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69-606: Sixel was first introduced as a way of sending bitmap graphics to DEC dot matrix printers like the LA50 . After being put into "sixel mode" the following data was interpreted to directly control six of the pins in the nine-pin print head . A string of sixel characters encodes a single 6-pixel high row of the image. The system was later re-used as a way to send bitmap data to the VT200 series and VT320 terminals when defining custom character sets . A series of sixels are used to transfer

138-620: A serial interface (LA30-S); however, the serial LA30 required the use of fill characters during the carriage-return. In 1972, a receive-only variation named LA30A became available. The LA30 was followed in 1974 by the LA36, which achieved far greater commercial success, becoming for a time the standard dot matrix computer terminal. The LA36 used the same print head as the LA30 but could print on forms of any width up to 132 columns of mixed-case output on standard green bar fanfold paper . The carriage

207-447: A stepper motor , rotary encoder attached to one wheel, or a transparent plastic band with markings that is read by an optical sensor on the printer head (common on inkjets ). Because the printing involves mechanical pressure, dot matrix printers can create carbon copies and carbonless copies . Although nearly all inkjet , thermal , and laser printers also print closely spaced dots rather than continuous lines or characters, it

276-565: A conventional printer was replaced by a spinning, fluted cylinder. The print head was a simple hammer, with a vertical projecting edge, operated by an electromagnet. Where the vertical edge of the hammer intersected the horizontal flute of the cylinder, compressing the paper and ribbon between them, a single dot was marked on the paper. Characters were built up of multiple dots. Unlike the LA30 's 80-column, uppercase-only 5 x 7 dot matrix, DEC's product line grew. New models included: The DECwriter LA30

345-426: A horizontally moving print head. The print head can be thought of featuring a single vertical column of seven or more pins approximately the height of a character box. In reality, the pins are arranged in up to four vertically or/and horizontally slightly displaced columns in order to increase the dot density and print speed through interleaving without causing the pins to jam. Thereby, up to 48 pins can be used to form

414-688: A local name, local currency or 'abroad' indication. In a similar fashion a nation's domestic stamps may be overprinted for use in foreign post offices under that power's control. For example, from 1919 to 1922 the United States overprinted 18 postage stamps at double value and marked for its office in Shanghai , China. Provisional stamps are postage issue made for temporary ad hoc usage to meet demands until regular issues are reintroduced. New states or states in transition have sometimes found it necessary to recirculate stocks of stamps printed by

483-547: A new national monetary system, such as Sierra Leone did when the British Commonwealth converted to decimal currency in the 1960s. Stamps have occasionally been overprinted multiple times. A famous example of repeated surcharging happened during the German hyperinflation of 1921–1923 . Prices rose so fast and dramatically that postage stamps which cost five or ten pfennigs in 1920 were overprinted for sale in

552-408: A number referring to one of a number of color registers , which varied from device to device. The colors in the registers are defined using either RGB or HLS values in a peculiar DEC format. To create a color image on a printer, a line of sixels is sent several times, each representing a single bitplane from the register-based colors on the terminals (normally 2 or 4 bits). Since the capabilities of

621-488: A particular strip forms a single sixel. Each sixel's pixels are read as binary and encoded into a single 6-bit number, with "on" pixels encoded as a 1. This number, from 0 to 63 decimal, is then converted into a single ASCII character, offset by 63 so that an all-black sixel, 0 decimal, is encoded as ? . This ensures that the sixels remain within the printable character range of the ASCII character set. Carriage return (CR)

690-627: A previous government. Some historical perspective may be gleaned from the study of such stamps: some transitional government overprints blend neatly with their predecessors' designs, while others attempt to totally obscure or even deface the older markings. In several European nations in 1944–45, Nazi occupational stamps were overprinted for the provisional governments, and those which depicted Adolf Hitler were most heavily overprinted, obliterating his face. During times of war, many nations have issued war tax stamps . Before new stamps could be printed, older stamps were frequently overprinted with surcharges or

759-549: A prominent overprint. The design and printing of valid paper currency is rarely done hastily and overprints are extremely rare, but in times of crisis such measures have been taken. After World War I, the various successor states of the Austro-Hungarian Empire made multilingual overprints to their old Imperial currency until new notes could be designed and circulated. Currency overprints were also used during World War II to mark all United States dollars in

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828-518: A similar print mechanism, a dot matrix printer can print arbitrary patterns and not just specific characters. The perceived quality of dot matrix printers depends on the vertical and horizontal resolution and the ability of the printer to overlap adjacent dots. 9-pin and 24-pin are common; this specifies the number of pins in a specific vertically aligned space. With 24-pin printers, the horizontal movement can slightly overlap dots, producing visually superior output ( near letter-quality or NLQ), usually at

897-415: A simple inscription such as "War Tax". In actual combat zones, the replenishment of stamp stocks is generally low on a military's list of priorities. In contested or occupied areas, captured local stamps are often expediently overprinted by the occupying forces. Any stamp that is cancelled by postal authorities before it is sold is described as "precancelled": the precancellation mark is an overprint. This

966-461: A simulated typewriter-like quality. By using multiple passes of the carriage, and higher dot density, the printer could increase the effective resolution. In 1985, The New York Times described the use of " near letter-quality, or NLQ" as "just a neat little bit of hype" but acknowledged that they "really show their stuff in the area of fonts, print enhancements and graphics." NLQ printers could generally be set to print in "draft mode", in which case

1035-427: A single pass of the print head per line would be used. This produced lower quality print at much higher output speed. In 1985, PC Magazine wrote "for the average personal computer user dot matrix remains the most workable choice". At the time, IBM sold Epson 's MX-80 as their IBM 5152. Another technology, inkjet printing , which uses the razor and blades business model (give away the razor handle, make money on

1104-471: A specific date, affording the bulk purchaser time to use them at their discretion. In some situations, however, months or years may be included in the overprint to indicate an expiration. Precancels for official government use are fastidiously prepared, but other kinds are almost always "heavy cancels" which deliberately obliterate much of a stamp's design. Since the 1980s, many modern postal systems no longer use overprints to indicate bulk purchases. Bulk mail

1173-575: A standard feature to facilitate connections to modern computers without legacy ports. Overprint An overprint is an additional layer of text or graphics added to the face of a postage or revenue stamp , postal stationery , banknote or ticket after it has been printed . Post offices most often use overprints for internal administrative purposes such as accounting but they are also employed in public mail . Well-recognized varieties include commemorative overprints which are produced for their public appeal and command significant interest in

1242-469: A time. The printer head is attached to a metal bar that ensures correct alignment, but horizontal positioning is controlled by a band that attaches to sprockets on two wheels at each side which is then driven with an electric motor. This band may be made of stainless steel, phosphor bronze or beryllium copper alloys, nylon or various synthetic materials with a twisted nylon core to prevent stretching. Actual position can be found out either by dead count using

1311-465: A true letter-quality printer such as a daisy wheel or laser printer, print quality was greatly superior to a 9-pin printer. As manufacturing costs declined, 24-pin printers gradually replaced 9-pin printers. By the dawn of the 1990s, inkjet printers became more common as PC printers. Dot matrix printing uses a print head that moves back-and-forth, or in an up-and-down motion, on the page and prints by impact, striking an ink-soaked cloth ribbon against

1380-466: A view to selling them to unsuspecting collectors. Stamps owned by commercial entities have sometimes privately overprinted the backs of their purchased stamps. These overprints are usually made as control marks or accounting information. Such overprinting does not invalidate a stamp unless it shows through the front. Some stamps are never valid for postal use. They are made for use in promotional displays or as reference material by postal authorities and

1449-399: Is franked using barcodes on pre-printed envelopes or on blank adhesive labels . The USPS introduced a new standard of barcode cancellation in 2011. Any overprint that does not originate from a stamp-issuing authority is considered a private overprint or private cancellation . Such overprints almost always invalidate a stamp for postal use. Most countries treat unofficial overprints

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1518-403: Is 14 pixels by 7 pixels, so the last line simply repeats 0b100000 14 times to fill the last line. $ at the end of a line means that the next line will overprint the current line, while - means that the next line represents a new line of sixels. Dot matrix printer Dot matrix printing , sometimes called impact matrix printing , is a computer printing process in which ink

1587-463: Is applied to a surface using a relatively low-resolution dot matrix for layout. Dot matrix printers are a type of impact printer that prints using a fixed number of pins or wires and typically use a print head that moves back and forth or in an up-and-down motion on the page and prints by impact, striking an ink-soaked cloth ribbon against the paper. They were also known as serial dot matrix printers . Unlike typewriters or line printers that use

1656-557: Is fanfolded and perforated so that pages can be easily torn from each other. In 1925, Rudolf Hell invented the Hellschreiber , an early facsimile -like dot matrix –based teletypewriter device, patented in 1929. Between 1952 and 1954 Fritz Karl Preikschat filed five patent applications for his teletype writer 7 stylus 35 dot matrix aka PKT printer, a dot matrix teletypewriter built between 1954 and 1956 in Germany. Like

1725-408: Is gradually supplanting them in some of these applications, but full-size dot-matrix impact printers are still used to print multi-part stationery . For example, dot matrix impact printers are still used at bank tellers and auto repair shops, and other applications where use of tractor feed paper is desirable such as data logging and aviation . Most of these printers now come with USB interfaces as

1794-553: Is not customary to call them dot matrix printers. Dot matrix printers have one of the lowest printing costs per page. They are able to use fanfold continuous paper with tractor holes. Dot matrix printers create noise when the pins or typeface strike the ribbon to the paper, and sound-damping enclosures may have to be used in quiet environments. They can only print lower-resolution graphics, with limited color performance, limited quality, and lower speeds compared to non-impact printers. The common serial dot matrix printers use

1863-400: Is represented by $ , and line feeds (LF) with a - ; both had to be sent in turn to return the cursor to the start of the line, CRLF . Sixel also includes a rudimentary form of compression, using run-length encoding (RLE). This is accomplished with the ! character followed by a decimal number of the times to repeat, and then a single sixel character to be repeated. Since

1932-463: Is the standard DEC " Device Control String ", or DCS, which was used to turn on or off a number of special features in DEC's equipment. The "q" is the sixel identifier. Sixel data then followed the q. The "String Terminator" sequence ESC + \ returned the device back to normal character mode again. For printing, sixels are sent to the printer, decoded back into binary, and sent directly to six pins in

2001-435: Is usually only done when stamps are sold in large bulk quantities to businesses or other large organizations: the postal service will save the labor of cancelling each individual stamp by precancelling the entire purchased quantity. The overprints also help prevent theft or misuse because they usually include the name of the city or region in which they are to be used. Unlike standard cancellation marks, they usually do not give

2070-444: The ! and decimal digits cannot be valid sixel data, lying outside the encoded range, the encoding is easy to identify and expand back out in software. "Sixel mode" is entered by sending the sequence ESC + Pp1;p2;p3;q . The p1 through p3 were optional setup parameters, with p1 defining an aspect ratio (deprecated in favor of p3), p2 how to interpret the color of zeros, and p3 with simple grid size parameters. ESC + P

2139-519: The 1966 FIFA World Cup were reissued after England's victory with the overprint "England Winners". Similarly, Guyana issued a set of 32 stamps showing team pictures of all the participants in the 1998 World Cup – after the tournament eight of these were reissued with an overprint announcing France's win. In some rare cases, commemorative overprints have been applied to souvenir sheets . When these postal commodities are overprinted, they are always very carefully positioned for aesthetic appeal, usually on

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2208-512: The LA30 , as did Centronics (then of Hudson , New Hampshire ): the Centronics 101. The search for a reliable printer mechanism led it to develop a relationship with Brother Industries, Ltd of Japan , and the sale of Centronics-badged Brother printer mechanisms equipped with a Centronics print head and Centronics electronics. Unlike Digital, Centronics concentrated on the low-end line printer marketplace with their distinctive units. In

2277-516: The Universal Postal Union (UPU). Still others are manufactured by printers for color matching throughout successive printings. In all such cases, the stamps will display the word "specimen" (or "cancelled") on its face. Occasionally, the word may be uniquely handwritten by a postal authority or, much more elaborately, punched through the stamp paper in a method known as perfin . Most often, though, specimen markings are applied as

2346-752: The dye-sublimation printer entered the market. In 1968, the Japanese manufacturer OKI introduced its first serial impact dot matrix printer (SIDM), the OKI Wiredot. The printer supported a character generator for 128 characters with a print matrix of 7 × 5. It was aimed at governmental, financial, scientific and educational markets. For this achievement, OKI received an award from the Information Processing Society of Japan (IPSJ) in 2013. In 1970 Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) introduced an impact dot matrix printer ,

2415-491: The 1980s. As carriage speed increased and dot density increased (from 60 dpi up to 240 dpi), with some adding color printing, additional typefaces allowed the user to vary the text appearance of printouts. Proportional-spaced fonts allowed the printer to imitate the non-uniform character widths of a typesetter, and also darker printouts. 'User-downloadable fonts' gave until the printer was powered off or soft-reset. The user could embed up to two NLQ custom typefaces in addition to

2484-469: The Hawaiian islands. These Hawaii overprint notes were made in case the islands were captured and the invading forces gained control of the money. Another unusual overprinting situation involving U.S. notes occurred when limited numbers of series 1935A silver certificate dollar bills were overprinted with either a red "R" or an "S". This indicated they were made of "regular" or "synthetic" paper and

2553-507: The MX) were notoriously loud during operation, a result of the hammer-like mechanism in the print head. The MX-80 even inspired the name of a noise rock band . The MX-80's low dot density (60 dpi horizontal, 72 dpi vertical) produced printouts of a distinctive "computerized" quality. When compared to the crisp typewriter quality of a daisy-wheel printer, the dot-matrix printer's legibility appeared especially bad. In office applications, output quality

2622-512: The US in 1957 he sold the rights to utilize the applications in any country (except the USA) to TuN. The prototype was also shown to General Mills in 1957. An improved transistorized design became the basis for a portable dot matrix facsimile machine, which was prototyped and evaluated for military use by Boeing around 1966–1967. IBM marketed its first dot matrix printer in 1957, the same year that

2691-506: The basic LA36 line into a wide variety of dot matrix printers. The DEC LA50 was designed to be a "compact, dot matrix" printer. When in graphic mode (as opposed to text mode), the printhead can generate graphic images. When in ( bitmap ) graphics mode, the LA50 can receive and print Sixel graphics format. The Centronics 101 (introduced 1970) was highly innovative and affordable at its inception. Some selected specifications: The IBM 5103

2760-470: The bitmap for each character. This feature is known as soft character sets or dynamically redefinable character sets ( DRCS ). With the VT240 , VT241 , VT330 , and VT340 , the terminals could decode a complete sixel image to the screen, like those previously sent to printers. Sixel encodes images by breaking up the bitmap into a series of 6-pixel high horizontal strips. Each 1-pixel-wide vertical column in

2829-694: The blank outer border (" selvage ") of the paper. Regular stamps were also overprinted to indicate exclusive usage for a special function or combination of functions; intended for airmail , official mail , newspapers , postage due , special delivery , telegraph and so on. The official stamps of some countries like Great Britain had an overprint which defined the specific official usage; for inland revenue , government parcels, office of works, military , admiralty, war tax (see below). The opposite occurs as well, in this case special function stamps are overprinted to serve as regular stamps. Overprints have been used as security measures to deter misuse and theft. In

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2898-450: The carriage return period, characters were buffered for subsequent printing at full speed during a catch-up period. The two-tone buzz produced by 60-character-per-second catch-up printing followed by 30-character-per-second ordinary printing was a distinctive feature of the LA36, quickly copied by many other manufacturers well into the 1990s. Most efficient dot matrix printers used this buffering technique. Digital technology later broadened

2967-485: The characters of a line while the print head moves horizontally. The printing speed of serial dot matrix printers with moving heads varies from 30 to 1550 characters per second (cps) . In a considerably different configuration, so called line dot matrix printers or line matrix printers use a fixed print head almost as wide as the paper path utilizing a horizontal line of thousands of pins for printing. Sometimes two horizontally slightly displaced rows are used to improve

3036-534: The cost of speed. Dot matrix printing is typically distinguished from non-impact methods, such as inkjet , thermal , or laser printing , which also use a bitmap to represent the printed work. These other technologies can support higher dot resolutions and print more quickly, with less noise. Unlike other technologies, impact printers can print on multi-part forms , allowing multiple copies to be made simultaneously, often on paper of different colors. They can also employ endless printing using continuous paper that

3105-511: The earlier Hellschreiber, it still used electromechanical means of coding and decoding, but it used a start-stop method ( asynchronous transmission ) rather than synchronous transmission for communication. In 1956, while he was employed at Telefonbau und Normalzeit GmbH ( TuN , later called Tenovis ), the device was offered to the Deutsche Bundespost (German Post Office), which did not show interest. When Preikschat emigrated to

3174-482: The effective dot density through interleaving. While still line-oriented, these printers for the professional heavy-duty market effectively print a whole line at once while the paper moves forward below the print head. Line matrix printers are capable of printing much more than 1000 cps, resulting in a throughput of up to 800 pages per hour. A variation on the dot matrix printer was the cross hammer dot printer, patented by Seikosha in 1982. The smooth cylindrical roller of

3243-485: The field of philately . The term "surcharge" in philately describes any type of overprint that alters the price of a stamp. Surcharges raise or lower the face value of existing stamps when prices have changed too quickly to produce an appropriate new issue, or simply to use up surplus stocks. Any overprint which restates a stamp's face value in a new currency is also described as a surcharge. Some postal systems have resorted to surcharge overprints when converting to

3312-521: The following commands set register 1 to yellow (100%, 100%, 0%) and 2 to green (0%, 100%, 0%). Unlike most modern systems which assign an 8-bit value (0–255) to each color channel, RGB mode is based on "intensity" of each channel from 0% to 100%. The data lines following select a color, yellow for the first and third and green for the middle, then draw sixels. The last line shows the RLE in use, meaning "repeat @ ( 0b100000 ) 14 times". The final output

3381-469: The format was almost identical, although the escape codes changed. In terms of the data, the only major difference is the replacement of the separate CR/LF with a single / . In the VT300 series for instance, 80-column character glyphs were 15 pixels wide by 12 high, meaning that a character could be defined by sending a total of 30 sixels. Color is also supported using the # character, followed by

3450-430: The hardware vary widely, a color sixel drawing can only be output to targeted devices. Non-graphics terminals generally silently ignore sixel escape sequences. The example above enters sixel mode, sets up three color registers, and then uses those registers to draw sixels in those colors. The #0;2;0;0;0 is interpreted as "set color register 0, use mode 2 (RGB mode), set R, G and B to 0%". This sets color 0 to black, and

3519-484: The nineteenth century, Mexico was plagued by thefts of stamps on their way to remote post offices. To address this, stamps were shipped from Mexico City to the local districts where they were overprinted with the district name – they were not valid for postage without the overprint. In El Salvador a significant quantity of stamps was stolen from the San Salvador post office in 1874. As a result all remaining stock

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3588-427: The paper, much like the print mechanism on a typewriter . However, unlike a typewriter or daisy wheel printer , letters are drawn out of a dot matrix, and thus, varied fonts and arbitrary graphics can be produced. Each dot is produced by a tiny metal rod, also called a "wire" or "pin", which is driven forward by the power of a tiny electromagnet or solenoid , either directly or through small levers (pawls). Facing

3657-522: The print head. The only complexity involved expanding the RLEs into the internal print buffer. Display on a terminal is somewhat more difficult. On terminals supporting graphics, the ReGIS graphics system was used to directly draw the sixel pattern into the screen's bitmap. This was done at high speed by storing the bitmap patterns as a glyph and then blitting them. When used for defining custom character sets

3726-406: The printer's built-in (ROM) typefaces. The desktop impact printer was gradually replaced by the inkjet printer . When Hewlett-Packard 's US patent 4578687   expired on steam-propelled photolithographically produced ink-jet heads in 2004, the inkjet mechanism became available to the printer industry. For applications that did not require impact (e.g. carbon-copy printing), the inkjet

3795-628: The process, they designed the parallel electrical interface that was to become standard on most printers until it began to be replaced by the Universal Serial Bus ( USB ) in the late 1990s. DEC was a major vendor, albeit with a focus on use with their PDP minicomputer line. Their LA30 30 character/second (CPS) dot matrix printer, the first of many, was introduced in 1970. In the mid-1980s, dot-matrix printers were dropping in price, and began to outsell daisywheel printers , due to their higher speed and versatility. The Apple ImageWriter

3864-722: The razor blade) has reduced the value of the low cost for the printer: "a price per milliliter on par with liquid gold" for the ink/toner. In June 1978, the Epson TX-80/TP-80, an 8-pin dot-matrix printer mainly used for the Commodore PET computer, was released. This and its successor, the 9-pin MX-80/MP-80 (introduced in 1979–1980), sparked the popularity of impact printers in the personal computer market. The MX-80 combined affordability with good-quality text output (for its time). Early impact printers (including

3933-435: The ribbon and the paper is a small guide plate named ribbon mask holder or protector, sometimes also called butterfly for its typical shape. It is pierced with holes to serve as guides for the pins. The plate may be made of hard plastic or an artificial jewel such as sapphire or ruby . The portion of the printer that contains the pin is called the print head. When running the printer, it generally prints one line of text at

4002-450: The same reasons as for their domestic use. Due to poor planning, supply problems, faster than anticipated changing postal rates, changes in currency or other reasons they ran out of stamps, and demand had to be met. Some overprints were used to establish the first stage of postal service in a new territorial possession or colony however. If preparations had not been made, the controlling nation's regular homeland stamps would be overprinted with

4071-689: The same way the United States Post Office does: the USPS Domestic Mail Manual states that stamps "overprinted with an unauthorized design, message or other marking" are not valid for postage. Private overprints generally remain outside the formal realm of philately, although individual issues can achieve notoriety through their popularity or aesthetic appeal. Private overprints are typically political messages or commercial promotion, but can also originate from speculative philatelic purposes produced deliberately with

4140-431: The values of thousands, millions, and eventually billions of marks. Overprints have often been used as commemoratives , providing a faster and lower-cost alternative to designing and issuing special stamps or postmarks . The United States , which historically has issued relatively few commemorative overprints, did this in 1928 for issues celebrating Molly Pitcher and the discovery of Hawaii . British stamps heralding

4209-431: Was a 30 character per second dot matrix printing terminal introduced in 1970 by Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) of Maynard, Massachusetts It printed 80 columns of uppercase-only 7 × 5 dot matrix characters across a unique-sized paper. The printhead was driven by a stepper motor and the paper was advanced by a noisy solenoid ratchet drive. The LA30 was available with both a parallel interface (LA30-P) and

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4278-431: Was a popular consumer dot matrix printer in the 1980s until the mid-1990s. In the 1970s and 1980s, dot matrix impact printers were generally considered the best combination of cost and versatility, and until the 1990s were by far the most common form of printer used with personal and home computers . Increased pincount of the printhead from 7, 8, 9 or 12 pins to 18, 24, 27, or 36 permitted superior print quality, which

4347-604: Was a serious issue, as the dot-matrix text's readability would rapidly degrade with each photocopy generation. Initially, third-party printer enhancement software offered a quick fix to the quality issue. General strategies were: Some newer dot-matrix impact printers could reproduce bitmap images via "dot-addressable" capability. In 1981, Epson offered a retrofit EPROM kit called Graftrax to add this to many early MX series printers. Banners and signs produced with software that used this ability, such as Broderbund 's Print Shop , became ubiquitous in offices and schools throughout

4416-583: Was a test of their wearing qualities. The Haitian Gourde was overprinted after the unexpectedly rapid fall of the Baby Doc Duvalier regime. The overprint consisted of a red circle with a slash across it with the date of the end of the Duvalier regime (7 February 1986) printed below in red. The brusque symbol obscured the images of Baby Doc and Papa Doc until they were replaced with images of figures from Haitian history. Something similar

4485-456: Was moved by a much-more-capable servo drive using a DC electric motor and an optical encoder / tachometer . The paper was moved by a stepper motor. The LA36 was only available with a serial interface but unlike the earlier LA30, no fill characters were required. This was possible because, while the printer never communicated at faster than 30 characters per second, the mechanism was actually capable of printing at 60 characters per second. During

4554-518: Was necessary for success in Asian markets to print legible CJKV characters . Epson's 24-pin LQ-series rose to become the new de facto standard, at 24/180 inch (per pass – 7.5 lpi). Not only could a 24-pin printer lay down a denser dot-pattern in a single pass, it could simultaneously cover a larger area and print more quickly. Although the text quality of a 24-pin was still visibly inferior to

4623-495: Was officially overprinted 'Contrasello' preventing usage of the non-overprinted stamps. The United States used a similar strategy to deal with thefts in Kansas and Nebraska in 1929, overprinting the current definitive issue with "Kans." and "Nebr." before they were shipped from Washington, to make it more difficult to sell stolen stamps outside the indicated state. Nations overprinted stamps for use in their colonies mainly for

4692-404: Was superior in nearly all respects: comparatively quiet operation, faster print speed, and output quality almost as good as a laser printer. By 1995, inkjet technology had surpassed dot matrix impact technology in the mainstream market and relegated dot matrix to niche applications. As of 2021 , dot matrix impact technology remains in use in devices and applications such as: Thermal printing

4761-448: Was the only IBM printer that could be attached to the IBM 5100 , an early day portable computer. Printing was 8 DPI, 10 pitch, 6 LPI, and capable of printing bidirectionally from a 128-character set. Two models were offered: 80 and 120 characters per second. Near Letter Quality mode—informally specified as almost good enough to be used in a business letter —endowed dot-matrix printers with

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