Re: [GKD] RFI: Low Cost / Low Energy Printing Devices
On Tue, 25 May, Cornelio Hopmann wrote: What are the best printing options available (Low energy, as in many place we will have to use Photo-voltaic, low operation costs)? Any experiences with recycled Matrix-printers or similar devices? This depends also on whether running costs are a factor, and who is paying for the consumables. A typical (modern) dot-matrix printer uses about 50w whilst printing, and has a switch-on surge of approx 120w. So your inverter from the stored solar energy (lead acid battery?) must be capable of delivering this surge without crashing the computer(s) already being supplied! However, a typical modern inkjet printer uses approx 35w and has a much lower switch-on surge (say 70w). The dot-matrix can have lower running costs because you can continue to use the ribbon until your eyes can hardly detect the letters on the pages. Moreover you can easily re-ink the old ribbons, possibly even using locally-produced vegetable dye inks. The inkjet will need an ongoing supply of relatively expensive ink-tanks, and replenishing these with third-party inks can prematurely damage the nozzles of the head. If you are going to use such inkjets, I'd recommend using a model (such as Canon) where the head (nozzle array) is independently replaceable of the ink reservoir by the end-user. HP tend to use nozzles integral with the ink reservoir. Epson tend to use nozzle arrays that are not replaceable by the user. If instantaneous power is not a problem, consider a laser printer. The page throughput will be far quicker per minute for which is powered up. You simply queue the print-output and switch on the printer once or twice a day. I'd recommend you consider laser printers by Kyocera. They use ceramic drums (not coated aluminium) and are regarded as non-replaceable items. All you add is toner, which makes the running costs far lower than other manufacturers. The Kyocera FS-1020D consumes 384w whilst printing (15w in stand-by), runs at 20 pages/minute and has inbuilt duplexing to save on paper by using both sides. The ceramic drum is also very hard, and hence tolerant of rough/re-cycled paper. We have trialled Kyocera laser printers close to the equator in Central Africa, and found them very tolerant of wide temperature fluctuations and red African dust! However we have no direct experience of running printers from PV energy sources as their power requirements are far beyond those of the Solo computers we were using. HTH -- Paul - __/_Paul Richardson | / ExpLAN Computers Ltd. +44 (0)1822 613868 |-- RISC OS Computer Sales and Software Development |/___ PO Box 32, Tavistock, Devon PL19 8YU Gt.Britain /[EMAIL PROTECTED] - ***GKD is solely supported by EDC, a Non-Profit Organization*** To post a message, send it to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd Archives of previous GKD messages can be found at: http://www.edc.org/GLG/gkd/
Re: [GKD] RFI: Low Cost / Low Energy Printing Devices
Dear Cornelio, In my experience you should consider all the aspects of the printing cost of ownership. These should certainly include the cost of the paper, ink/toner/ribbons, power, hardware maintenance, and software maintenance. In a project I led in India with a solar-powered mobile photo printer we learned a great deal about the reliability of the printers and their power needs and the cost-per-page of different printing options. This leads to giving some thought to what types of printing do you wish to support. For example, in Costa Rica and Honduras I worked with telecenters that had internet access but had not considered how to utilize printed pages to convey the information gained from the Internet to the larger community. Images can be very powerful but ink can be very expensive. It is all a balance of value versus cost of ownership and cost per page. In a Linux educational solution I was involved with we learned about assuming printer drivers exist. It can be very frustrating and expensive to have a standard operating system and desktop for your schools but ad hoc printer configurations. It leads to staff in each school trying to track down the appropriate drivers for the printers, especially much older models that have not been updated to recent operating systems. So pre-qualify a short list of printers that you know will work with your solution and save yourself a great deal of frustration in the field. If you have additional questions or would like to learn more about any of our experiences please let me know and I would be happy to help. Cheers, Christopher Christopher Shockey Hewlett Packard [EMAIL PROTECTED] ***GKD is solely supported by EDC, a Non-Profit Organization*** To post a message, send it to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd Archives of previous GKD messages can be found at: http://www.edc.org/GLG/gkd/
[GKD] ANN: Online Professional Training for Educators Discussion (June 1-25)
Dear GKD Members, The GKD-DOTCOM discussion on Connectivity (Oct-Nov 2003) was superb, and we are working to complete a White Paper based on the rich and complex interchange of experience and information. As soon as the White Paper is completed, we will submit it for comments to GKD. We would like to launch a second GKD-DOTCOM discussion, on a topic that has been important to GKD members: Using ICT to provide professional development to educators, and thereby expand and improve education in developing countries. The specific focus of the discussion is on practical approaches to providing effective online professional training for educators. A White Paper citing the cases, projects, experience, success stories, and recommendations presented by discussion members will be widely circulated throughout the development community. We hope that List members will share information on: * Strategies, tools, and partnerships for providing online professional development to educators * Case studies, projects, achievements, challenges and lessons learned * Success stories of efforts that have overcome challenges and effectively expanded access in low-resource environments The Agenda will focus on: * Learning about activities that provide online professional development for educators (June 1-4) * Identifying the technologies, tools, and infrastructure required to have the desired impact and sustainability (June 7-11) * Examining approaches for evaluating online professional development efforts (June 14-19) * Exploring what's on the horizonÂ’ and what online technologies and techniques will be available in 3 years (June 21-25) The discussion builds on a session of the DOT-COM/InterAction ICT Speaker Series (May 6, 2004). More information on the session, and presentations by the speakers, can be found at the DOT-COM Alliance website cited below. Although the focus of the discussion during these four weeks will be on Online Professional Development for Educators, the Moderators will also post messages of a more general nature (i.e. announcements, newsletters, cases) that are time-sensitive. To distinguish the Online Professional Development for Educators messages, their subject line will be labeled [GKD-DOTCOM], whereas the subject of the general GKD messages will continue to be labeled [GKD], as usual. ***WORLD WIDE WEB SITES FOR THE DISCUSSION*** The DOT-COM Alliance website provides information about this discussion, the DOT-COM/Interaction Speaker Series, and other projects using ICT to support development: http://www.dot-com-alliance.org/speakerseries.htm For more information about this discussion series, please visit: http://www.dot-com-alliance.org/discussiongroup.htm The DOT-COM Archive of this discussion (as of June 1) is available on: http://www.dot-com-alliance.org/archive.html The GKD database provides an easy way to search messages of this and other GKD discussions: http://www.GKDknowledge.org **FOR FURTHER INFORMATION** For further information about: DOT-COM Discussions, please contact: Margie Joyce, DOT-COM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] GKD, please contact: Janice Brodman, dot-ORG, [EMAIL PROTECTED] ***GKD is solely supported by EDC, a Non-Profit Organization*** To post a message, send it to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd Archives of previous GKD messages can be found at: http://www.edc.org/GLG/gkd/
