Epson Stylus 600 - compatible with an Acorn?
Robin Moffatt
about the availability of printer drivers etc for use on his RPC600. He
currently has a Cannon BJ200 working with Turbo drivers.
So, is anyone currently using an Epson 600 with their Acorn? Are there Turbo
drivers for the Epson 600?
TIA,
Robin Moffatt
(If possible plz email him directly - Al...@moffatt.demon.co.uk)
--
|D |\/| oo Horn Player oo Sheffield, UK oo
|\obin | |offatt oo R.Mo...@IName.com oo ICQ #13864293 oo
"Two boll weevils grew up in South Carolina. One went to
Hollywood and became a famous actor. The other stayed behind in
the cotton fields and never amounted to much. The second one,
naturally, became known as the lesser of two weevils."
John Kortink
>
> My father is looking into purchasing an Epson Stylus 600, but is concerned
> about the availability of printer drivers etc for use on his RPC600. He
> currently has a Cannon BJ200 working with Turbo drivers.
>
> So, is anyone currently using an Epson 600 with their Acorn? Are there Turbo
> drivers for the Epson 600?
I have one and have got it working with a printer
config file available from Acorn's ftp site. Alas
my PC (ugh) produces much better quality output
with it (Epson's own drivers), so expect not to
get the most out of it.
John Kortink
email : kor...@inter.nl.net (private and preferred), or j...@arcobel.nl (work)
Peter Smith
"Robin Moffatt" <ro...@moffatt.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> My father is looking into purchasing an Epson Stylus 600, but is concerned
> about the availability of printer drivers etc for use on his RPC600. He
> currently has a Cannon BJ200 working with Turbo drivers.
>
> So, is anyone currently using an Epson 600 with their Acorn? Are there
> Turbo drivers for the Epson 600?
I don't know about the TurboDrivers, but I've got an Epson Stylus 600 colour
with my RiscPC and it's great!
I've had no problems with banding and blocked heads that I got with my old
800 B&W. The printer definitions are on the Acorn site somewhere, and they
may be included with RiscOS 3.7.
FWIW, I've actually got the printer attached to my PC, and I print across my
LAN. This way PC and RPC can both share the printer.
HTH
Peter
(CCd to Robin's Dad)
--
To reply by mail, change .com to .co in my email address
54 things to do in a lift....
34. Play the harmonica.
Andy Marks
> Are there Turbo drivers for the Epson 600?
Don't know about that bit!
--
-------------------------------------------
Andy Marks - and...@argonet.co.uk
Creswell, Derbyshire
Home of the World-Famous(?) Creswell Crags
I know, I've seen them!
-------------------------------------------
Alan Jones
<URL:mailto:and...@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> On 30 Jul in comp.sys.acorn.apps, Robin Moffatt
> <ro...@moffatt.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > So, is anyone currently using an Epson 600 with their Acorn?
> Yes, I am, with the standard drivers available from Xemplar.
>
> > Are there Turbo drivers for the Epson 600?
> Don't know about that bit!
Nope... The Epson Stylus Colour deffinitions work ok but not as good
as the Acorn ones.
Alan
>
**************************************************************************
Alan J Jones | -- ACORN DEALER and RESOURCE CENTRE -- |
Product Manager | Distributors of Acorn Third Party Software for |
Koala Soft | Education, Business and Home Computing |
| PO. Box 157, Winmalee. NSW 2777. AUSTRALIA |
**************************************************************************
Chris Hughes
<URL:mailto:ru...@bolsterstone.demon.com.uk> wrote:
> The strength of a chain being it's weakest link etc. . If Acorn can't get
> their act together with input/output devices soon, then I see little
> future in the Acorn desktops :-(
It was announced at the Wakefield Show and been mentioned on the net and in
magazines that Acorn will be releasing a new !Printers that work with
Photo-realistic printers, and other general improvements etc, they hoped
when Phoebe is released September/October time, possibly just with Phoebe at
first but I can't see that lasting long the demand is big for a new
!Printers.
--
Chris Hughes, Member of Wakefield Acorn Computer (User) Group
(The views expressed above are mine, and not necessarily the User Group's)
scotts
Ruth Gunstone <ru...@bolsterstone.demon.com.uk> wrote:
>
> I have the Epson Stylus Colour 600, working with Acorn/Xemplar's latest
> drivers. However, many of the drivers options, wrt resolution/colour
> depth produce some horrible messes!
> With experimentation, I found a couple of greyscale options that work ok,
> and a couple of hi-res colour options, and stick to those.
I have just got hold of this printer (my old Canon BJC600's print head died)
and I have also had problems trying to use the 720dpi (Super) option in
the driver, as downloaded from Xemplar's ftp site. I'll try the one on Acorn's
ftp though, to see if its different. I'm using V1.53 of !Printers.
It works on 360dpi though. I havent tried color printing yet though.
The Epson PC driver is very comprehensive. Take note, Acorn!
> I was told by a representative of Acorn that they are looking into the
> !Printers problem, and have a person "working on it".
I hope it gets sorted. And soon.
Steve
--
+-- --+
| Stephen Scott, Acorn User magazine, IDG Media |
sco...@idg.co.uk, http://www.idg.co.uk/acornuser
My personal contact details;
| sa_s...@yahoo.com, http://sascott.home.ml.org/ |
+-- --+
Stuart Bell
> It was announced at the Wakefield Show and been mentioned on the net and
> in magazines that Acorn will be releasing a new !Printers that work with
> Photo-realistic printers, and other general improvements etc, they hoped
> when Phoebe is released September/October time, possibly just with
> Phoebe at first but I can't see that lasting long the demand is big for
> a new !Printers.
Wasn't a major improvement in !Printers announced well over a year ago?
:-( :-( :-(
--
Stuart Bell - change nospam to argonet to email responses to news.
Running an Acorn Risc PC, a Mac Color Classic and
an Apple PowerBook 100 in a Wintel-free Zone.
Paul Vigay
> > It was announced at the Wakefield Show and been mentioned on the net and
> > in magazines that Acorn will be releasing a new !Printers that work with
> > Photo-realistic printers, and other general improvements etc, they hoped
> > when Phoebe is released September/October time, possibly just with
> > Phoebe at first but I can't see that lasting long the demand is big for
> > a new !Printers.
> Wasn't a major improvement in !Printers announced well over a year ago?
> :-( :-( :-(
It was certainly mentioned to me at the Acorn Southwest show many months
ago.
--
Paul Vigay Acorn Programming,
__\\|//__ Internet Consultancy
http://www.matrix.clara.net (` o-o ') & Web Design
-----------------------------------ooO-(_)-Ooo---------------------------
Get outta there!
Remove ".vogonpoetry" to reply by email.
Paul Vigay
> > In article <486E3C3398%ru...@bolsterstone.demon.com.uk>, Ruth Gunstone
> > <URL:mailto:ru...@bolsterstone.demon.com.uk> wrote:
> > > The strength of a chain being it's weakest link etc. . If Acorn can't
> > > get their act together with input/output devices soon, then I see
> > > little future in the Acorn desktops :-(
> > It was announced at the Wakefield Show and been mentioned on the net and
> > in magazines that Acorn will be releasing a new !Printers that work with
> > Photo-realistic printers, and other general improvements etc, they hoped
> > when Phoebe is released September/October time, possibly just with
> > Phoebe at first but I can't see that lasting long the demand is big for
> > a new !Printers.
> I was told by someone.high.up@acorn in November '96 that a new !Printers
> with configurable palettes etc was going to be released in the following
> spring - ie '97.
Aha. That's it then. Not year 2000 compliant.....
Presumably by '97 they meant 2097!
:-)
--
Paul Vigay Acorn Programming,
__\\|//__ Internet Consultancy
http://www.matrix.clara.net (` o-o ') & Web Design
-----------------------------------ooO-(_)-Ooo---------------------------
Stand by.
Andrew P. Harmsworth Esq.
<ch...@cumbrian.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> possibly just with Phoebe at first but I can't see that lasting long
> the demand is big for a new !Printers.
Yes, but I bet you a dime they'll make non-Phoebe buyers pay for it, just
like they did with Java and Browse.
APH
--
\ http://www.warwick.warwks.sch.uk/ | Warwick School | Designed on \
>------------------------------------+----------------+---Acorn------->
/ Daytime Phone: +44 (0)1926 776464 | WARWICK | 233 MHz /
Facsimile: +44 (0)1926 401259 | CV34 6PP | StrongARM
a...@warwick.warwks.sch.uk | United Kingdom | RiscPCs
Mike Lane
Andrew P. Harmsworth Esq. <dna...@ni.edam.maps> wrote:
> Yes, but I bet you a dime they'll make non-Phoebe buyers pay for it, just
> like they did with Java and Browse.
Well of course they will! Why should you expect to get professionally written
software for nothing?
--
Mike Lane
Daniel Pead
inn.demon.co.uk> writes
>> Yes, but I bet you a dime they'll make non-Phoebe buyers pay for it, just
>> like they did with Java and Browse.
>
>Well of course they will! Why should you expect to get professionally written
>software for nothing?
Because its "available for nothing" on other platforms. If a PC/Mac
user wants a WWW browser they grab a free copy of Netscrape Navigrator
or Internet Exploiter. If they buy a peripheral, the driver is in the
box - they don't have to fork out extra for it. Even if you move to NT
you can often download the driver for free.
We're talking about a considerable addition to the cost of ownership
here - those 25 quid cheques soon add up, especially if you're running a
roomful of computers.
Yes - I understand the different economics of the Acorn and PC markets -
but (putting my "Joe Customer" hat on) as a potential customer I don't
give a damn: "Brand A" computer means free internet software and
drivers, "Brand B" computer means extra hidden costs. End of argument.
If Acorn want to go on selling computers they'll have to earmark a large
part of the income to developing *free* internet software and drivers
for a wide range of peripherals. They also need to make these
compatible with (and free for) older machines. Reason? If people's
existing RISC-PCs etc. can't talk to the internet, drive new printers
etc. they are going to get marginalised in favour of PCs, and that
person is much less likely to go out and buy a Phoebe.
Alternatively, come up with a "universal driver" that lets RISC-OS
print/scan/etc. via windows drivers running on the 486 card.
Acorn should have bought up the collected works of St Pilling, WSS and
Spacetech and bundled them with RISC-OS ages ago.
--
Daniel Pead
Email: d...@octpen.demon.co.uk WWW: http://www.octpen.demon.co.uk/
Adrian Jackson
> but (putting my "Joe Customer" hat on) as a potential customer I don't
> give a damn: "Brand A" computer means free internet software and
> drivers, "Brand B" computer means extra hidden costs. End of argument.
True to some extend. Of course, the hidden maintenance and OS
updates for Brand A aren't exactly cheap either (70 quid for
Windows 95 OSR 2 (aka Windows 98) anyone?).
Adrian
Ian Molton
Daniel Pead <d...@octpen.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> Because its "available for nothing" on other platforms. If a PC/Mac
> user wants a WWW browser they grab a free copy of Netscrape Navigrator
> or Internet Exploiter. If they buy a peripheral, the driver is in the
> box - they don't have to fork out extra for it. Even if you move to NT
> you can often download the driver for free.
Crap. Navigator only recently became free, and if you think you dont pay
for IE 4 you are mad.
--
-Ian aka Lennier
Acorn Computers, the best in the world
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hawk/
BaBe - Women's human rights organisation in Croatia
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hawk/babe/
Preferences: Cats, Zap, Purple
Richard Walker
Andrew P. Harmsworth Esq. <dna...@ni.edam.maps> wrote:
> In article <ant0216341cbYH%4...@cumbrian.demon.co.uk>, Chris Hughes
> <ch...@cumbrian.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > possibly just with Phoebe at first but I can't see that lasting long
> > the demand is big for a new !Printers.
>
> Yes, but I bet you a dime they'll make non-Phoebe buyers pay for it, just
> like they did with Java and Browse.
Can I extend the bet...?
I bet it won't be available for non-Phoebe owners, just like RISC OS 4.
--
Richard.
"Listen, Do you want to know a secret."
Andreas Feldner
Paul Vigay <pvi...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk> wrote:
> In article <48703637...@no-spam.co.uk>,
> Stuart Bell <sab...@no-spam.co.uk> wrote:
> > In article <ant0216341cbYH%4...@cumbrian.demon.co.uk>,
>
> > > It was announced at the Wakefield Show and been mentioned on the net and
> > > in magazines that Acorn will be releasing a new !Printers that work with
> > > Photo-realistic printers, and other general improvements etc, they hoped
> > > when Phoebe is released September/October time, possibly just with
> > > Phoebe at first but I can't see that lasting long the demand is big for
> > > a new !Printers.
>
> > Wasn't a major improvement in !Printers announced well over a year ago?
> > :-( :-( :-(
>
> It was certainly mentioned to me at the Acorn Southwest show many months
> ago.
>
I'm working with ESC 600 and the Acorn printer drivers produce
*excellent* results. The only thing that doesn't work is the 720 dpi
mode without microweave. The results are in no way worse than that
obtained by a win95 printer driver. Someone raised the point that
Epson may have changed the printer firmware in the last few months.
This seems to be a very strange bit but otherwise one can't really
explain why the same driver produces nonsense with one machine and
works fine with the other. Again, my printer, obtained about February
this year, works excellent with Acorns printer drivers.
--
===Andreas Feldner==============================================
== Fichtestr. 33 = 95445 Bayreuth = Germany == (0)921/4 74 63 ==
== IRCing as Pelzi == in WWW: http://home.pages.de/~pelzi/ =====
=========================================Campaign against MIME==
... Sorry... my mind has a few bad sectors.
Andreas Feldner
Paul Vigay <pvi...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk> wrote:
> > I was told by someone.high.up@acorn in November '96 that a new !Printers
> > with configurable palettes etc was going to be released in the following
> > spring - ie '97.
>
> Aha. That's it then. Not year 2000 compliant.....
>
> Presumably by '97 they meant 2097!
Nope, my ESC 600 driver has this configurable palettes. You have to
download and install them with the definition file (just in case
someone missed *that* point). The ReadMe file is very clearly
written...
--
===Andreas Feldner==============================================
== Fichtestr. 33 = 95445 Bayreuth = Germany == (0)921/4 74 63 ==
== IRCing as Pelzi == in WWW: http://home.pages.de/~pelzi/ =====
=========================================Campaign against MIME==
... Discoveries are made by not following instructions.
Daniel Pead
<adr...@dai.ed.ac.uk> writes
Touché...!
Of course, to add support for >2GB discs and USB to my RISC-PC 600 would
only cost... er... about ?? quid for RISC-OS 3.7 (assuming you can now
get it without a StrongARM & provided I didn't need to pay someone to
fit it) plus a few tens of thousands to pay ANT or someone to develop a
USB podule for me.
OTOH there's still quite a range of peripherals (the latest Epson
printers included) which support Win 3.1.
Daniel Pead
<mh12...@cr10m.staffs.ac.uk> writes
>Crap. Navigator only recently became free, and if you think you dont pay
>for IE 4 you are mad.
Its been free to educational users all along (and I don't think NS ever
lost much sleep over the number of unregistered copies)... and sure, the
cost of IE is hidden somewhere in the price of other MS products - but
its spread very thin. It should be easier for Acorn to recoup the price
of that type of development from increased machine sales than for a
small software house to recoup it by selling people an application which
they feel they ought to get for "free" and that they'll pirate given
half a chance.
Daniel Pead
Feldner <btp...@dialin-10.bayreuth.baynet.de> writes
>I'm working with ESC 600 and the Acorn printer drivers produce
>*excellent* results. The only thing that doesn't work is the 720 dpi
>mode without microweave. The results are in no way worse than that
>obtained by a win95 printer driver.
What are you comparing it with?
The problem occurs when printing photographs.
I did a test print on the Stylus Colour 1520 (essentially a wide 800 -
not a 6 colour printer or anything) at 1440x720 dpi on Epson glossy
paper. comparing Artworks output via the Acorn drivers with Corel Xara
output via the Windoze drivers. The print contained 2 items:
1. The "Mini Cooper" pic from the Artworks CD (vs. the Xara version of
same)
2. The Olympus C1400L picture of a Pierrot doll from http://www.octpen.d
emon.co.uk/etcetera/
Text was equally pin-sharp on each.
Superficially, the vector art car looked good on both (especially
allowing for the fact that the Xara version has a few embellishments)
although the dithering on the PC version is a tad more subtle and
there's a hint of colour stepping in some parts of the Acorn print.
However, the Acorn version of the photo bombs badly when compared to the
PC output - its dark, with a green cast and obtrusive dithering
artefacts (Pierrot has acquired a 5-o-clock shadow). There's no
comparison.
Liam Gretton
<URL:mailto:d...@octpen.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> I did a test print on the Stylus Colour 1520 (essentially a wide 800 - not
> a 6 colour printer or anything) at 1440x720 dpi on Epson glossy paper.
> comparing Artworks output via the Acorn drivers with Corel Xara output via
> the Windoze drivers.
>
> PC output - its dark, with a green cast and obtrusive dithering
> artefacts (Pierrot has acquired a 5-o-clock shadow). There's no
> comparison.
Although Acorn's drivers aren't a patch on PC ones, I think you may have
introduced further artefacts by printing from ArtWorks. I may be wrong,
but IIRC ArtWorks can't print bitmaps in greater than 8bpp. Printing from
Photodesk or even Draw may have showed better results.
--
Liam Gretton l...@star.le.ac.uk
Space Research Centre, li...@binliner.demon.co.uk
Physics and Astronomy Dept, phone +44 (0) 116 223 1039
Leicester University, fax +44 (0) 116 252 2464
Leicester LE1 7RH, UK http://xmm4.xra.le.ac.uk/
Richard Simpson
: So, is anyone currently using an Epson 600 with their Acorn? Are there Turbo
: drivers for the Epson 600?
I have an Epson Stylus Colour 800 which I believe is basically the same as
the 600 but with more jets to give it greater speed. I have tried both the
Acorn driver and the Turbo driver and have been disapointed with both.
Neither one uses anything like all of the jets when printing at 720 and 1440
dpi, so the full speed of the printer is not realised. In addition, colour
matching is awful and the Turbo driver frequently puts far too much ink
onto the paper. Also, the Turbo driver prints black text with a halftone
screen on it. Small characters are therefore jagged and look awful. This
can be fixed by turning off halftoning of text, but then it dumps so much
ink that the text shows right through to the other side of the paper. I
never had any of these problems with the Turbo driver for my Canon BJC600.
I have found that if I want to produce high quality prints of photographs,
the best approach is to use the postscript print driver to produce a
Postscript file, then switch to ARMLinux and use Ghostscript 5.10 with the
uniprint driver to drive the printer. The quality is superb and all of the
jets are used. Unfortunately, it takes ages to run Ghostscript (often 10
minutes per page - probably because it needs a lot of floating point) and
switching between operating systems all of the time is a pain.
The version of Ghostscript which I have found for RiscOS is an old version
(4.03 ?). Does anyone know if 5.10 has been compiled for RiscOS? I am
about to solve the problem by buying a DEC Alpha (533 MHz for under 1000
pounds, can't be bad!) running Linux so I shall use that as a print server
running Ghostscript (very much faster than the Acorn) and configure RiscOS
to send Postscript to it over the network.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Richard Simpson
Farnborough, Hants, Uk Fax: 01252 392976
rsim...@ewrcsdra.demon.co.uk
Chris Hughes
>
> > In article <ant0216341cbYH%4...@cumbrian.demon.co.uk>, Chris Hughes
> > <ch...@cumbrian.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > > possibly just with Phoebe at first but I can't see that lasting long
> > > the demand is big for a new !Printers.
> >
> > like they did with Java and Browse.
>
> Can I extend the bet...?
>
> I bet it won't be available for non-Phoebe owners, just like RISC OS 4.
Then you would lose! Acorn IIRC awhile back it would be available for older
machines, I admit that does not say how old or which versions of RiscOS,
they meant.
Andreas Feldner
<re-posted, because it didn't seem to appear?!?>
In message <XeTInPAY...@octpen.demon.co.uk>
Daniel Pead <d...@octpen.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> What are you comparing it with?
>
> The problem occurs when printing photographs.
>
> I did a test print on the Stylus Colour 1520 (essentially a wide 800 -
> not a 6 colour printer or anything) at 1440x720 dpi on Epson glossy
> paper. comparing Artworks output via the Acorn drivers with Corel Xara
> output via the Windoze drivers. The print contained 2 items:
>
> 1. The "Mini Cooper" pic from the Artworks CD (vs. the Xara version of
> same)
Don't have ArtWorks...
>
> 2. The Olympus C1400L picture of a Pierrot doll from http://www.octpen.d
> emon.co.uk/etcetera/
Didn't find a doll picture there! Took the statue and the baby in the
green instead. It printed excellent.
>
> Text was equally pin-sharp on each.
Here we both agree ;-)
>
> Superficially, the vector art car looked good on both (especially
> allowing for the fact that the Xara version has a few embellishments)
> although the dithering on the PC version is a tad more subtle and
> there's a hint of colour stepping in some parts of the Acorn print.
Draw files generally print well, even with colour transitions etc.
However, I don't have the opportunity to make direct comparisions in
this area, so it may all be true what you observed...
> However, the Acorn version of the photo bombs badly when compared to the
> PC output - its dark, with a green cast and obtrusive dithering
> artefacts (Pierrot has acquired a 5-o-clock shadow). There's no
> comparison.
That's where we both get totally out of sync. I took my tests very
seriously before I went to buy the printer. We have the ESC 600 at our
institute and I took quite some printer files generated at home to
print them out and compare them with output generated at the win95
machine. For example, look at http://maan.home.pages.de/ on a series
of sub-pages called Gallerie or something like that (the only local
link on that page...). There are a couple of very colourful
JPEG pictures (scanned photographs of paintings by the page owner). I
printed them both from Netscape and Browse, respectively, in various
resolutions. While output from win95 on normal paper in lower res.
modes is generally better balanced than that from RISC OS, the high
res. modes (720x720 and 1440x720, microweave) with special coated
paper (Boeder, in this case) were excellent from both drivers. If you
take the painting with the spider-like black structures, the RO driver
clearly scored over win95 in detail, as these structures got a *bit*
smeared and pixellized with win95 and where absolutely clear on the RO
output. There was not the slightest shift in colour balance between
the two printouts. Also, I took a photograph of a villa in Heidelberg
from a PhotoCD. The scene was quite moody, set in fog, very slight
pastell tones etc. and I thought it to be quite a hard test for a
colour printer, because there were only subtle differences in colour.
The ESC 600 with Acorn printer drivers performed excellent with it.
The pastelle colours were met exactly in hue and also the saturation
and brightness was quite as the original. In that, the RO printer
driver performed much better than a certain HP printer (don't have the
exact model number now, was a much sold model last autumn...) where
the original win95 drivers exaggerated the colours, at least with
default settings of the various switches.
Conclusion: ARE WE REALLY TALKING ABOUT THE SAME PRODUCT?!?
Some thoughts: CC programs are known to cause problems when something
in the system is changed. Try to use programs not from CC with a
machine where no CC 'system extensions' are loaded. Make sure that no
hidden traces of a turbo driver messed up your printer driver
installation. Generally, the turbo drivers won't work without trouble
with the new generation of Acorn printer drivers, so I was told. Draw
directly handles JPEG. Do a printout with draw. Nobody knows, maybe
Artworks converts JPEGs into 256 colour sprites before printing or
does something cunning to bypass the Acorn colour balance scheme.
Regards, Andreas.
PS: Did you know that windows NT doesn't support non-square pixel
modes on printout? So says the ESC 600 printer driver for winNT, and
if you switch it to 1440x720dpi, all items are scaled individually
wrong. So you have to use 720x720 wiht winNT. Hmmmm...
--
===Andreas Feldner==============================================
== Fichtestr. 33 = 95445 Bayreuth = Germany == (0)921/4 74 63 ==
== IRCing as Pelzi == in WWW: http://home.pages.de/~pelzi/ =====
=========================================Campaign against MIME==
... I appreciate your not breathing while I smoke.
Richard Walker
Chris Hughes <ch...@cumbrian.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> In article <951147248%runny...@manorsch2.demon.co.uk>, Richard Walker
> <URL:mailto:runny...@mindless.com> wrote:
[new printer manager for RISC OS]
> > I bet it won't be available for non-Phoebe owners, just like RISC OS 4.
>
> Then you would lose!
I hope not! Then again, maybe...
> Acorn IIRC awhile back it would be available for older machines, I admit
> that does not say how old or which versions of RiscOS, they meant.
But they sort of said that about RISC OS 4, and do we/you/I believe them?
Out of interest, whatever happened to:
- Macintosh network support in OmniClient (client/server)
- Macintosh network support in Access (peer-to-peer)
- Macromedia Director playback engine
- Multi-tasking Replay (NOT just the 1997 beta)
- New video codecs
- Whiteboard applications
- Apple Exchange software
Yep, I've just dug out the '1 million ukp RISC OS development' booklet from
Xemplar which included the above. Oh, and it also mentions a new version
of the RISC OS printer manager! :-)
Believe it or not, I'm not being deliberately negative - just pointing out
that what 'Acorn' say, well...
On a more posisive note, has anyone visited the Clan section of Acorn's web
site recently? It's had a bit of an overhaul - at last! Unfortunately,
there's some nice things in the 'coming soon' section which I really don't
think will appear.
--
Richard.
"Michelle, ma belle. These are words that go together well, my Michelle."
Liam Gretton
<URL:mailto:ch...@cumbrian.demon.co.uk> wrote:
[RISC OS 4]
> Then you would lose! Acorn IIRC awhile back it would be available for
> older machines, I admit that does not say how old or which versions of
> RiscOS, they meant.
Really? Do you have a reference for that (I'm not being sarcastic, just
genuinely curious)?
I think many components of RO 4 *could be* released for older hardware, but
whether Acorn are willing to devote the time for testing etc is harder to
say. The new filer would be a bit of a godsend.
Chris Stapleton
I bought the Epson Stylus 600 back in April (at the time it was 140UKP) and
downloaded the new driver from Acorn. I have found that for JPEGs it is
best to convert them to sprites using ChangeFSI then print the sprite from
Draw, I don't have ArtWorks either.
I showed the results to my workmates (all software "professionals" with PCs
at home) and a few of them were so impressed they went and bought one
themselves, the being that they all reported back that they could not get
the same results without major playing around with the driver settings and
one unhappy soul went through several ink cartridges and still could not
emulate the printouts that I got.
My printer has been flashing the low ink warning for about a month (take out
the cartridge, tap it and replace it to stop the light flashing) but is
still printing 16M colour photos!.
Chris. (a very happy Stylus 600 owner)
P.S All the test pictures I used came from the CD supplied with the
printer, and what a lot of them there are too.
--
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There's got to be more to life than compile-link-and-go.
----------------------------------------> chrisst...@argonet.co.uk
Daniel Pead
Feldner <btp...@dialin-10.bayreuth.baynet.de> writes
>Didn't find a doll picture there! Took the statue and the baby in the
>green instead. It printed excellent.
Sorry - I'd recently extended the selection - Its on the second page.
>Conclusion: ARE WE REALLY TALKING ABOUT THE SAME PRODUCT?!?
Doesn't sound like it, does it?.
Are you using the Epson PC drivers as supplied on CD [1] with the
printer (or preferably the latest from their WWW site) or are you using
the generic Epson ESC/P2 drivers supplied with Win95 and WinNT (which
would explain everything, including the 1440/720dpi problem)?
[1] "If your computer is not fitted with a CD drive, insert the supplied
CD and select the 'Create driver discs' option..." :-)
Chris Hughes
<URL:mailto:l...@star.le.ac.uk> wrote:
> In article <ant1019140b0YH%4...@cumbrian.demon.co.uk>, Chris Hughes
> <URL:mailto:ch...@cumbrian.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
> [RISC OS 4]
>
> > Then you would lose! Acorn IIRC awhile back it would be available for
> > older machines, I admit that does not say how old or which versions of
> > RiscOS, they meant.
>
> Really? Do you have a reference for that (I'm not being sarcastic, just
> genuinely curious)?
>
> I think many components of RO 4 *could be* released for older hardware, but
> whether Acorn are willing to devote the time for testing etc is harder to
> say. The new filer would be a bit of a godsend.
Just to clarify I was not talking about RiscOS 4, which will only be for
Phoebe and the other new machines!?! :-) I was talking about the new Printer
Manager.
As to who said this, a number of rather important Acorn people, past and
present!
Chris Hughes
<URL:mailto:runny...@mindless.com> wrote:
> In message <ant1019140b0YH%4...@cumbrian.demon.co.uk>
> Chris Hughes <ch...@cumbrian.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > In article <951147248%runny...@manorsch2.demon.co.uk>, Richard Walker
> > <URL:mailto:runny...@mindless.com> wrote:
>
> [new printer manager for RISC OS]
>
> > > I bet it won't be available for non-Phoebe owners, just like RISC OS 4.
> >
> > Then you would lose!
>
> I hope not! Then again, maybe...
>
> > that does not say how old or which versions of RiscOS, they meant.
>
>
> Out of interest, whatever happened to:
>
> - Macintosh network support in OmniClient (client/server)
> - Macintosh network support in Access (peer-to-peer)
> - Macromedia Director playback engine
> - Multi-tasking Replay (NOT just the 1997 beta)
> - New video codecs
> - Whiteboard applications
> - Apple Exchange software
>
> Yep, I've just dug out the '1 million ukp RISC OS development' booklet from
> Xemplar which included the above. Oh, and it also mentions a new version
> of the RISC OS printer manager! :-)
Well you said it! Some these are from Xemplar not Acorn!! certainly all the
Mac items, so ask Xemplar rather then Acorn about these, interesting point
about the Printer manager because IIRC Xemplar did say awhile back they had
commissioned work on a new Printer manager and have already done some new
drivers, nothing extra ordinary, but at least they were done.
>
> Believe it or not, I'm not being deliberately negative - just pointing out
> that what 'Acorn' say, well...
:-) A mixture of Xemplar and Acorn. It is important to remember that
although they are related they operate as two companies, with different
needs.
> On a more posisive note, has anyone visited the Clan section of Acorn's web
> site recently? It's had a bit of an overhaul - at last! Unfortunately,
> there's some nice things in the 'coming soon' section which I really don't
> think will appear.
Hmmmm I will have a look next time I get a chance.
Andreas Feldner
Chris Stapleton <chrisst...@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> I bought the Epson Stylus 600 back in April (at the time it was 140UKP) and
> downloaded the new driver from Acorn. I have found that for JPEGs it is
> best to convert them to sprites using ChangeFSI then print the sprite from
> Draw, I don't have ArtWorks either.
From RISC OS 3.6 on, Draw can handle JPEGs natively. The necessary
module also works an RISC OS 3.5 and applications that support the
newer JPEG rendering calls can be made to use them on 3.5, to
(however, RO 3.5 Draw won't accept a JPEG file for input). I think the
current printer driver will accept a JPEG file dropped onto it, if the
relevant module (SpriteExtend?) is installed.
> My printer has been flashing the low ink warning for about a month (take out
> the cartridge, tap it and replace it to stop the light flashing) but is
> still printing 16M colour photos!.
Be very, very careful here and keep a fresh cartridge at hand to
replace immediately when the first signs of drop outs appear. My
Stylus Color colour print head died by drying out over Saturday/Sunday
where I couldn't get a new cartridge. It's not possible to revitalise
the print head once that happened. It's the one point of vulnerability
of these otherwise excellent printers and I suggest from my experience
not to play with it.
Regards Andreas.
--
===Andreas Feldner==============================================
== Fichtestr. 33 = 95445 Bayreuth = Germany == (0)921/4 74 63 ==
== IRCing as Pelzi == in WWW: http://home.pages.de/~pelzi/ =====
=========================================Campaign against MIME==
... Data, data everywhere, and not a byte to eat!
Andreas Feldner
>
> In article <7ce9577348%btp...@dialin-10.bayreuth.baynet.de>, Andreas
> Feldner <btp...@dialin-10.bayreuth.baynet.de> writes
>
> >green instead. It printed excellent.
>
Oh, I see, didn't wait long enough for all the pictures on the second
page.
> Are you using the Epson PC drivers as supplied on CD [1] with the
> printer (or preferably the latest from their WWW site) or are you using
> the generic Epson ESC/P2 drivers supplied with Win95 and WinNT (which
> would explain everything, including the 1440/720dpi problem)?
Of course. Admittedly, the NT problem could be due to an old driver
but its online help says it's not possible to create printer drivers
for non-square modes on NT. Don't know if this is correct.
Also, this discussion is a bit off-topic. The PC output is not bad,
it's in fact excellent. But the PC driver's algorithm introduced a
bit of smearing in a detail of one of the pictures I tested, where
the Acorn driver clearly produced the better results.
What I want to point out again and again is the fact that the output
from the Acorn printer driver is excellent in terms of colour
matching and its general dithering algorithm. There are definitely
no noticable colour artefacts as described by some contributors here.
If you experience such problems, obviously the fault has to be
sought elsewhere. Okay, I'll take this image of the doll, print it on
win95 and RISC OS and scan them both with the same
scanner settings. So anybody can make their own comparisons.
Watch http://romeo.phy.uni-bayreuth.de/~pelzi/gallerie/
Regards, Andreas.
--
Andreas Feldner * Feldner & Braun Software GdbR
Malcolm Davies
Andreas Feldner <btp...@dialin-10.bayreuth.baynet.de> wrote:
> > My printer has been flashing the low ink warning for about a month
> > (take out the cartridge, tap it and replace it to stop the light
> > flashing) but is still printing 16M colour photos!.
> Be very, very careful here and keep a fresh cartridge at hand to
> replace immediately when the first signs of drop outs appear. My Stylus
> Color colour print head died by drying out over Saturday/Sunday where I
> couldn't get a new cartridge. It's not possible to revitalise the print
> head once that happened. It's the one point of vulnerability of these
> otherwise excellent printers and I suggest from my experience not to
> play with it.
FWIW, I attach a Feb '98 mail (long but interesting - and it works!) to
the Epson mailing list from Steve Chlupsa - an acknowledged US 'master'
(IMHO) re re-filling; cleaning etc. and getting full value from Epson
printers and cartridges.
Mailing starts >>>>
"THE ULTIMATE CLOG CLEARING PROCEDURE FOR THE EPSON 600"
The first thing a person should do if they notice a reduction in print
quality (white lines or gaps) is to do a nozzle check. This can be found
under Printer Utilities. This will show you exactly how many nozzles are
not firing, and give you a baseline to check for improvement. Next you
should try several cleaning cycles, many times this will get things
flowing again. (NOT...;-)
There are 2 reasons for a printhead to not give you a perfect nozzle
check. The first being an actual clog, and the second being an air bubble,
either in the cartridge or the printhead. An old cartridge can lead to ink
"thickening" and also cause problems. Of course, an empty cartridge will
also cause trouble! If you are refilling cartridges and putting less than
7 cc's of ink in an empty chamber, you are not getting a "factory full"
refill. This will cause the ink counter to say you still have ink when
it's long gone. (see my earlier post on "The Ultimate Refill" method to
see how to get "full" refills).
OK...let's say you know you have ink, and you've done 4-5 cleaning cycles
and still get a bad nozzle check pattern.
Step 1: Alcohol injection into cartridge
The first thing to do is try to get rid of an air bubble if there is one.
To do this I like to inject 1-2 cc's of isopropyl alcohol into the color
chamber that is giving the bad nozzle check.To do this you will need a
syringe and small needle.(available at your local vet, or farm supply) Put
the printhead into the "change cartridge" position and remove the
cartridge. Draw 1-2 cc's of alcohol into the syringe and poke the needle
into the rear hole on the top of the cartridge. Aim for the middle of the
bottom of the cartridge, about 1-1/4" in.(GENTLY...You don't want to
pierce the internal filter screen)
Now inject the alcohol above where the outlet port would be. Re-install
the cartridge and let the printer do it's "new cartridge boogie". Now LET
IT SIT for 15-20 minutes! Then run a cleaning cycle and then another
nozzle check. Sometimes this is all it takes. The alcohol will also help
to thin ink that has become too viscous. I have run tests with ink diluted
with as much as 50% alcohol and could hardly tell the difference. (ink
extender?? :-) You may need to run a couple cleaning cycles to get
everything flowing again. If this doesn't work, roll up your sleeves and
proceed to STEP 2.
Step 2: Alcohol injection into printhead
Still clogged? Don't despair. Put the printhead back into "cartridge
change" position and remove the offending cartridge. Remove the needle
from the syringe and draw 1cc of alcohol. Do you see the little pointed
nipple that is in the hole where you pulled the cartridge from? This is
the thingie that breaks the seal of a fresh cartridge and feeds ink to the
printhead. Place the plastic tip of the syringe firmly over the nipple.
(gently...if you break the nipple you're screwed) Slowly inject the
alcohol into the nipple and remove syringe. Hopefully you just injected
the alcohol into the printhead, where it will displace any air bubbles and
dissolve dried up ink deposits. (kinda like fuel injector cleaner on a
car)
Let the printer sit for a good couple hours after this. The alcohol needs
time to work it's magic. Then reinstall cartridge and test as above. If
you STILL have a problem after several cleaning cycles.....It's time to
get serious and remove the printhead completely. (STEP 3) This is not for
the faint of heart and is reserved for more "technically inclined" users.
(It's really not that bad...I can have it out in 2-3 minutes) It may help
to take a photo or video "before" shot to help you put it back together
right!
Step 3: Removal and cleaning of printhead
1:Move printhead to "change cartridge" position and remove cartridges.
2: LEAVE POWER SWITCH ON AND UNPLUG PRINTER CORD. This will keep the
printhead where we want it.
3:Remove top cover.(4 screws..2 front, 2 in back)
4:Carefully remove ribbon cable going into top of printhead assembly.
5:Remove screw holding the metal arm at the bottom of the cartridge
holder,remove metal arm.
6:There is a small plastic tab in front of where the ribbon cable plugs
in, this is all that is left holding the printhead.
Lift the tab over the protrusion of the printhead and slide the
printhead assembly forward and up to remove.
Scary, huh? It's easier than it sounds. Now that you have that bugger
out, it's time for a serious alcohol soak. Put enough alcohol into a cup
to cover the whole thing. (Don't worry..it won't hurt anything) Now let it
sit overnite. The alcohol will work it's way in and do wonders while you
sleep.
The next morning, rinse the assembly with clean alcohol, shake off excess
and let dry. Now we're ready for the real "nozzle test"! Get a foot of
small bore plastic tubing that will fit onto the plastic tip of the
syringe. I use a 1/16" I.D. tube that I soften with a lighter and widen
the opening with a Bic pen so that it will slip onto the syringe. Now draw
in 5-6 cc's of alcohol through the tubing into the syringe. place the open
end of the tubing over the feed nipple of the clogged color. now firmly
inject the alcohol.
If the head is clear, you will see 32 (color) or 64 (black) very, very
fine streams of alcohol spraying out of the nozzle plate on the bottom of
the printhead. If some are crooked or not spraying, we need to backflush
that color. VERY GENTLY clamp the printhead (bottom side-nozzle plate- up)
into a small vise or holding fixture of some kind, you will need
both hands free. Now take your alcohol -syringe-tube combo and hold the
tubing firmly over the micro-sized nozzle holes on the nozzle plate.(A
magnifying glass will help) While holding the tube firmly in place, force
some alcohol into the nozzle holes. (You know it's going in if it drips
out the feed nipple)
Keep moving and repeat until you go over ALL the nozzle holes. What this
is doing is back flushing each jet in the printhead and dislodging any
foreign objects (dust, etc...) out of the printhead. If a head has a rock
in the pipes (dust, etc..) and you only flush from the top...you're just
pushing it to the spray nozzle and it's still gonna be clogged. A back
flush like this is the only way to clear this type of clog, unless you
replace the printhead. Now you can slap it back together, run a couple
cleaning cycles, and get back to printing.
I have not met a clog that I couldn't clear with the above methods. I
recently had a 500 in the shop that someone had let the black run bone dry
in. 4 WEEKS LATER, they installed a new cartridge and
....."chaaaaaa.....know what???? unh--unh!!!" Clog city. No amount of
cleaning cycles or alcohol injection would clear that gooed up printhead.
EVERY SINGLE NOZZLE WAS CLOGGED. This was a candidate for the old
Epson "replace the printhead" routine. So I figured, What the hell! Let's
pull the printhead and test the "procedure". After a "Step 3" full boogie
removal and backflush, I ran ONE cleaning cycle and......PERFECT.
Remember, this head was so clogged that I couldn't get even 1 nozzle to
spray!
I know it's kinda involved, but for us techies out there or for a printer
out of warranty......it's the only way to go. Feel free to post questions
to the list or e-mail me direct. Good Luck!
Steve Chlupsa "The Mad Bomber" of Refilling e-mail schl...@kih.net
Mailing ends >>>>
Hope this helps
Cheers - Malcolm
--
Malcolm Davies ZFC S+ ** Tel/Fax : +44 (0)1283 575 345 **
Burton on Trent, Staffs - UK ** Email to : mdavies@DON'T.SPAM.ME **
* ToEmailMe@Home - Change 'DON'T.SPAM.ME'_above_to_'argonet.co.uk' **
Peter Smith
> I'd just like to add my two pennys worth.
>
> I bought the Epson Stylus 600 back in April (at the time it was 140UKP)
Mutter mutter.
I bought mine just before the prices crashed :-(
>
> I showed the results to my workmates (all software "professionals" with PCs
> at home) and a few of them were so impressed they went and bought one
> themselves, the being that they all reported back that they could not get
> the same results without major playing around with the driver settings and
> one unhappy soul went through several ink cartridges and still could not
> emulate the printouts that I got.
>
FWIW, I did a print out of the same graphic (Mini drawfile) in Artworks and
Xara.
Overall, they're _very_ similar. The grey halftoning on the PC is a _little_
finer, but that's because it uses all 4 colours. Any grey on the Acorn is
made up of just black.
The colours on the RiscPC are _slightly_ darker, but nothing to go
complaining about.
> My printer has been flashing the low ink warning for about a month (take out
> the cartridge, tap it and replace it to stop the light flashing) but is
> still printing 16M colour photos!.
>
DOH!
I'm afraid you _should't_ do that. When you remove a cartridge, it resets an
internal counter, and when you put the cartridge back, it assumes it's a new
one. This is why they say in the manual never remove a cartridge unless it's
empty, because you can't put it back. (AFAIK!)
Peter
--
To reply by mail, change .com to .co in my email address
54 things to do in a lift....
39. Listen to the lift walls with a stethoscope.
Paul Vigay
> I bought the Epson Stylus 600 back in April (at the time it was 140UKP) and
> downloaded the new driver from Acorn. I have found that for JPEGs it is
> best to convert them to sprites using ChangeFSI then print the sprite from
> Draw, I don't have ArtWorks either.
Out of interest, what version of the printer driver are you using, and are
you using the printer definition file (pdf) available to download on the
Xemplar Printer Driver update web page?
My father bought an Epson Stylus 600 (on my recommendation) for his SA Risc
PC and although the results are quite impressive are of much lower quality
to Dan Pead's printouts on his Stylus photo (running on the PC). I would
love to know how to increase the quality of the printouts from the Acorn,
because as far as I'm concerned this is about the only thing the PC beats
the Acorn on - and I want it to be rectified.
--
Paul Vigay Acorn Programming,
__\\|//__ Internet Consultancy
http://www.matrix.clara.net (` o-o ') & Web Design
-----------------------------------ooO-(_)-Ooo---------------------------
So, what were you planning on doing tonight, then?
Remove ".vogonpoetry" to reply by email.
Paul Vigay
Daniel Pead <d...@octpen.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> Are you using the Epson PC drivers as supplied on CD [1] with the
> printer (or preferably the latest from their WWW site) or are you using
> the generic Epson ESC/P2 drivers supplied with Win95 and WinNT (which
> would explain everything, including the 1440/720dpi problem)?
Moral: Don't use anything written by Microsoft.
> [1] "If your computer is not fitted with a CD drive, insert the supplied
> CD and select the 'Create driver discs' option..." :-)
Erm, if you don't have a CD, how do you insert the CD?? ;-)
--
Paul Vigay Acorn Programming,
__\\|//__ Internet Consultancy
http://www.matrix.clara.net (` o-o ') & Web Design
-----------------------------------ooO-(_)-Ooo---------------------------
"Put your hand up," teachers say. Put your hand up what, I ask.
Paul Vigay
I decided to upgrade the entire !Boot sequence on my A4 so that it matched
the layout of my Risc PC, and also installed the new window manager etc
(3.98) which all works nicely and with no problems - until today!
I tried loading PhotoDesk II and it stopped with an error "Unknown SWI &66
call". At first I thought PhotoDesk's protection had become confused by my
new !Boot sequence, so decided to ignore it. As I was in a rush and only
wanted to view some JPEG images, I decided to temporarily forget about
PhotoDesk and try ChangeFSI instead - which also decided to crash with a
fatal error - unknown SWI call.
At this, I thought a module must have become unplugged and spent about an
hour investigating my !Boot sequence etc for possible errors.
To cut a long story short, I discovered that Wimp_Initialise returns the
version of the window manager and that PhotoDesk II and ChangeFSI seem to
use this call to work out what version of Risc OS you are using. Thus both
progs assumed that I was running on a Risc PC - hence the errors (which
incidentally turned out to be OS_Memory).
Now, the A4 is still running Risc OS 3.1, but returning a value of 3.98
(from the window manager). Is this a bug in the way the programs are
written or a bug in Risc OS? More importantly, is there a way around it? I
tried re-poking a new value into the header of the module, but obviously
that didn't work. Doing a shift-break (ie. not loading the new !Boot
sequence) allowed PhotoDesk and ChangeFSI to work perfectly, so it does
indeed seem to be caused by the new !Boot sequence.
Any ideas, or solutions??
regards,
--
Paul Vigay Acorn Programming,
__\\|//__ Internet Consultancy
http://www.matrix.clara.net (` o-o ') & Web Design
-----------------------------------ooO-(_)-Ooo---------------------------
What is it?
Kade Hansson
<pvi...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk> wrote:
> To cut a long story short, I discovered that Wimp_Initialise returns the
> version of the window manager and that PhotoDesk II and ChangeFSI seem to
> use this call to work out what version of Risc OS you are using. Thus both
> progs assumed that I was running on a Risc PC - hence the errors (which
> incidentally turned out to be OS_Memory).
>
> Now, the A4 is still running Risc OS 3.1, but returning a value of 3.98
> (from the window manager). Is this a bug in the way the programs are
> written or a bug in Risc OS? More importantly, is there a way around it? I
> tried re-poking a new value into the header of the module, but obviously
> that didn't work. Doing a shift-break (ie. not loading the new !Boot
> sequence) allowed PhotoDesk and ChangeFSI to work perfectly, so it does
> indeed seem to be caused by the new !Boot sequence.
Well, technically it is a bug in these programs, because it is patently
obvious that WindowManager does not supply the OS SWIs. However, almost
every program I know (including most of my own) use the Window Manager
version to determine what version of the OS is being used- thankfully I
only usually differentiate between version 2 and 3, and I'm pretty sure WM
3.98 will not run on RO2. :-)
Possible solution: poke the implementation of Wimp_Initialise in your WM
3.98 so that it returns 310, or discontinue use of the WM 3.98. The first
solution may generate more problems, however, as it will now be difficult
for Nested WIMP programs to recognize that you are running 3.98.
--
Archer
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/6413/
End.
Stuart Thomson
> In article <oPpXDRAt...@octpen.demon.co.uk>,
> Daniel Pead <d...@octpen.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > Are you using the Epson PC drivers as supplied on CD [1] with the
> > printer (or preferably the latest from their WWW site) or are you using
> > the generic Epson ESC/P2 drivers supplied with Win95 and WinNT (which
> > would explain everything, including the 1440/720dpi problem)?
>
> Moral: Don't use anything written by Microsoft.
>
> > [1] "If your computer is not fitted with a CD drive, insert the supplied
> > CD and select the 'Create driver discs' option..." :-)
>
> Erm, if you don't have a CD, how do you insert the CD?? ;-)
>
The keyboard on my father's PC wasn't properly connected, so during the boot
process it said words to the effect of:
"Keyboard not found. Press F5 to enter setup or F10 to re-boot."
--
Stuart Thomson.
s...@nospam.demon.co.uk
** Please substitute the 'nospam' with 'lavenham' to email me. **
Paul Corke
> I tried loading PhotoDesk II and it stopped with an error "Unknown SWI &66
> call". At first I thought PhotoDesk's protection had become confused by my
It's SWI "OS_DynamicArea" - not a lot of use on pre 3.50 :(
> Now, the A4 is still running Risc OS 3.1, but returning a value of 3.98
> (from the window manager). Is this a bug in the way the programs are
> written or a bug in Risc OS? More importantly, is there a way around it? I
Unfortunately Acorn have never provided an easy way to work out what
version of the OS is being used. The recommended way is to check what
version of UtilityModule is running. However, I guess that you could
look at the windowmanager version returned and have a pretty good guess.
After all, until very recently no-one softloaded a different
windowmanager.
So basically it's the app's fault. However, you should be able to hack
the module header to make it work. Make sure you're changing the right
module - !System.310.Modules.Wimp - there's several different copies in
your boot structure.
Assuming this doesn't work, you might want to look at the values at
module offset &2230 and &37cc. They look suspiciously like module
version numbers...
The downside of this, of course, is that it will mess up any apps
which want to use the facilities of the new windowmanager. They'll
just assume that an old non-nested version is in use. In fact, you may
as well just go back to the old windowmanager.
So what you really need is some way to switch between windowmanager's at
startup. I'm sure you could hack !Boot.Resources.Wimp.LoadWimp so that
if Alt is held down then it doesn't load the new version...
Paul.
--
Innovative Media Solutions Ltd.
Box Bush Farm, West Wick, Weston-super-Mare, BS24 7TF.
Tel: (01934) 522 880. Fax: (01934) 522 881.
mailto:pa...@ims-bristol.co.uk http://www.ims-cdc.demon.co.uk/
Liam Gretton
<URL:mailto:pa...@ims-bristol.co.uk> wrote:>
> Unfortunately Acorn have never provided an easy way to work out what
> version of the OS is being used. The recommended way is to check what
Er... how about the return value of OS_Byte 129?
> So what you really need is some way to switch between windowmanager's at
> startup. I'm sure you could hack !Boot.Resources.Wimp.LoadWimp so that
> if Alt is held down then it doesn't load the new version..
Yuck. This shouldn't be necessary. Software which fails because of the new
WindowManager should be reported as broken to the developer.
Daniel Pead
<pvi...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk> writes
>My father bought an Epson Stylus 600 (on my recommendation) for his SA Risc
>PC and although the results are quite impressive are of much lower quality
>to Dan Pead's printouts on his Stylus photo (running on the PC).
I'd point out that the "comparison" I've been arguing over with Andreas
Feldner was done on a Stylus 1520 not the Stylus Photo. The "Photo" is
a 6-colour job and produces near dye-sub results & wouldn't be a fair
comparison unless you used the Spacetech drivers.
Sam Smith
<URL:mailto:pa...@ims-bristol.co.uk> wrote:
>
> <URL:mailto:pvi...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk> wrote:
> > I tried loading PhotoDesk II and it stopped with an error
> > "Unknown SWI &66 call". At first I thought PhotoDesk's
> > protection had become confused by my
>
> It's SWI "OS_DynamicArea" - not a lot of use on pre 3.50 :(
You could use the Dummy Dynamic Areas module - which appears to
give sub 3,5 machines, DDA's.
By Justin Fletcher - I don't know an URL, but may be able to dig
a copy out if necesary.
Cheers
Sam Smith
mailto:Sa...@techie.com http://sams.base.org
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Peter Smith
kad...@postoffice.utas.edu.au (Kade Hansson) wrote:
> In article <4874a8bf...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk>, Paul Vigay
> <pvi...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > To cut a long story short, I discovered that Wimp_Initialise returns the
> > version of the window manager and that PhotoDesk II and ChangeFSI seem to
> > use this call to work out what version of Risc OS you are using. Thus both
> > progs assumed that I was running on a Risc PC - hence the errors (which
> > incidentally turned out to be OS_Memory).
> >
[ snip ]
>
> Well, technically it is a bug in these programs, because it is patently
> obvious that WindowManager does not supply the OS SWIs. However, almost
> every program I know (including most of my own) use the Window Manager
> version to determine what version of the OS is being used-
Whatever happened to *fx0? ;-)
Peter
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Peter Smith
Paul Corke <pa...@ims-bristol.co.uk> wrote:
[ snip ]
> Unfortunately Acorn have never provided an easy way to work out what
> version of the OS is being used.
AFAIK, *FX0 has _always_ returned the OS, even from the days of the BBC A.
Peter
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Paul Corke
Ok as long as you can guarantee that versions of the OS > 3.50 will
return numbers > 0xa5.
> Yuck. This shouldn't be necessary. Software which fails because of the new
> WindowManager should be reported as broken to the developer.
Indeed.
Liam Gretton
<URL:mailto:pa...@ims-bristol.co.uk> wrote:
> In article <ant13105...@xmm4.xra.le.ac.uk>, Liam Gretton
> <URL:mailto:l...@star.le.ac.uk> wrote:
> > Er... how about the return value of OS_Byte 129?
>
> Ok as long as you can guarantee that versions of the OS > 3.50 will
> return numbers > 0xa5.
I think that whatever method you use to determin the OS, there's always the
problem of what to do if you decide the OS version isn't one you know about.
Obviously, it's impossible to say that &A5 or greater will be returned for
RISC OS >=3.50, but it's a fair bet (RISC OS 4 will return &A8 IIRC).
druck
> Unfortunately Acorn have never provided an easy way to work out what
No that is just for obey files to do an RMEnsure with.
If you are a program OS_Byte 129 0 255 returns R1 =
&A0 - Arthur 1.20
&A1 - RISC OS 2.00
&A2 - RISC OS 2.01
&A3 - RISC OS 3.00
&A4 - RISC OS 3.10 & 3.11
&A5 - RISC OS 3.50
&A6 - RISC OS 3.60
&A7 - RISC OS 3.70 & 3.71
&A8 - RISC OS 4 (unconfirmed)
Good enougth?
---druck
Paul Vigay
Daniel Pead <d...@octpen.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> In article <4874a7fc...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk>, Paul Vigay
> <pvi...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk> writes
> >My father bought an Epson Stylus 600 (on my recommendation) for his SA Risc
> >PC and although the results are quite impressive are of much lower quality
> >to Dan Pead's printouts on his Stylus photo (running on the PC).
> I'd point out that the "comparison" I've been arguing over with Andreas
> Feldner was done on a Stylus 1520 not the Stylus Photo. The "Photo" is
> a 6-colour job and produces near dye-sub results & wouldn't be a fair
> comparison unless you used the Spacetech drivers.
I'm still trying to work out whether SpaceTech's drivers work with the
Stylus 600 yet. No one was answering their phone yesterday.
--
Paul Vigay Acorn Programming,
__\\|//__ Internet Consultancy
http://www.matrix.clara.net (` o-o ') & Web Design
-----------------------------------ooO-(_)-Ooo---------------------------
It is you.
David Briggs
> In article <Xtb4rBAl...@octpen.demon.co.uk>,
> Daniel Pead <d...@octpen.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > In article <4874a7fc...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk>, Paul Vigay
> > <pvi...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk> writes
> > >My father bought an Epson Stylus 600 (on my recommendation) for his SA Risc
> > >PC and although the results are quite impressive are of much lower quality
> > >to Dan Pead's printouts on his Stylus photo (running on the PC).
>
> > I'd point out that the "comparison" I've been arguing over with Andreas
> > Feldner was done on a Stylus 1520 not the Stylus Photo. The "Photo" is
> > a 6-colour job and produces near dye-sub results & wouldn't be a fair
> > comparison unless you used the Spacetech drivers.
>
> I'm still trying to work out whether SpaceTech's drivers work with the
> Stylus 600 yet. No one was answering their phone yesterday.
>
While I was at the Acorn Southeast Show I enquired at the Spacetech stand
and they said that it wouldn't work with the Epson Stylus 600.
--
David Briggs
Art Hoogendoorn
> .... was done on a Stylus 1520 not the Stylus Photo. The "Photo" is
> a 6-colour job and produces near dye-sub results & wouldn't be a fair
> comparison unless you used the Spacetech drivers.
>
500 as well as 700?
the ESP 500 has dropped in price recently and does 720*720 dpi.
would be a nice one for me.
greetings, Art.
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Charles Ebrill
<pvi...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk> wrote:
>
>> I'm still trying to work out whether SpaceTech's drivers work with the
> Stylus 600 yet. No one was answering their phone yesterday.
>
photo driver) they said driver only for the Stylus Photo, but they were
working on others
Charles
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Andrew P. Harmsworth Esq.
<pvi...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk> wrote:
> I'm still trying to work out whether SpaceTech's drivers work with the
> Stylus 600 yet
I don't think so, as the 600, like my 800, uses CMYK only - and not all
those lovely extra colours on the Photo range.
Still, I hope it does :-)
APH
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Andrew P. Harmsworth Esq.
Roger Lynn
kad...@postoffice.utas.edu.au (Kade Hansson) wrote:
> Well, technically it is a bug in these programs, because it is patently
> obvious that WindowManager does not supply the OS SWIs. However, almost
> every program I know (including most of my own) use the Window Manager
> version to determine what version of the OS is being used- thankfully I
> only usually differentiate between version 2 and 3, and I'm pretty sure WM
> 3.98 will not run on RO2. :-)
>
> Possible solution: poke the implementation of Wimp_Initialise in your WM
> 3.98 so that it returns 310, or discontinue use of the WM 3.98. The first
> solution may generate more problems, however, as it will now be difficult
> for Nested WIMP programs to recognize that you are running 3.98.
The solution I used for !ChangeFSI was simply to set version% to 311
immediately after the Wimp_Initialise SWI. It's a bit of a kludge, but it
works.
Roger
T.K. Kelly
Esq. <dna...@ni.edam.maps> wrote:
>
> In article <4875e361...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk>, Paul Vigay
> <pvi...@interalpha.vogonpoetry.co.uk> wrote:
> > I'm still trying to work out whether SpaceTech's drivers work with the
> > Stylus 600 yet
>
> I don't think so, as the 600, like my 800, uses CMYK only - and not all
> those lovely extra colours on the Photo range.
According to Acorn Publisher, Spacetech have announced a version of their
printer driver which incorporates a new algorithm which gives improved
results on CMYK and also incorporates support for six-colour printing.
Initially it is for the Epson PhotoStylus but supports the Canon BJC series
also.
PS. It is free if you buy the printer from them. Otherwise, Ł69. If you
already have their driver, there is an update for the cost of postage.
Terry.
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