Copyright © 2009 BERTL Inc.
April 2009
All Rights Reserved. The license under which this document is made available and applicable law prohibit any reproduction or further transmission of any portion of this document. This
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Page 9
April 2009
Xerox WorkCentre 4260 XF
www.BERTL.com
PRINTING BACKGROUND
Printing passed copying as the primary method of
reproducing documents years ago. Today, printing is just
as important—if not more important—than copying.
Connectivity
Most devices include Ethernet and USB connectivity out-
of-the-box. Some devices also include a parallel interface.
In addition, many devices provide a selection of optional
connectivity choices such as Wireless 802.11b or g (g is
the faster, preferred standard), Bluetooth for cell phone or
PDA connectivity, PictBridge photo printing for printing
directly from a digital camera, and FireWire for high-speed
local connectivity.
Page Description Languages (PDLs)
PCL is the page description language (PDL) provided by
most printer and MFP suppliers. Some manufacturers
charge for a PostScript upgrade or provide a PostScript
Level 3 emulation (clone). Still other manufacturers
provide genuine Adobe PostScript Level 3 and bundle in
PCL. A few manufacturers also include their own PDL,
which are typically loosely based on the Microsoft
Windows/GDI printing technology of old. These Windows
or GDI drivers often offer significant productivity
advantages over traditional PCL and PostScript print
drivers, since the bulk of the processing is handled by the
more powerful desktop PC, rather than by the less well-
equipped printer processor itself.
Network-Bandwidth/Print File Sizes
Native File
Size
PCL
PS
1-page digital photo PDF
4.48 MB
4.25 MB
5.79 MB
4 page Passport Form
PDF
0.08 MB
640 KB
503 KB
16-page Magazine in PDF
1.78 MB
7.48 MB
3.41 MB
22-page Excel Worksheet
0.12 MB
1.44 MB
1.44 MB
32-page Text-Based
PowerPoint
0.23 MB
6.25 MB
6.29 MB
32-page Graphic Intensive
PowerPoint
4.20 MB
14.1 MB
13.8 MB
38-page Form Word
Document
0.91 MB
14.0 MB
13.6 MB
50-page Text-Based PDF
0.17 MB
5.34 MB
1.72 MB
PRODUCTIVITY
Evaluating print productivity is not as simple as timing copy
jobs. The printing process involves several steps and can
be affected by a variety of factors along the way.
The document must first be spooled by the print driver into
a PCL or PostScript file. The PCL or PostScript file is then
sent to the printer where it is raster image processed
(RIPped) into image data by the device processor. The
image data is then sent to the marking engine and output
as printed pages.
There are three obvious factors highlighted above (spool
time, RIP time, and print engine speed), which can all
make or break a device’s overall productivity. Other
factors include concurrency and contention; for instance,
print speed may slow down when the device is being used
for other functions, such as scanning.
However, it is possible to time and compare these factors
through the use of careful preparation, conditioning and
testing. Following are charts that show printing
performance when tested under controlled conditions.
First Page Out Time (seconds)
Job List
Media
Size
PCL
PS
1-page photo print
Letter
16.08
22.25
4-page passport form
PDF
Letter
13.86
10.30
16-page Magazine PDF
Letter
11.71
11.80
22-page Excel Worksheet
Letter
10.37
10.66
32-page text-based
PowerPoint
Letter
10.46
12.46
32-page graphic-intensive
PowerPoint
Letter
12.42
16.77
38-page Word form
Letter
9.18
11.80
50-page text-based PDF
Letter
12.49
11.08
50-page text-based PDF
(duplex)
Letter
13.99
15.46
