@CENTER UNDER = HARDWARE & MISC. @ARTICLE TEXT = @ARTICLE TEXT = LASER PRINTERS @ARTICLE TEXT = @COMPANIES = JASMINE TECHNOLOGIES, INC.: @ARTICLE TEXT = Jasmine is a firm that sells a variety of add-on products for the Apple Macintosh including high capacity hard disk drives, 2400 baud modems and tape backup devices. They chose to unveil a new product known as DirectPrint at the show. DIRECT PRINT is a new laser quality printer based on a Casio liquid crystal shutter (LCS) print engine that includes a Postscript compatible (read clone) controller and the new Weitek XL-8200 laser printer co-processor. These features are claimed to make the printer fully PostScript compatible, five times faster than an equivalent Apple LaserWriter printer Postscript laser printer and more maintenance free. DirectPrint will be available in the next 60 days at a list price of approximately $5,000. @ARTICLE TEXT = @COMPANIES = QMS, INC.: @ARTICLE TEXT = QMS is a well known supplier of Canon-based laser printers and laser printer supplies including the ``Jet-Script'' add-in card that brings PostScript to the HP Laser Jet Series II printer. At last year's show they unveiled the world's first color printer to use the color edition of Postscript: the QMS ColorScript 100. The COLOR SCRIPT 100 printer was again the center of attention at the QMS booth as it printed a beautiful, multi-color art poster drawn in Micrografx Designer, a PC based drawing program that runs under Microsoft Windows. @ARTICLE TEXT = And the big news? QMS proudly announced that the recent easing in the memory chip shortage has allowed them to lower the price of this printer from $24,995 to $21,995. It may not be an affordable product for most users but once again it was easily the most impressive printer at the show. @ARTICLE TEXT = @COMPANIES = TEKTRONIX: @ARTICLE TEXT = In addition to a well known line of high quality graphics terminals, Tektronix sells a high quality color printer known as the 4693D COLOR IMAGE PRINTER. Using thermal wax technology and specially coated paper and plastic transparency film, this printer produces output that was exceeded at the show only by the QMS ColorScript. Sample output pro-duced by Aldus Persuasion and Zenographics Mirage was indeed vivid and sharp. And the price? A somewhat reasonable $8,990! @ARTICLE TEXT = @CENTER UNDER = LASER PRINTER ENHANCEMENTS @ARTICLE TEXT = @COMPANIES = KROY, INC.: @ARTICLE TEXT = Now here's an interesting product. Kroy is best known for it's lettering machine that is widely used by engineers and architects. Their newest product allows you to add spot color to pages from a standard black and white laser printer. KROY COLOR PLUS is a two part system which consists of a $895 color transfer machine and a series of colored sheets which cost 65 cents each. To add color to a laser printed page, you simply put a colored sheet over the printed page and run both through the processor. The processor heats the colored sheet and the desired color replaces the black image left by the laser printer's toner. @ARTICLE TEXT = Kroy sales staffers showed several variations on this theme by using the device to add several different colors to one page. This can be done by arranging strips of different colors under a clear sheet of film. Not quite as nice as the QMS or Tektronix printers, but at $895 a very clever product. @ARTICLE TEXT = @COMPANIES = THE PRINTER WORKS: @ARTICLE TEXT = The Printer Works is a local ``value added retailer'' (VAR) that specializes in laser printers, supplies and accessories. At the show, they were showing three products that will be of interest to many of you. @ARTICLE TEXT = BUSINESS LASER PRINTER is a new laser printer from General Computer based on the Ricoh 6000 engine used in several printers such as the Okidata Laserline 6. The printer includes a genuine PostScript controller that includes the latest release of Adobe's well known fonts (rev 49.0). Even though this printer will eventually sell for $4,295, the Printer Works is selling it for $2,995 until their supplies run out. While I'm not a fan of the Ricoh engine, this offer may be to good for some of you to pass up. @ARTICLE TEXT = PLP FONT DISK is a $795 hard disk based controller that plugs into the Business Laser Printer and adds up to 7Mb RAM in print spooling and 20 Mb in additional fonts. The price on this one sounds a bit hard to believe so I'd call Printer Works before getting too excited about the product! @ARTICLE TEXT = SUPER CARTRIDGE 1 is a font cartridge from IQ Engineering of Sunnyvale that adds 55 fonts to a HP Laser Jet, Laser Jet II or 100% compatible laser printer. The cartridge is said to come with the necessary instructions and software drivers as well as enhanced font quality over the HP originals. If it works, this cartridge would be a great way to enhance the older HP laser printers which only have one font cartridge slot. It sells for a list price of $645 and is being sold by the Printer Works for $595. @ARTICLE TEXT = @CENTER UNDER = OPTICAL CHARACTER READERS (OCR) @ARTICLE TEXT = @COMPANIES = CAERE CORPORATION: @ARTICLE TEXT = Caere announced two versions of OMNI PAGE, a new product that works with OCR devices from Apple, Canon, Dest, DataCopy and Hewlett Packard. The Macintosh version of Omni Page is a software only product that ships next week at a price of $795. It requires a Macintosh II with 2Mb of RAM memory and uses the Mac's internal 68020 CPU to take a graphic image of a scanned page with text of sizes up to 72 point and translate it into a file ready for use with a Mac word processing program. @ARTICLE TEXT = The MS-DOS version of Omni Page consists of the software running under Microsoft Windows and a 68020 based co-processor card that handles the image conversion and allows Omni Page to run as a background application. This version supports 16 different MS-DOS word processing formats including Word Perfect, Word Star 2000, Wang PC, Microsoft Word, DisplayWrite 3 and 4, Multimate, Samna and DCA. The MS-DOS version will ship in October at a price of $2,495. @ARTICLE TEXT = Caere claims that Omni Page is the most advanced product of its type on the market. A demonstration of the product showed Omni Page successfully scanning and converting a page from Business Week magazine that included color, graphics, text and a photograph. @ARTICLE TEXT = @COMPANIES = CALERA RECOGNITION SYSTEMS: @ARTICLE TEXT = Formerly known as Palantir, this vendor also announced a product that allows current OCR devices to recognize proportional and printed text. Known as the TRUE SCAN series, this is a PC based product that combines software and a Motorola 68020 based co-processor card. Calera recommends that users have a PC AT or compatible (80286 or 80386 CPU) to run the product. @ARTICLE TEXT = Like the Caere Omni Page product, the Calera True Scan can read a variety of documents and typestyles including the obligatory page from Business Week. (Must be a new industry benchmark!) Calera distinguishes itself from the competition by several features including the ability to convert images directly into Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheets and top PC based desktop publishing programs (Pagemaker, Ventura Publisher and PC Paint-brush), converting images from a PC Fax board in the same micro and rotating scanned pages. True Scan has two versions: True Scan Model S ($2,495) and True Scan Model E ($3,495). (The Model E operates at higher speeds and has the image rotation feature which explains its higher price). @ARTICLE TEXT = @COMPANIES = CTA c/o Trans-National Trade Development Corporation : @ARTICLE TEXT = TEXT PERT: EXPERT TEXT READER is a Mac based product from a Mac software house in Spain known as CTA. Available in several versions (English, French, German, Italian, Spanish and Swedish) the product uses the native processor in a Mac SE or Mac II with 1Mb of RAM to translate image files from an Apple OCR device. Text Pert can handle typestyles up to 36 pitch from any document and distinguishes itself from the competition by including basic text editing commands in the product. Looks like an interesting product although I wonder how they will support the product since the technical staff is still based in Spain! @ARTICLE TEXT = @COMPANIES = DEST CORPORATION: @ARTICLE TEXT = As its answer to the Xerox/Kurzweil product, Dest announced an enhanced version of their high-end OCR unit. WORKLESS STATION II will support Mac and PC based systems as well as dedicated word processors from DEC and Wang. The product handles proportionally spaced type as well as traditional typefaces at a projected price of $10 - $12,000. Despite their leadership in the OCR field, I suspect that most users who need this capability will go for the more powerful co-processor systems described above if they work as advertised instead of this new product from Dest. @CENTER UNDER = VIDEO MONITORS & CARDS @ARTICLE TEXT = @COMPANIES = IBM CORPORATION: @ARTICLE TEXT = Shortly before the show IBM entered the world of full- page, high-resolution black and white monitors with the announcement of THE 8507 DISPLAY SYSTEM. The 8507 Display System consists of a 19" full page monitor and a video graphics card. Text quality on the monitor was nice although I can't honestly say that it bettered any of the other full page systems at the show. @ARTICLE TEXT = IBM also had a variety of desktop publishing systems on display, all of which had printers that were using HAMMERMILL LASER PRINT PAPER for output. I don't know if this makes Hammermill the ``official paper'' to be used with IBM printers but we use it with HP Laser Jet II and Desk Jet printers and find it to be one of the best products available for laser and desk jet use! @ARTICLE TEXT = @COMPANIES = MONITERM CORPORATION: @ARTICLE TEXT = Moniterm is a well-known manufacturer of full page, high resolution monitors for the Macintosh and PC compatible microcomputers. At the show they unveiled a new display system for the Mac II. Known as the VIKING G/S, this product features a 19" grey scale monitor and video controller board that offers 256 shades of grey and a resolution of 1024 x 768 for high quality desktop publishing and related applications on the Mac II. List price for the Viking G/S system is $4,195. @ARTICLE TEXT = @COMPANIES = WYSE TECHNOLOGIES: @ARTICLE TEXT = Adding to its line of monitor systems for desktop publishing and CAD use, Wyse announced the WY-7190 DISPLAY SUBSYSTEM. Billed as the first high quality display subsystem that supports multiple graphic modes (CGA, MDA, Hercules, VGA and WY-700), this product features a 19" monitor with a resolution of 1280 x 960, true paper-white phosphor (P-193) and a 16-bit, AT compatible graphics controller card based on the Texas Instruments TI 34010 graphics processor. @ARTICLE TEXT = This monitor features very sharp resolution and has one of the brightest white phosphors I've seen. I should also note that WYSE offers an optional anti-glare screen from Sun Flex that fits behind the monitor frame for users who are willing to trade some clarity and brightness for anti-glare protection. The WY-7190 will be available in volume in November at a suggested list price of $2,195. An optional VGA adapter board (required for the monitor's VGA mode) will be priced at $399. <188> @ARTICLE TEXT = @ARTICLE TEXT = @ART SB 8 =