JP2003162199A - Printer - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a printer which switches between high quality printing and high-speed printing corresponding to the upper limit of a total amount of printing toner, secures print quality, and efficiently carries out a printing job. <P>SOLUTION: Print data supplied from a host apparatus 2 is stored into a print data holding part 4 through a print data receiving part 3, and the operation of an amount of toner used is carried out by a toner total amount calculation part 9. In this case, the toner total amount calculation part 9 sets a print speed by referring to a table 10 on the upper limit of the total amount of toner, and notifies information on the print speed set in an engine speed control part 11. A printer engine 8 carries out the printing job of print data at a print speed set by the engine speed control part 11. Accordingly, the printer can carry out the printing job of the print data at a print speed on the basis of the print data and at a high processing speed while securing the print quality. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2003,JPO

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a printing device capable of changing a printing speed.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In a color printer apparatus for performing color printing by combining toners of a plurality of colors, the upper limit value of the total toner amount per unit area that enables normal printing is defined by the printing performance of the apparatus.

Generally, the upper limit of the total amount of toner is the printing speed,
It is related to the engine speed of the so-called printer engine,
The higher the engine speed, the smaller the total toner amount upper limit value, and the slower the engine speed, the larger the total toner amount upper limit value. Here, when the upper limit of the total toner amount is large, color reproducibility is improved, and high quality printing is possible. If the upper limit of the total amount of toner is small, the color reproducibility is poor and the quality of printing is low.

In a printer having a plurality of engine speeds, the printer engine is operated at a low speed when high quality printing is performed, while the printer engine is operated when high quality printing is not expected. It drives at high speed to improve printing speed.

[0005]

However, in the conventional printer device, regardless of the content of the print data to be actually printed, the engine may be set according to a preset state before the printing process, for example, a high-quality printing or a high-speed printing setting state. The speed has been determined.

Therefore, for example, even when the data to be actually printed is equal to or smaller than the upper limit value of the total toner amount at the time of engine high speed, high quality printing is designated (processing is performed at low speed), and wasteful printing time is used. Be seen. For example, in the case of collectively processing print data for 50 pages, if high-quality printing is designated, the processing is performed at a low speed, and even if such a high print quality is not needed, the low-speed processing wastes time. .

On the other hand, when the high speed printing is designated, on the other hand, even if the print data exceeds the upper limit of the total amount of toner, the high speed processing is performed and the print quality is deteriorated. For example, even in the case of print data for two pages, high-speed processing is performed and print quality is degraded. The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and provides a printing apparatus that switches the printing speed in accordance with the upper limit value of the total amount of toner in the print data, secures the printing quality, and performs high-speed printing processing. It is a thing.

[0008]

According to the invention as set forth in claim 1, the above-mentioned object is to determine the amount of developer used for print data in a printing apparatus for printing using developer based on print data. An arithmetic means for performing an arithmetic operation, a printing speed setting means for setting a printing speed for the print data in accordance with an arithmetic result by the arithmetic means, and a printing process for printing the print data at the printing speed set by the printing speed setting means This can be achieved by providing a printing device with a processing means.

The present invention is used in a printing apparatus that uses a developer such as an electrophotographic system or an inkjet system, and calculates the amount of developer used for print data as, for example, the amount of use per unit area, and prints each print data. The printing speed is determined according to the total amount of. By configuring in this way,
The set print speed corresponds to the total amount of developer corresponding to the print data, and printing can be performed at the optimum print speed.

According to a second aspect, in the invention according to the first aspect, the developer is, for example, a toner. This example is compatible with a printing apparatus that uses toner, and has a configuration in which the printing speed is set based on the amount of toner used corresponding to the print data, and the printing process is performed at the printing speed corresponding to the print data.

According to a third aspect of the present invention, in the first or second aspect of the present invention, there is provided storage means for storing the print data, and the computing means reads the print data from the storage means and uses the developer. Is a configuration for calculating. Here, the storage means for storing the print data may be provided exclusively, or an existing reception buffer or the like may be substituted.

With this configuration, the total amount of toner and the like can be calculated using the print data once stored in the storage unit, and the calculation unit can calculate the total amount of toner and the like at a predetermined speed. Claim 4 is the same as claim 1,
In the description of 2 or 3, the printing speed setting unit has a table that stores the printing speed corresponding to the usage amount of the developer, and searches the table to set the printing speed corresponding to the usage amount of the developer. This is the configuration.

Here, in the table, for example, the printing speed corresponding to the usage amount of the developer is divided into n stages and stored,
The printing speed corresponding to the total amount of the developer performed by the calculation means is determined. For example, the upper limit value of the above n levels is selected and set as the corresponding printing speed.

With this configuration, it is possible to efficiently set the printing speed corresponding to the print data. The description of claim 5 is the same as the description of claim 4 above.
The table stores printing speed information of high speed printing or low speed printing.

With this configuration, the printing speed can be set more quickly by the alternative selection.

[0016]

BEST MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION Embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a circuit block diagram of a printer device (printing device) used to describe the present embodiment.

In FIG. 1, the printer device 1 is connected to a host device 2 such as a personal computer (PC),
The print data is supplied from the host device 2. The printer device 1 includes a print data receiving unit 3, a print data holding unit 4,
Print data drawing unit 5, image memory 6, drawing data transfer unit 7, printer engine 8, total toner amount calculation unit 9, total toner amount upper limit table 10, engine speed control unit 11
It is composed of.

The print data receiving unit 3 receives the print data supplied from the host device 2 and stores it in the print data holding unit 4. The print data holding unit 4 stores the print data supplied via the print data receiving unit 3 for a predetermined period. When the print data holding unit 4 holds a predetermined amount of print data, the print data drawing unit 5 reads the print data,
Perform command analysis. Then, for example, the data converted into bitmap data is expanded in the image memory 6. The drawing data transfer unit 7 has a function of transferring the data expanded in the image memory 6 to the printer engine 8, and transfers the print data to the printer engine 8 by, for example, DMA (Direct Memory Access) transfer.

On the other hand, the total toner amount calculation unit 9 calculates the toner usage amount Tcur of the print data held in the print data holding unit 4. This process is performed by referring to the print data held in the print data holding unit 4. The total toner amount upper limit value table 10 is a table used for determining an engine speed, which will be described later. The engine speed control unit 11 controls the engine speed according to the print speed information supplied from the total toner amount calculation unit 9.

FIG. 2 shows the total toner amount upper limit value table 10 described above.
It is an example of the table built in. In this table, as shown in the figure, the data structure has n stages and the record #
The total toner amount upper limit value corresponding to the engine speed is registered in each of 0 to # n-1.

FIG. 3 is a diagram for specifically explaining FIG. In this example, the data structure has four levels, and the record # 0 has a print speed of 6 pp with respect to the total toner upper limit value 280.
The data of m is registered, the data of the printing speed 12 ppm for the total toner amount upper limit value 250 is registered in the record # 1, and the total toner amount upper limit value 2 is also recorded in the records # 2 and # 3.
Data of a printing speed of 24 ppm for 30 and data of a printing speed of 40 ppm for the total toner upper limit value 210 are registered. With the above configuration, the processing of this embodiment will be described below.

First, according to the flow chart shown in FIG. 4, the print data receiving section 3 judges whether or not print data is received from the host device 2 (step (hereinafter referred to as ST)).
1) Wait for input of print data (ST1 is NO). After that, when print data is input from the host device 2 (ST1
Is YES), the print data is received and stored in the print data holding unit 4 (ST2).

Next, the print data receiving section 3 determines whether or not one page of print data is stored in the print data holding section 4 (ST3). Then, the process of receiving the print data is repeated until the storage of the print data for one page is completed (ST3
Is NO, ST2). After that, when the storage of the print data for one page is completed (YES in ST3), the print data holding unit 4
The process of saving the print data to the printer is completed (ST4).

Next, the total toner amount calculation unit 9 calculates the total toner amount upper limit value based on the print data stored in the print data holding unit 4. FIG. 5 is a flowchart explaining this processing. First, it is determined whether the print data storage processing is completed (ST5). Here, if the print data saving process has been completed as described above (ST5 returns YE
S), the total toner amount maximum value Tmax is cleared, and the toner usage amount Tcur per unit area of the print data is calculated (ST6,
ST7). In this process, the total toner amount calculation unit 9 refers to the print data holding unit 4 to calculate the toner usage amount Tcur per unit area of the print data. For example, referring to print data in a range including a predetermined dot, printing for each dot,
Calculation is performed by reading the gradation information for each non-printing.

The data thus obtained is then used for comparison between the toner usage amount Tcur and the total toner maximum value Tmax (ST8). If the toner usage amount Tcur is large (ST8).
8 is YES), and it is determined whether the calculation process of the toner usage amount of all print data is completed (ST10). On the other hand, if the calculation process of the toner usage amount of all print data is not completed yet (NO in ST10), the toner usage amount calculation position in the page is updated, and the toner usage amount calculation process is continued (ST7-).
ST11). If the toner usage amount Tcur is not large (YES in ST8), the process (ST10) is executed with the toner usage amount Tcur set to the maximum toner amount maximum value Tmax.

After that, when the calculation process of the toner usage amount is completed (YES in ST10), the registered number n of the total toner amount upper limit value table 10 is read (ST12). For example, in the example of the table shown in FIG. 3 described above, n is “4”.
First, n-1 is calculated, and it is determined whether the n-1 is "0" (ST13, ST14).

In the above example, n-1 is "3", the judgment (ST14) is NO, and the total toner upper limit value T0 is read from the table (ST15). Then, it is determined whether the total toner amount upper limit value T0 is larger than the total toner amount maximum value Tmax (ST16). If the total toner amount upper limit value T0 is not larger (NO in ST16), n-1 is calculated again and the above process is repeated (ST13 to ST).
16). On the other hand, if the total toner amount upper limit value T0 is larger than the total toner amount maximum value Tmax (YES in ST16), the engine speed data of the corresponding upper limit value is read out from the table and notified to the engine speed control unit 11 (ST17).
Also, information on the corresponding upper limit value of the total amount of toner is notified (S
T18).

For example, when the total toner amount upper limit value T0 calculated by the total toner amount calculation unit 9 is 220 and the total toner amount upper limit table shown in FIG. 3 is used, the minimum total toner amount upper limit value of 220 or more is 230. , The corresponding engine speed is 24ppm. Therefore, in this case, the engine speed control unit 11 is notified of the engine speed of 24 ppm, and the print data drawing unit 5 is also notified of the engine speed information.

Note that, for example, the maximum total toner amount Tmax is set to 29
When the above table is used, the total toner amount upper limit value of 290 or more does not exist in the table. Therefore, the maximum toner amount upper limit value in the table is set to 280. Thereafter, the same processing is performed, and the engine speed control unit 11 is notified of information on an appropriate engine speed in accordance with the information on the total toner amount upper limit value.

The engine speed control section 11 carries out processing according to the flow chart shown in FIG. That is, if the engine speed is set as described above (YES in ST19),
The printer engine speed is controlled so that the printer engine operates at the notified engine speed (ST20).

Further, according to the flow chart shown in FIG. 7, the print data drawing unit 5 receives the above notification (ST2
1) The print data is expanded in the image memory 6 (ST2
2). That is, the print data is read from the print data holding unit 4, command analysis is performed, and the data is expanded in the image memory 6 every predetermined byte. Then, it is judged whether the development of the print data for one page is completed (ST23), and when the development of the print data for one page is completed (YES in ST23), the completion of the drawing of the print data is notified (ST24).

Further, FIG. 8 is a flow chart for explaining the processing of the drawing data transfer section 7. When the processing for expanding the bitmap data in the image memory 6 is completed as described above (YES in ST25), the image memory 6 Of the data is transferred to the printer engine 8 (ST26).

The printer engine 8 prints on the recording paper according to the transferred data. At this time, the printing process is performed according to the engine speed notified from the engine speed control unit 11 described above. For example, when the toner usage amount Tcur is large, the printing speed is correspondingly low, and when the toner usage amount Tcur is small, the printing speed is correspondingly high, and the print data is printed at the optimum printing speed. Can be printed on recording paper.

With this configuration, according to the present example, it is possible to ensure the print quality and perform efficient print processing. Incidentally, FIG. 9 shows an example of a two-stage table of low speed printing or high speed printing instead of the total toner amount upper limit value table 10. The printing of this example can also be performed by using such a table. A device can be provided.

Further, in the above description of the embodiment, the printer device using toner as the developer has been described, but it may be applied to an ink jet type printer device, for example. The data held by the print data holding unit 4 is not limited to the print data for one page.
It may be print data for several pages or for one document (for one job).

Further, the calculation processing performed by the total toner amount calculation unit 9 is performed for each unit area, but may be performed for each drawing pixel, for example. In addition, the engine speed is n stages,
Although the upper limit value is set for each step, the engine speed of the printer engine may be constant and the total toner amount upper limit may be calculated from the engine speed.

Further, although the engine speed is changed page by page, the engine speed may be changed in consideration of the time loss due to the engine speed switching process or the like.

[0038]

As described above, according to the present invention, the print processing can be performed at the optimum print speed corresponding to the print data, and the print processing is performed at the optimum print speed while ensuring the print quality. be able to.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a system block diagram of a printer device (printing device) used to describe the present embodiment.

FIG. 2 is an example of a table constructed in a toner total amount upper limit table.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a specific example of a toner total amount upper limit value corresponding to an engine speed.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart illustrating a process of a print data receiving unit.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart illustrating a process of a total toner amount calculation unit.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart illustrating a process of an engine speed control unit.

FIG. 7 is a flowchart illustrating a process of a print data drawing unit.

FIG. 8 is a flowchart illustrating a process of a drawing data transfer unit.

FIG. 9 is a diagram showing another example of a total toner amount upper limit value table.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 Printer device 2 Host device 3 Print data receiver 4 Print data storage 5 Print data drawing part 6 image memory 7 Drawing data transfer unit 8 printer engine 9 Total toner amount calculator 10 Toner total amount upper limit value table 11 Engine speed controller

   ─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continued front page    F term (reference) 2C061 AQ06 AR01 BB10 HH03 HJ02                       HK18 HK23 HM01 HM03 HN02                       HN15 HN20                 2H027 DA17 DA45 DD02 DE07 EE03                       EE08 FD08                 5B021 AA02 BB01 BB04 CC05                 5C074 AA12 BB17 DD13 DD16 EE08                       GG13

Claims (5)

[Claims] 1. A printing device for printing using a developer based on print data, a calculation means for calculating a usage amount of the developer for the print data, and the print data according to a calculation result by the calculation means. A printing apparatus, comprising: a printing speed setting unit that sets a printing speed for the print data; and a printing processing unit that prints the print data at the printing speed set by the printing speed setting unit. 2. The printing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the developer is toner. 3. The method according to claim 1, further comprising storage means for storing the print data, wherein the calculation means reads out the print data from the storage means and calculates a usage amount of the developer. Printing device. 4. The printing speed setting means has a table that stores the printing speed corresponding to the usage amount of the developer, and searches the table to determine the printing speed corresponding to the usage amount of the developer. The printing device according to claim 1, 2, or 3. 5. The printing apparatus according to claim 4, wherein the table stores printing speed information of high speed printing or low speed printing.