisc) the slow speed of the NX1000
   was not going to be enough.


WHAT:

   First I had to decide what I really needed against what I wanted (colour
   laser sounds great) and then look at finances (try quill & ink).

Laser:

   Far too expensive for home use. I have the option of transferring data
   to IBM formated disks and using one at work if I really need that
   quality. Also if I manage to get a Modem/Fax connection I can dump
   printout to our plain paper Fax at work (just as effective and no viral
   problems).

Bubble Jet:

   The Cannon BJ-10ex which we bought for the laptops at work is a delight.
   With the addition of a cut sheet feeder it is a quiet, impressive little
   printer with a price around the $700 mark - I was seriously looking at
   this and made lots of enquiries until I found its biggest drawback:
   Running Costs. One report put the cost per sheet of printed material at
   46 cents. I suspect this is exaggerated but even at 30 cents a sheet it
   would not have been economical. The retail cost of the print head/ink
   jets package is now $50. Sadly I had to give ideas of near laser quality
   printing and graphics away and look at 24 pin dot matrix.

24 Pin:

   Here the choices were considerable and I found prices as low as $400 and
   as high as $1500.

   The cheaper printers' only claim to fame was the fact that they had 24
   pins and they were slower than their more expensive counterparts or
   didn't have colour options.

   Since finances were a consideration I looked at four possible printers
   under $700.

   The Epson LQ-100 $425:
   The cheapest and smallest of the printers I looked at because of its
   size, the fact it had a paper tray to hold 30 sheets A4 and could be
   stood on its back to save space. Two scalable fonts from 8-32pt as an
   additional incentive.  Its main drawback was that the tractor feed was
   optional at another $95 and the print head was rated at 100 million
   strokes/wire, half that of the next model I looked at.

   The Star LC24-200 Black $540
   I admit a bias to Star printers since I already own one. This printer
   had no cut sheet feeder, just the standard guide for manual feeding. But
   it did come with tractor feed and paper parking which makes paper
   changing easier. It was also rated at fractionally faster in draft mode
   than the Epson.

   The Star LC24-200 Colour $699
   The same specs as the black only but with colour option and a bigger
   buffer. I didn't really need the colour option but at the time Brash's
   were offering a four month interest free package which would mean I
   wouldn't have to pay for the printer until January '93.

   The Panasonic (number unknown) Colour $699
   This was a better looking printer and seemed more solidly built although
   the specs were close to the Star. It only rated a look because of the
   Brash's deal. The front panel was a maze of colour coded selections.


THE CHOICE:

   Finances played the final decision and I opted for the Star LC24-200
   Black. I don't really make enough use of colour in my printing to
   warrant the extra $160 and by timing my purchase with my Mastercard
   payment I have two months before it's due.

THE PRINTER:

   There were two concerns with the printer when I unpacked it. First I had
   to install the roller unit for the friction feed and it took me a
   moment's careful thinking to get it to fit. It's actually foolproof in
   that it will only fit in one way and when you get it right it drops into
   place.  The second concern was this large piece of plastic in front of
   the printhead. Initially I thought it was there for protection of the
   head during transport but I noticed it was fixed. It wasn't until I
   printed something that I realised it was there to hold the paper against
   the platten so the printer can print on the top of the page.

   After that all went well loading the continuous paper from either the
   back or below is simple and a few test runs with QED dumping 80
   characters to the printer to position the cut sheet guide and it was
   ready to go.

   Like the NX1000 the front buttons are mutilfunctional but this time they
   are real buttons not those membrane type. (makes it easier to know
   you've pressed something)

   The main delight of this printer is its ease of operation. Once the cut
   sheet guide is in place you drop a sheet in and press one button. The
   printer loads the sheet to start printing at the top of the page and
   turns itself on-line.

   Fonts;

   Font selection is simple and with 5 NLQ fonts and two draft modes plus
   the option of installing fonts cartridges at a later date or additional
   memory cartrige (probably for IBM's who have to wait 'till the printer
   takes the last of the data before doing anything else)

   Of the two draft modes the standard is good enough for those printouts
   of text from Megadisc and manuals from PD programs although when I
   printed using MOST from an earlier edition of Megadisc onto cut sheet,
   the printer switched to uni-directional (one way) printing until the end
   of the first paragraph on each sheet after the first. Something to do
   with resetting itself after it runs out of paper I think. Still it's only
   a minor curiosity.

   The High Speed Draft is effectively 9pin draft and at 222 cps it ain't
   slow!!!

   Graphics;

   Printing from Wordworth in Graphic & Text mode created an unexpected
   problem. I wanted to print a mixed text and picture page, and on the
   screen it looked fine - the text wrapped around a clip art piccy and so I
   hit the print button.

   On cut sheet the printer inched forward to the end of the page and then
   tried to reverse itself all the time not printing anything.  I tried
   with continuous to the same effect except this time the paper could
   reverse back to the top of the page. Unfortunately it wanted to reverse
   further back than it had gone forward so I got the paper out beep. With
   a little fiddling I got the printer going and it printed quite happily.

   When I tried it with some text only near the bottom of the page it
   actually printed that first and then went back to do the graphic.

   I tried printing in Graphic mode and found that solved the problem and
   with some fiddling with the margins got a reasonable printout.  The
   printout was not anything amazing but having just read an article on
   Compugraphic fonts, and Desk Top Publishing with 24 pin printers from
   MD23 I'll reserve judgement on it.

   The usual imbedded commands that Star allows are available although the
   colour codes obviously do nothing on my model. And the manual is simple
   and straightforward until you get to the technical mumbo-jumbo starting
   at Chapter 4. But if you can't get a printout by then you either don't
   need a printer or you've forgotten to turn the thing on.

SUMMARY OF GOOD POINTS:

   Prints whole page
   Paper parking easier and seems more reliable
   Buttons are tactile

SUMMARY OF BAD POINTS:

   Paper guide for cut sheet still flimsy
   Roller assembly easier to put in than manual picture suggests
       (once you think about it)

CONCLUSION:

   This is really not much more than a standard 24 pin printer but for just
   over $500 it's slightly more than you would expect. If this one performs
   with the reliability of the 9pin NX1000 I'm going to be printing happily
   for another 3-4 years. My recommendation would be that this is really
   the level at which to start printing.  The 9pins are cheap and I really
   can't complain about mine except I think in the long run I would have
   been happier if I'd bought a 24pin first up.


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