Originally published in the December 1996 edition of the GEOS Publication

Overcoming Limitations

What are the two biggest drawbacks to using GEOS? If you ask people who love GEOS, and people who loathe GEOS, you will usually get the same answer - speed and print quality.

The best way to get around the first problem is to utilize RAM disks whenever possible. I also solved this by getting a 4 MHz Schnedler TurboMaster Cartridge and am saving up for the release of the 20 MHz SuperCPU128 from CMD.

Over the years many solutions have arose for the print quality problem. Multi-strike drives came along that printed the same line numerous times to darken the print. This darkened the print but didn't always solve the 'dotty' look the print had. Interpolating drivers came along that could intelligently fill in dots in the printout to overcome the 'dotty' output. Perfect Print, available from CMD, uses specially designed fonts and multi-pass drivers to improve GEOS printouts.

While all of these methods did improve the print quality of GEOS documents (although some methods only worked best with certain programs) they came with a high price - time (I have printed 20 pages at 300 DPI on a Laser in less time than it took to print one page on a Dot Matrix with a multi-strike driver). Multi-strike and interpolating drivers need more time to pass the print head across the paper and to process where to place the extra dots; and the quality still isn't the best possible. All in all, Dot Matrix Printers and all of these tricks do not produce our best printouts.

The good folks at Berkeley Softworks (BSW) wanted to give C-64 users a powerful operating system when they developed GEOS. They also knew that the power had to be outstanding in printed form to be really impressive. To that end BSW gave GEOS the power to communicate with PostScript equipped Laser Printers. The output from a Laser Printer is truly amazing and people have a hard time believing that a C-64 Computer did the page layout. If all goes well you should be reading this copy of the GEOS Publication in all of its' Laser Printed Splendor.

To use a Laser Printer with geoPublish you will need a few more files. First off, you need geoPubLaser. This program comes with geoPublish and allows the C-64 to communicate with a Laser Printer connected to it. You must, however, be certain that you have the correct version combinations. GeoPublish versions with a date before 10/4/88 should use geoPubLaser dated 3/10/88. GeoPublish versions dated 10/4/88 or later should be paired with geoPubLaser V1.8 which has a date of 10/25/86. The version of geoPubLaser dated 11/19/87 should not be used at all.

The next program you will need is PS Patch 2.0. The patch from Jim Collette will patch geoPubLaser so it will print your PostScript files to disk instead of to the printer. This is very handy as most C-64 users don't own a Laser Printer. Once a file is on a disk you can transfer it to a Laser equipped computer for printing in a variety of ways. One method is by using a modem and a terminal program to send the file directly to the other computer (or upload it to a BBS and download it with the computer that is connected to the Laser).

Another method is to use Big Blue Reader (64/128) or Little Red Reader (128 only) to transfer the file to an IBM disk with your 1571 or 1581. Then take this disk to an IBM or Mac for printing. New Macs can read IBM formatted floppies while older Macs need special software to do this. Amigas with special software can read C-64 5.25" disks (and maybe 3.5" also) so that is another option.

Leaving the easiest to last is to hook your C-64 directly to a Laser (your own or someone else's - an SX-64 comes in handy for this) using a modem cable and null-modem connector or a geoCable connector. This negates the need to create a file on disk and lets you send the file directly to the Laser from geoPubLaser.

One last file that is a big help is Jim Collette's PS.Processor. This program allows you to print multiple copies of the same file onto one page (handy for making business cards). You can also print a magazine like GEOS Publication in Landscape Mode by specifying which page to print beside which other page. The last thing this program does is correct a bug in geoPubLaser and geoLaser that doesn't properly reset the printer after printing a page. This fault is supposed to make subsequent pages print out at a slightly reduced size but so far I haven't noticed its affects. PS.Processor comes on the Collette Utilities Disk from CMD along with PS.Patch and numerous other helpful GEOS programs.

The next things you will need are more fonts (although normal GEOS fonts can still be used they will only print at 80 DPI). Normal GEOS printing involves dumping the 80 DPI screen to your 80 DPI printer. There are 11 LW Font files for GEOS users that allow printing at 300 DPI (or higher depending on the printer used) as opposed to the normal 80 DPI of GEOS printouts. This is accomplished during printing by substituting the fonts built into the printer for the fonts you used (you must make sure the printer supports the fonts you use or you will get strange results). These fonts are PD and are available from many sources (four come with GeoPublish).

Once you start Laser Printing your files you will encounter a number of differences from your Dot matrix output. A Laser is not a WYSIWYG printer. Anything on the page will be printed even if it is covered by another object and is not visible on your screen or Dot Matrix draft copy. Special Text (like headlines, page numbers, picture captions) need extra attention. While GeoPublish sizes the box to fit the text as viewed on-screen you must resize the box to leave a fair amount of white space on the right of the text. Stretching the box in this manner will alleviate part of the text from being cut off by the Laser.

Rick Krantz' Toolkit will come in handy for doing wholesale font changes to utilize LW Fonts in your documents. GetItWrite V2.0 by Joseph Thomas is also very helpful im making sure all of your files are present.

I hope these tips will show everyone how easy it can be to get great Laser printouts. No doubt there will be plenty of questions from GP readers on this topic and I am prepared to provide answers. I know other GP readers use Laser Printers with GEOS so there is a fair amount of available knowledge on the subject. Don't be afraid to ask questions - it will only improve your experiences.

Until next time - enGEOy your Commodore.
 