列印機的歷史?

The world's first computer printer was a 19th-century mechanically driven apparatus invented by Charles Babbage for his Difference Engine.
In Babbage’s time numerical tables were calculated by humans called ‘computers’. At Cambridge he saw the high error rate of the people computing the tables and thus started his life’s work in trying to calculate the tables mechanically, removing all human error. He began in 1822 with what he called the difference engine, made to compute values of polynomial functions.
Unlike similar efforts of the time, Babbage's difference engine was created to calculate a series of values automatically. By using the method of finite differences, it was possible to avoid the need for multiplication and division.


圖片參考：http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/09/050114_2529_difference.jpg/220px-050114_2529_difference.jpg



圖片參考：http://en.wikipedia.org/skins-1.5/common/images/magnify-clip.png
The London Science Museum's replica Difference Engine, built from Babbage's design.
The first difference engine needed around 25,000 parts of a combined weight of fifteen tons (13,600 kg) standing 8 ft (2.4 m) high. Although he received much funding for the project, he did not complete it. He later designed an improved version, "Difference Engine No. 2". This was not constructed at the time, but was built using his plans in 1989-1991, to 19th century tolerances, and performed its first calculation at the London Science Museum bringing back results to 31 digits, far more than the average modern pocket calculator.

[edit] Printer
Babbage designed a printer for the second difference engine which had some remarkable features; it supported line-wrapping, variable column and row width, and programmable output formatting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Babbage

2007-05-02 18:44:33 補充：
DOn't post any irrelavent stuffs !!!

印表機
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惠普business inkjet3000工作組級噴墨印表機印表機屬於一種電腦輸出設備，可以把與之相連的電腦內儲存的數據按照文字或圖形的方式永久的輸出到紙張或者透明膠片上。

單色和彩色印表機
單色印表機只能包含一種顏色的圖片，通常是黑色，有些單色印表機也可以列印灰度圖象。彩色印表機可以列印包含各種色彩的圖片。照片印表機是一種彩色印表機，可以生成模擬全色域的圖片，成為除印刷方法以外的另一種大量生成照片的辦法。


[編輯] 印表機的分類
由於大部分列印媒介是紙，所以印表機是根據把圖像印在紙上的方法進行分類的：


佳能IR5800cn商務辦公級彩色雷射印表機
[編輯] 基於墨粉的印表機
雷射印表機可以把墨粉印在媒介上，這種印表機具有最佳的成本優勢，優秀的輸出效果，尤其是針對家庭和辦公的單色印表機，雷射印表機佔有統治地位。另一種基於墨粉的印表機是LED印表機，它是採用發光二極體代替雷射來生成墨粉圖案。


[編輯] 噴墨印表機
噴墨印表機可以把把數量眾多的微小墨滴（通常只有幾皮升，10–12升）精確的噴射在要列印的媒介上，對於彩色印表機包括照片印表機來說，噴墨方式是絕對主流。由於噴墨印表機可以不僅局限於三種顏色的墨水，現在已有六色甚至七色墨盒的噴墨印表機，其顏色範圍早已超出了傳統CMYK的局限，也超過了四色印刷的效果，印出來的照片已經可以媲美傳統沖洗的相片，甚至有防水特性的墨水都有上市了


[編輯] 擊打式印表機
擊打式印表機是依靠強力的衝擊把墨轉印在媒介上，類似於打字機，它只能列印純文本。菊瓣字輪式印表機是一種特殊的擊打式印表機，它的鉛字模圍繞著一個輪子的邊緣，高爾夫球印表機和菊瓣字輪式印表機很相似，只是字模不但是圓環狀分佈，而是分佈於一球形的表面上方，因此可以容納更多的字模圖案。


[編輯] 點陣式印表機
點陣式印表機又稱針式印表機，它是依靠一組像素或點的矩陣組合而成更大的圖像，點陣式印表機是運用了擊打式印表機的原理，用一組小針來產生精確的點，比擊打式印表機更先進的是，它不但可以列印文本，還可以列印圖形，但是列印文本的質量通常要低於採用單獨字模的擊打式印表機。


Tandy 1000型電腦和Tandy DMP-133點陣式印表機點陣式印表機又可以大體分為兩種:

彈道線式印表機
儲能印表機
點陣式印表機既可以是基於字元又可以是基於線的（按照直線密排的點就構成了一條線），這就要提到列印頭的構造。

在一段時間點陣式印表機曾經是最常見的通用印表機類型，例如家用印表機和小型辦公印表機。這種印表機的列印頭有9或者24針，24針列印頭具有更高的列印質量。當噴墨印表機的價格降到可以與點陣式印表機相競爭的時候，點陣式印表機開始失去普通用戶的寵愛。

現在點陣式印表機依然在一些低成本低要求的設備中使用，例如收銀機。另外它的擊打式列印原理使它用於列印採用無碳複寫紙的多頁文檔（例如銷售發票或信用可收據），而其他的列印方式是不能使用這種紙的。現在點陣式印表機正在被迅速取代，即使是在收銀機領域。


[編輯] 行式印表機
行式印表機正如其名，一次可以列印一整行的文字。這種印表機又分為兩種。一種是「鼓式印表機」，即圓柱上的每個環都裝有所有要列印的字元，原理類似蓋日期的數字圖章，這樣就可以一次列印一行。另一種是「鏈式印表機」（也叫火車印表機），是把各種字元放在可以上下滑動的鏈子上，需要那個字元就把它滑動到要列印的行上。不管是哪一種印表機，在列印的時候都是擊槌擊打紙的背面，同時字模和色帶正墊好在上方，打完一行紙張向上走再打下一行，擊槌擊打的是紙而不是字模，這一點和一般擊打式印表機把字模往紙上擊打是不同的。

這種印表機是所有擊打式印表機中列印速度最快的，過去常用於大型電腦中心的海量列印。它從未用於個人電腦用戶，現在已經被高速的雷射印表機所取代。

The world's first computer printer was a 19th-century mechanically driven apparatus invented by Charles Babbage for his Difference Engine.

In Babbage’s time numerical tables were calculated by humans called ‘computers’. At Cambridge he saw the high error rate of the people computing the tables and thus started his life’s work in trying to calculate the tables mechanically, removing all human error. He began in 1822 with what he called the difference engine, made to compute values of polynomial functions.

Unlike similar efforts of the time, Babbage's difference engine was created to calculate a series of values automatically. By using the method of finite differences, it was possible to avoid the need for multiplication and division.



The London Science Museum's replica Difference Engine, built from Babbage's design.
The first difference engine needed around 25,000 parts of a combined weight of fifteen tons (13,600 kg) standing 8 ft (2.4 m) high. Although he received much funding for the project, he did not complete it. He later designed an improved version, "Difference Engine No. 2". This was not constructed at the time, but was built using his plans in 1989-1991, to 19th century tolerances, and performed its first calculation at the London Science Museum bringing back results to 31 digits, far more than the average modern pocket calculator.


[edit] Printer
Babbage designed a printer for the second difference engine which had some remarkable features; it supported line-wrapping, variable column and row width, and programmable output formatting.