Thanks, Paul and Rich.
Bruce
On Aug 29, 2006, at 1:21 PM, Paul A. Rubin wrote:
Bruce Pourciau wrote:
This is a LaTeX rather than LyX question. Concerning the quality
of the output -- specifically for printing LaTeX and eps files,
but also more generally -- what would be the difference between
printer A and printer B, if A is described as having "standard
postscript support," while B, under "printer fonts," says "26
scalable fonts" but there's nothing about postscript support. We
will be getting a new printer for the department of mathematics,
and we'll need good reasons if we ask for the more expensive
printer A.
Any help would be appreciated.
Bruce
Printers that advertise "standard Postscript support" typically
have a set of Type 1 Adobe fonts in firmware. That allows the
printer driver to print glyphs from those fonts on the printer
without resorting to bitmaps. I'm not sure how many Type 1 fonts
there are all told, but I'm sure I've seen printers that advertised
35 or more Type 1 fonts in firmware. The extent to which you get
mileage out of the built-in fonts is obviously proportional to the
likelihood that users employ those fonts in their documents. I
think you get a bit of a speed boost using fonts the printer has in
firmware; whether the output quality is better may depend on
printer resolution and some other factors, so I'm less sure there
is an advantage there.
If printer B has 26 scalable fonts that are not Adobe fonts (and
are not MS TrueType fonts), then my guess is that you won't get any
mileage out of them. I've seen printers once or twice that had a
few non-Adobe fonts, but they were fonts I never used (and did not
have installed on my PCs).
For either printer, if a font is encountered that is not Adobe Type
1, the used glyphs from that font will probably be embedded in the
document, and I think the driver for either should be able to
handle that. If a font is neither embedded in the document nor
recognized, I think the driver will use a map to substitute some
font it (or the printer) knows, and that can produce some butt-ugly
output.
For what it's worth, I turn all my LyX output into PDFs and print
them on an HP multifunction ink-jet that does not contain any
Postscript font support whatsoever. I also tend to use the ae or
lmodern fonts, even when generating PDFs (although occasionally I
will use pslatex, which might match the embedded Type 1 fonts if I
had embedded Type 1 fonts, which I don't).
/Paul
Bruce,
Probably no difference whatsoever. Most printers do not come with
built-in
postscript engines because the licensing fee increases the printer
cost and
most folks (i.e., Microserfs) couldn't care less. So, CUPS (or
whatever
other printing system you're using nowadays) passes the test through
ghostscipt and sends the output to your printer.
Fonts included with the printer do not need to be downloaded from
a host,
along with the document. But, you can use whatever typefaces your
application supports and the output will be as high as the printer
produces
(as long as you have it configured that way).
Rich
