This was the first printer I purchased in the mid eighties. They lasted forever on dirty shipping docks. Such a great example of a well designed, well built device.
"I love the sound of dot matrix printing in the morning" :) Back in the day, Epson was the "go to" company for printers for 8 bit computers. Had a GX-80 myself. The LX-80 was also very popular.
31:52 When one of these little tabs broke on my Epson MX80 (this would have been 30 years ago), I used the top off of a sewing pin. It was the type with a plastic head. I cut the pin a mm or so from the top, drilled a small, shallow hole in the bracket, set the stub of the pin into that hole, and fixed it with epoxy. This fix held the spring well for many years.
Graphics printing is unidirectional so that way the lines will match up better. Bidirectional printing causes slight shifts in the positioning of each pass that is unnoticeable with text, but may cause the lines in a graphical image to become ragged.
there are still drivers and support, because it's one of the many "instruments" in the original "soundtrack/symphony" of every German doctor's office ... add 3 constantly ringing phones (intentionally ignored by the staff) and someone screaming "do we alread have a urine sample from Herr Schultz?" and the illusion is perfect
BBC micro's with Epson FX-80's were the thing when I was in school! We used to have them on trolleys and you could hear one printing all over the school :)
Great videos and the noise does indeed transport me back to past times. I remember one of these at school connected to a RM 480z and later on I bought a second hand one for my Amiga at home. Happy days !
@33:10 A magnet countersunk into each half near the little "finger tab". Look for the weakest workable magnets, or position so that there is still a gap when 'closed', to prevent excessive drag. If a convenient position can't be found, don't forget that you could increase your options if you set them up to repel instead.
What a great printer for its time! As I recall, something like 144 dots per inch in graphics mode. Back in the day I took advantage of that graphics mode to write an Atari 8-bit driver for the MX-80 just so I could print my AtariBASIC code in the actual Atari font. It would probably have been fully compatible with the RX-80 too. As a retro enthusiast, I wouldn't mind picking up one of these babies for the collecfion. Apparently there's even an open source project to make these into AirPlay / WiFi printers so we can use them with all our modern devices.
This was my first printer hooked up to an IBM 386 acquired from my dads work when they upgraded. Can still hear my brother printing out school papers into the wee hours of the night. Good times
I still have my LX-800 stashed somewhere.. haven't checked up on it for years... these EPSON's were super reliable and sturdy. I had mine hooked up to a IBM 8086 and CPC 6128... Awesome printers !
@@JanBeta 30:35 .. Oohh the good old trusted Dental Pick🙂....... Hey Jan !! .. What does the electronic technician use the Dental Pick for??? ... to fix Bluetooth, of course🤣😂...
Oh, this brings back memories. I had one of the back home (bought as new by my dad) in about 1985-6. We used it clear up until 1996, when it was just too slow & noisy for our use. It was replaced by an HP Deskjet 660C. I wound up trading it for an ImageWriter II circa 1999.
Back in school one of these printers had the same issue with the broken spring post. The school technician fixed it by drilling a small hole and installing a small bolt to hook the spring over. I'm not sure if the plastic will still support that at its current age but it might be worth a shot
Ah, the good old dot matrix days, I stared with a Comrex CR-220 and then a Panasonic KX-P1180 which had Epson emulation, fine for C=64 and then Amiga. Love the sound of these.
I did the repair of the broken spring holders on the tractor feeds like 25 Jears ago... drilled a 3,2mm hole (in small steps due to the brittle material) instead of the broken bolt and used a tread cutter toolset to make a 4mm (M4) Screw go in to it to hold the Springs. Had to file down the Screwhead a lot. We had a RS232 Interface card plugged inside, and therefore we could't use the parallel Centronics Port at the same printer, as some of the internal dip switches on the Mainboard were set to add, as far as I remember it correctly, to every Carriage return a Line feed, as required from the old computer on the serial port, but this prevented the usage of the parallelport with a DOS PC which sent them both by itself. So the stickytape on the Parallelport was no surprise for me.... ;-).
Memories... Star 10 was my first as well. Used with a Sharp MZ 721. No support for Norwegian characters at the time, so "modded" the printout with a black Bic pen...
The first printer I personally owned was an IBM Graphics Printer, which looked very Epson-y and was partially compatible with the command set of the Epson RX and FX...turns out it was basically a rebadged Epson MX-80 with support for IBM's Codepage 437.
I think I would fix the spring clips by drilling a small hole with a pin drill through the part that you have glued together and glue in a steel pin (dressmaking pin cut down?). A glue joint is likely to break again unsupported as you have seen. You can use a pin drill to make holes as small as 0.2mm and they are really cheap on eBay. The sound of a matrix printer brings back so many fond memories......
Great video, as always. The company I worked for used to supply these Epson printers (not sure exactly which model, although FX80 springs to mind) with our electronic measuring systems. They had RS232 interface cards installed.
my dot matrix printers years ago mps-801 for my commodore and la75 for my dec stuff.. did have access to lg-31 at one point but glad to see the back of it as the tracking belts snapped to often.
Love seeing the old Epson X. I had a couple of those back in the day before I upgraded to a Panasonic wide carriage 24pin LX-P1524, which was used & abused for years.
I wonder if you could make a small hole in the plastic and then feed the end of the spring through ? That would eliminate the need for the broken bit of plastic.
This exact model was my second printer! The first was an horrendous little thermal printer from Sinclair, that absolutely stank as it burned off the metallic layer on the proprietary paper one had to use with it - and it's print quality was... simply not there. The Sinclair printer was for my old ZX81, which I rightfully hated. This model Epson was used on a BBC Model B (my second machine, which I loved) and was extremely useful for printing out code listings and such. I love the sound, that and the character set took me back forty years, immediately! Thanks for the upload Mr B - nice work Sir!
Epson FX-80 crew here. Companion to Apple IIe. My heart more with it's Panasonic replacements: 9-pin 1091 with NLQ switch (!) And the big daddy 1124 24-pin which lasted through college.
when I started working in IT in the mid 90s, the FX80s were ubiquitous (slowly being reoplaced by HP laserjets and Canon bubblejets). I even remember setting up a LQ-870 in a classroom. That puppy go some usage.
Epsons and Okidatas still get used in some retail businesses. Impact printers let you print receipts with carbon copies. I had one too, years ago. Epson was supported by just about everything, back when the printer support had to be built into the programs.
Have one sitting on a desk near me. Wayback the paper detect failed. I had to cut a pin on a TTL and piggyback a new TTL. Luckily the schematic was in the manual. It got me through college and beyond.
Klasse! Das Geräusch weckt wirklich nostalgische Gefühle🙂Mein erster Nadeldrucker war der MPS801 für den C64 und später dann der MPS1000 für den Amiga. Wenn ich mich nicht total irre, habe ich noch einen Adapter von Centronics auf LAN, um einen Drucker mit Centronics-Anschluss ans Netzwerk zu verbinden. Lang ist es her 🙂Gruss, Michael
We had one here at work from 88 to 92-ish. Ours broke the same spring mounts - we put a little screws in there to hold the springs. Great printer, but constant use finally killed it (burned the print head up). Replaced with an Oki Microline 393, and that thing was an unkillable tank. Probably still in a closet somewhere.
The most recent time I've seen one of these still in use was tucked in the back corner of a machine room at a bank where its purpose in life was printing PIN slips for credit cards/debit cards. Probably been retired now. The "not centronics" port on the back is probably an IEEE-488 port which you are correct, could be used for Commodore PETs, but it's probably more likely that it was used to connect to an HPIB/GP-IB bus (which is also IEEE-488) with a bunch of other items (test equipment and such), likely for printing out test reports or something of that nature, probably not actually rare, as HPIB/GP-IB is still very widely used in industry.
I still have an MX-80F/T that I bought in about 1981 or 1982. Used it for years until I replaced it with a Panasonic KXP-2123 24-pin printer, which could also use a color ribbon. It also worked well, except the color was poor. Replaced years later with an Epson Stylus Color 600, which was great, even for color photos. It worked well for a few years, until the head clogged and couldn't be cleaned completely. Then had an Epson Stylus Photo R200 which worked very well for a few years until it's internal ink storage pad got full and it would no longer print; Same story with the following Epson Stylus Photo R260. Now using a very old (but reliable) Canon Pixma MP150. (I've done a lot of printing over the last ~40 years!)
Yesss Jan, you did it again! That was a very good video. I remember those days. What an excitement when you bring home a new printer. Nowadays these excitements does not exist anymore. You worry only when the ink cartridge is empty after just a few days of printing. Pffff..😄😄
Those might still be in use in some doctors offices, for actual carbon copies. And yes, those are still a thing in some places in Germany. Or at least u til very recently. In the car rental place I used to work at, they were still using a dot matrix printer with tractor feed paper as late as 2010.
The RX80 was available with several 8-bit interfaces, looks like the one you have is Atari, also available was Commodore's IEC bus which emulated the MPS 801/802 standard and provided an special mode for pass-thru ESC/P mode
This was the first printer I ever used. There were 3 of them in rooms of BBC Micros at school. One of them had a mod to make some of the dip switches accessible without opening the case. They were extended via a ribbon cable to a small plastic box with toggle switches that sat outside the printer. Most of the BBC software required one set of switch options and one specific program (it was a CAD package, can't remember which one) needed different settings. The BBC hooked up to the normal parallel port.
I have no idea what the printer was that I got with my first A500, I hardly used it. I remember it had membrane switches and was an Epson? I used it to print essays from Amiga in first year at Uni, it was a bit hit and miss. :)
Tip: unlock the right tractor feed so it 'floats' left and right as needed. It helps prevent jams on holed paper as it willl follow the holes in the paper.
There are some computer labs that have these, relegated to the Computer science history classes, even some CS101 classes as late as 2004(when I was attending) made us print our C programs out on dot matrix paper for grading. I love the sound. It is associated with me being done with computer lab for the day, since printing out my work was the last thing I did.
An Epson dot matrix was my 2nd printer. My 1st was a Star Micronix (I think I'm spelling that right.) I still have them both in storage, so this video will be helpful when I pull them out to get them going again.
Can still remember my printer back then, that was a real monster. A NEC Pinwriter P7+ if he has printed quickly then my mother had always complained that he is so mega loud.
Awesome job, Jan! Lucky the printer only needed a little TLC. Getting the right printer driver on Workbench is sometimes tedious. I was spoilt in the '80s and '90s with Amigas and had an A2000 hooked up to a Hewlett Packard Laser Jet, and a colour NEC Pinwriter. Needless to say, with ProWrite and DPaint my assignments were the best looking throughout primary and high school! I copped a lot of flack from other students, but my teachers loved the easy-to-read fonts and drooled over the colour pictures printed out, which - with the content - yielded good marks! 🤣😂
Brings back so many memories! Never had a real Epson back in the day - they were very expensive because they were bullet-proof and really designed for heavy duty office/industrial use. Lovely to see one of these old girls back in action. Amazing it still had the protective films on! 👍😁
33:05 My idea for tensioning the paper retaining flaps: Computer cases usually have steel blanking plates in the 5.25in bays that you have to remove when installing an optical drive. If you have one of of those, use this or if not, use an empty can of pop. 1. With sheet metal cutters (tin snips), cut out 2 small pieces (1 for each flap) the same size as the top of the flaps (same place as the rubber band is at 33:05 but extend the metal over the larger part as well for extra strength). 2.With the metal held in place with tape, drill four small holes, 1 in each corner through the metal and the plastic for screws, making sure you line up the holes correctly. It should look like a skin over the curved part of the flap with a small self tapping screw in each corner. 3. In the same place as where the rubber band is at 33:05, shape the metal so it folds over like how the rubber band does and make a little hook in the same place as where the little plastic bit broke off. Use that to attach the spring to. Imagine a J and an up-side-down U next to each other. The U folds over the top and the J is the hook for the spring. That will definitely be strong enough. Hope you understand. Thats how i would do it if i was going to do it properly.
I used to own a 120 character wide epson printer, though not that I had wide paper to actually use it lol! It was hooked up to an msx2 computer with a diy cable. I typed in a hardcopy print program from a magazine and still have some prints from that. Later I got an epson like yours as well before I switched to inkjets on the pc. Never got into those star printers with color capability and 24 dots.
Hmm I think I had one of those as well, looks very similar at least. I totally forgot about it until I saw your video. I think I actually still have the parallel cable it came with. :)
Loving the nostalgia kick of this dot matrix printer. Back in my Atari ST days (early/mid 1990s) I had a Star LC-10 colour dot matrix printer that served me well on a couple of school projects. Even back then cartridges were a bit expensive (although nothing like as bad as they got in the inkjet era, where it was sometimes cheaper to buy a new printer and throw the old one away), so mine came with an ink spray for rejuvenating the black ribbon.
There is 17 power transistors 4 for 1st stepper motor 4 for 2nd stepper motor and 9 for 9 pins in printhead. It is strange why are those arrange in groups of 4, 6 and 7 transistors ?? Maybe this has something to do with microcontroller pins?
My first instinct regarding the broken sprocket covers was: maybe 3D-print replacements? Dunno if something like that would be sturdy enough, though. Would be kind of poetic if it worked :3c
So pity you didn't have a problem with needles. Actually not. But I have Epson LQ-100 and there are couple needles are stuck. Would be interesting to see a way of fixing them
Excellent work Jan! Right not I'm going through the same process with a Star NX-1000 Dot Matrix Printer, well used but with the original box & manual along with two Centronics cables. This printer can also emulate an Epson LX-800 and IBM Proprinter II. This printer will need some serious retrobriting 🙂
Congratulations. Great nostalgia. For the paper retainer, what about drilling a small hole and glueing in a metal pin with super glue. It would be better than forcing in a screw which could crack the plastic. Maybe?
if you decide to try and fix those clips again you could use a Rivit coller take those clamps off completely and drill small hole and glue in the rivit collor from behind should work as long as when closed they dont obstruct the clamps.
Those small spring-loaded flaps over the tractor feed gears are not the best design in terms of durability. I prefer Star Micronics dot matrix printers that use a spring-loaded metal bar to hold the paper in place, they are truly indestructible.
Recently I went through my C64 box-stash and actually found my old C64-Centronics-Adapter which I used with my Star-Dot Matrix back in the day which I used to print out the listings of my self-written basic programs for fault-finding. 😆Its for the Userport and gets 5V via the Datasette-port. I think the printer must be somewhere around still, just can´t find it...
This is ace! I was pleasantly surprised to see I can still get stuff for my Star printer! Maybe these matrix units are still being used in industry somewhere?
I had the lx-86 on my c64 Growing up in the 80s Was actually my father's setup Now with the plastic you could use a soldering iron and try to weld the pieces back on or use metal from a paper clip washer etc and if you have soldering tweezers heat it up and stick in
Very nice dot matrix printer :) Never had these myself, but I remember that noise from various places. My oldest printer is Canon BJC-2100 inkjet printer from 2001 and it still has the parallel / Centronics port, which I've always used with HP Brio PC & Windows 98SE. It has USB port as well, but I just somehow chose to use the parallel port, and never changed it. I still have this HP PC and the Canon printer, but now I have also more modern HP Deskjet all-in-one printer with scanner built in it. As the Canon has the parallel port, I wonder if it would work with Amiga 500, if there would be suitable printer driver? My Amiga OS is the Workbench 1.3.3. version.
The Epson dot matrix printers were great but very expensive. The rx 80 was the price of a c64 plus the 1541 at some time. I had the star sg 10 around, not quite that expensive and it used basically normal type writer ribbons, so you could spool up a new rippon if a ribbon was out... Boy, those printers were loud....
You too, I used (and abused a Star model something- don't recall the number) from late high school to when I graduated college (1984ish to 1991ish). very loud but the ribbons were extremely cheap.
We used to have acoustic/acrylic shields (with sponge insulation) at work in 1986 to cut down on the noise of dot matrix printers. They weren't very effective! 😁
I love the sound of matrix printers. I bought a Citizen MSP80 (i think) with my first paycheck which was a tractor feed 9 pin matrix printer. Printed thousands of pages on it (which kind of annoyed my parents as I was living at home at the time although they never complained) - I think I got through a box and a half of fanfold before I moved out which thinking of it was probably at least 5000 pages. I used to like to sit and read listings to work out where problems were in programs I was writing, and so the printer was pretty much on the go whenever I was at home!
You certainly got your money's worth back in the 80s. Look at them caps and that meaty transformer. I always remember the print head having a "hot don't touch" sticker on it or near it. Makes a nostalgic noisy racket. Loverly
I had an LX-80 for my C64 and Atari ST. They are tanks. These printers are used heavily where multi-layered forms are used. Epson printer commands were the defacto standard for most printers. Probably why drivers are still available.
Reglue the two parts to the cover. Remove the latch from the printer. Cast a negative in silicone, and then a positive/copy with black urethane, that will have the two nubbins in one part.
I use a Commodore MPS-803 to print signs and monthly calendars using PrintMaster on the C64, since everything still works perfectly fine. PrintMaster is also available for the Amiga (although the interface is pretty crappy) though there is better printing software out there like Pelican Press or Deluxe Print.
This was the first printer I purchased in the mid eighties. They lasted forever on dirty shipping docks. Such a great example of a well designed, well built device.
"I love the sound of dot matrix printing in the morning" :) Back in the day, Epson was the "go to" company for printers for 8 bit computers. Had a GX-80 myself. The LX-80 was also very popular.
31:52 When one of these little tabs broke on my Epson MX80 (this would have been 30 years ago), I used the top off of a sewing pin. It was the type with a plastic head. I cut the pin a mm or so from the top, drilled a small, shallow hole in the bracket, set the stub of the pin into that hole, and fixed it with epoxy. This fix held the spring well for many years.
Graphics printing is unidirectional so that way the lines will match up better. Bidirectional printing causes slight shifts in the positioning of each pass that is unnoticeable with text, but may cause the lines in a graphical image to become ragged.
there are still drivers and support, because it's one of the many "instruments" in the original "soundtrack/symphony" of every German doctor's office ... add 3 constantly ringing phones (intentionally ignored by the staff) and someone screaming "do we alread have a urine sample from Herr Schultz?" and the illusion is perfect
Hey, this was my first printer for me back in the 80s. Glad I found it again your channel.
Finally! It's rare to see dot matrix printer restorations. I thought I was the only one that liked dot matrix printers.
BBC micro's with Epson FX-80's were the thing when I was in school! We used to have them on trolleys and you could hear one printing all over the school :)
Everything was designed to be fixed back then i just love it!! Nothing better than the sound of an old Dot Matrix
Great videos and the noise does indeed transport me back to past times. I remember one of these at school connected to a RM 480z and later on I bought a second hand one for my Amiga at home. Happy days !
@33:10 A magnet countersunk into each half near the little "finger tab". Look for the weakest workable magnets, or position so that there is still a gap when 'closed', to prevent excessive drag. If a convenient position can't be found, don't forget that you could increase your options if you set them up to repel instead.
What a great printer for its time! As I recall, something like 144 dots per inch in graphics mode. Back in the day I took advantage of that graphics mode to write an Atari 8-bit driver for the MX-80 just so I could print my AtariBASIC code in the actual Atari font. It would probably have been fully compatible with the RX-80 too. As a retro enthusiast, I wouldn't mind picking up one of these babies for the collecfion. Apparently there's even an open source project to make these into AirPlay / WiFi printers so we can use them with all our modern devices.
This was my first printer hooked up to an IBM 386 acquired from my dads work when they upgraded. Can still hear my brother printing out school papers into the wee hours of the night. Good times
I still have my LX-800 stashed somewhere.. haven't checked up on it for years... these EPSON's were super reliable and sturdy. I had mine hooked up to a IBM 8086 and CPC 6128... Awesome printers !
Great my old printer was a StarLC 24 -200. Great channel as usual have a Nice weekend Jan. Love that you used a A600 ;)
Herzlichen Glückwunsch zum 256. Video. Jetzt kann man Deine Videos nicht mehr an einem Byte abzählen 😉
Huch, das hatte ich bis jetzt noch nicht bemerkt. Dann kaufe ich mal ein zusätzliches Byte! 😅
@@JanBeta 30:35 .. Oohh the good old trusted Dental Pick🙂....... Hey Jan !! .. What does the electronic technician use the Dental Pick for??? ... to fix Bluetooth, of course🤣😂...
I had the VIC 1525. Loved making banners, posters and cards using Print Shop and PrintMaster.
Oh, this brings back memories. I had one of the back home (bought as new by my dad) in about 1985-6.
We used it clear up until 1996, when it was just too slow & noisy for our use. It was replaced by an HP Deskjet 660C.
I wound up trading it for an ImageWriter II circa 1999.
My school IT room used to be filled with these. The memories!
Back in school one of these printers had the same issue with the broken spring post. The school technician fixed it by drilling a small hole and installing a small bolt to hook the spring over. I'm not sure if the plastic will still support that at its current age but it might be worth a shot
Ah, the good old dot matrix days, I stared with a Comrex CR-220 and then a Panasonic KX-P1180 which had Epson emulation, fine for C=64 and then Amiga. Love the sound of these.
I did the repair of the broken spring holders on the tractor feeds like 25 Jears ago... drilled a 3,2mm hole (in small steps due to the brittle material) instead of the broken bolt and used a tread cutter toolset to make a 4mm (M4) Screw go in to it to hold the Springs. Had to file down the Screwhead a lot. We had a RS232 Interface card plugged inside, and therefore we could't use the parallel Centronics Port at the same printer, as some of the internal dip switches on the Mainboard were set to add, as far as I remember it correctly, to every Carriage return a Line feed, as required from the old computer on the serial port, but this prevented the usage of the parallelport with a DOS PC which sent them both by itself. So the stickytape on the Parallelport was no surprise for me.... ;-).
Ah what memories, my first printer was a Citizen Swift 24 with which I printed many full colour pictures from my Amiga.
Great Video, I still have my Star LC 10 from Amiga days 🥰 so I can share the sentiments of still running these old beasts.
One of the greatest printers ever. I felt like a king with the colour option...
Memories... Star 10 was my first as well. Used with a Sharp MZ 721. No support for Norwegian characters at the time, so "modded" the printout with a black Bic pen...
I forgot about this one. It was my first printer. My dad bought it at his work. Good memories.
The first printer I personally owned was an IBM Graphics Printer, which looked very Epson-y and was partially compatible with the command set of the Epson RX and FX...turns out it was basically a rebadged Epson MX-80 with support for IBM's Codepage 437.
I remember that the FX-80 is the one printer EVERY operating system, application, etc has drivers for since forever.
My first printer was a RX-80 F/T, those springs broke the clamps on mine too, put blu tack on them and the lid held them down.
when you mention the GOERLITZ interface, i remember the magazine advertisements they put in HappyComputer etc.
I think I would fix the spring clips by drilling a small hole with a pin drill through the part that you have glued together and glue in a steel pin (dressmaking pin cut down?). A glue joint is likely to break again unsupported as you have seen. You can use a pin drill to make holes as small as 0.2mm and they are really cheap on eBay.
The sound of a matrix printer brings back so many fond memories......
Great video, as always. The company I worked for used to supply these Epson printers (not sure exactly which model, although FX80 springs to mind) with our electronic measuring systems. They had RS232 interface cards installed.
my dot matrix printers years ago mps-801 for my commodore and la75 for my dec stuff.. did have access to lg-31 at one point but glad to see the back of it as the tracking belts snapped to often.
Love seeing the old Epson X. I had a couple of those back in the day before I upgraded to a Panasonic wide carriage 24pin LX-P1524, which was used & abused for years.
I wonder if you could make a small hole in the plastic and then feed the end of the spring through ? That would eliminate the need for the broken bit of plastic.
This exact model was my second printer! The first was an horrendous little thermal printer from Sinclair, that absolutely stank as it burned off the metallic layer on the proprietary paper one had to use with it - and it's print quality was... simply not there. The Sinclair printer was for my old ZX81, which I rightfully hated. This model Epson was used on a BBC Model B (my second machine, which I loved) and was extremely useful for printing out code listings and such. I love the sound, that and the character set took me back forty years, immediately!
Thanks for the upload Mr B - nice work Sir!
That interface card is a computer in itself.
Epson FX-80 crew here. Companion to Apple IIe. My heart more with it's Panasonic replacements: 9-pin 1091 with NLQ switch (!) And the big daddy 1124 24-pin which lasted through college.
getting the first floppy drive and printer really made things nice to share with others
Hallo Jan, mit dem 3D Printer neu Drucken? und coole Videos, ich bin ein Amiga User.
when I started working in IT in the mid 90s, the FX80s were ubiquitous (slowly being reoplaced by HP laserjets and Canon bubblejets). I even remember setting up a LQ-870 in a classroom. That puppy go some usage.
You can drill a small hole on top where the rubber band is now positioned and use a longer spring hooked into the hole.
Epsons and Okidatas still get used in some retail businesses. Impact printers let you print receipts with carbon copies.
I had one too, years ago. Epson was supported by just about everything, back when the printer support had to be built into the programs.
We had a huge NEC Pinwriter P7 dot matrix printer that could print landscape A3 papers. You could switch the feeder from friction and tractor feeder.
Jan can I ask you a question? Some people are replacing all capacitors in all old computers or anything else. Do you agree with this practice?
Ah, 1980s Epson dot-matrix printers :) The one we had for our Apple IIe clone in the mid-80s was a LX-80 - worked like a champ.
Epson Classic ! To think of the millions of school assignments printed out on EPSON printers in all the classrooms of the world !
Can you make hole in plastic and put the spring loop in the end in the hole ? Then you dont need any screw.
Have one sitting on a desk near me. Wayback the paper detect failed. I had to cut a pin on a TTL and piggyback a new TTL. Luckily the schematic was in the manual. It got me through college and beyond.
Lot of nostalgia to mee too!! Thanks!
Klasse! Das Geräusch weckt wirklich nostalgische Gefühle🙂Mein erster Nadeldrucker war der MPS801 für den C64 und später dann der MPS1000 für den Amiga. Wenn ich mich nicht total irre, habe ich noch einen Adapter von Centronics auf LAN, um einen Drucker mit Centronics-Anschluss ans Netzwerk zu verbinden. Lang ist es her 🙂Gruss, Michael
We had one here at work from 88 to 92-ish. Ours broke the same spring mounts - we put a little screws in there to hold the springs. Great printer, but constant use finally killed it (burned the print head up). Replaced with an Oki Microline 393, and that thing was an unkillable tank. Probably still in a closet somewhere.
The most recent time I've seen one of these still in use was tucked in the back corner of a machine room at a bank where its purpose in life was printing PIN slips for credit cards/debit cards.
Probably been retired now.
The "not centronics" port on the back is probably an IEEE-488 port which you are correct, could be used for Commodore PETs, but it's probably more likely that it was used to connect to an HPIB/GP-IB bus (which is also IEEE-488) with a bunch of other items (test equipment and such), likely for printing out test reports or something of that nature, probably not actually rare, as HPIB/GP-IB is still very widely used in industry.
I still have an MX-80F/T that I bought in about 1981 or 1982. Used it for years until I replaced it with a Panasonic KXP-2123 24-pin printer, which could also use a color ribbon. It also worked well, except the color was poor. Replaced years later with an Epson Stylus Color 600, which was great, even for color photos. It worked well for a few years, until the head clogged and couldn't be cleaned completely. Then had an Epson Stylus Photo R200 which worked very well for a few years until it's internal ink storage pad got full and it would no longer print; Same story with the following Epson Stylus Photo R260. Now using a very old (but reliable) Canon Pixma MP150. (I've done a lot of printing over the last ~40 years!)
Yesss Jan, you did it again! That was a very good video. I remember those days. What an excitement when you bring home a new printer. Nowadays these excitements does not exist anymore. You worry only when the ink cartridge is empty after just a few days of printing. Pffff..😄😄
Those might still be in use in some doctors offices, for actual carbon copies. And yes, those are still a thing in some places in Germany. Or at least u til very recently.
In the car rental place I used to work at, they were still using a dot matrix printer with tractor feed paper as late as 2010.
The RX80 was available with several 8-bit interfaces, looks like the one you have is Atari, also available was Commodore's IEC bus which emulated the MPS 801/802 standard and provided an special mode for pass-thru ESC/P mode
This was the first printer I ever used. There were 3 of them in rooms of BBC Micros at school. One of them had a mod to make some of the dip switches accessible without opening the case. They were extended via a ribbon cable to a small plastic box with toggle switches that sat outside the printer. Most of the BBC software required one set of switch options and one specific program (it was a CAD package, can't remember which one) needed different settings. The BBC hooked up to the normal parallel port.
I had the JX80 which was the Color version with the multi colour ribbon, one of the best printers I ever had.
Awww, never had dot printer :-( Started straight from HP desk jet 420 in 1998 and it was pretty shiттy printer, barely limped till graduation in 2000.
I have no idea what the printer was that I got with my first A500, I hardly used it. I remember it had membrane switches and was an Epson? I used it to print essays from Amiga in first year at Uni, it was a bit hit and miss. :)
Tip: unlock the right tractor feed so it 'floats' left and right as needed. It helps prevent jams on holed paper as it willl follow the holes in the paper.
My first was a MX80 which we upgraded to FX80.
My second was a NEC P2+ (Think this one is still sitting somewhere in my parents garage).
There are some computer labs that have these, relegated to the Computer science history classes, even some CS101 classes as late as 2004(when I was attending) made us print our C programs out on dot matrix paper for grading.
I love the sound. It is associated with me being done with computer lab for the day, since printing out my work was the last thing I did.
An Epson dot matrix was my 2nd printer. My 1st was a Star Micronix (I think I'm spelling that right.) I still have them both in storage, so this video will be helpful when I pull them out to get them going again.
My first printer was a FX-1000 which we bought as used. Never managed to get the paper properly aligned when printing more than one page.
Can still remember my printer back then, that was a real monster. A NEC Pinwriter P7+ if he has printed quickly then my mother had always complained that he is so mega loud.
Awesome job, Jan! Lucky the printer only needed a little TLC. Getting the right printer driver on Workbench is sometimes tedious. I was spoilt in the '80s and '90s with Amigas and had an A2000 hooked up to a Hewlett Packard Laser Jet, and a colour NEC Pinwriter. Needless to say, with ProWrite and DPaint my assignments were the best looking throughout primary and high school! I copped a lot of flack from other students, but my teachers loved the easy-to-read fonts and drooled over the colour pictures printed out, which - with the content - yielded good marks! 🤣😂
Brings back so many memories! Never had a real Epson back in the day - they were very expensive because they were bullet-proof and really designed for heavy duty office/industrial use. Lovely to see one of these old girls back in action. Amazing it still had the protective films on! 👍😁
33:05 My idea for tensioning the paper retaining flaps:
Computer cases usually have steel blanking plates in the 5.25in bays that you have to remove when installing an optical drive. If you have one of of those, use this or if not, use an empty can of pop.
1. With sheet metal cutters (tin snips), cut out 2 small pieces (1 for each flap) the same size as the top of the flaps (same place as the rubber band is at 33:05 but extend the metal over the larger part as well for extra strength).
2.With the metal held in place with tape, drill four small holes, 1 in each corner through the metal and the plastic for screws, making sure you line up the holes correctly. It should look like a skin over the curved part of the flap with a small self tapping screw in each corner.
3. In the same place as where the rubber band is at 33:05, shape the metal so it folds over like how the rubber band does and make a little hook in the same place as where the little plastic bit broke off. Use that to attach the spring to.
Imagine a J and an up-side-down U next to each other. The U folds over the top and the J is the hook for the spring.
That will definitely be strong enough. Hope you understand. Thats how i would do it if i was going to do it properly.
If the flaps are too thin for screws, use strong double sided tape to stick the metal to the plastic.
I used to own a 120 character wide epson printer, though not that I had wide paper to actually use it lol! It was hooked up to an msx2 computer with a diy cable. I typed in a hardcopy print program from a magazine and still have some prints from that. Later I got an epson like yours as well before I switched to inkjets on the pc. Never got into those star printers with color capability and 24 dots.
Hmm I think I had one of those as well, looks very similar at least. I totally forgot about it until I saw your video.
I think I actually still have the parallel cable it came with. :)
Loving the nostalgia kick of this dot matrix printer. Back in my Atari ST days (early/mid 1990s) I had a Star LC-10 colour dot matrix printer that served me well on a couple of school projects. Even back then cartridges were a bit expensive (although nothing like as bad as they got in the inkjet era, where it was sometimes cheaper to buy a new printer and throw the old one away), so mine came with an ink spray for rejuvenating the black ribbon.
39:10 Good Safety Record ! Love the sign... :-)
There is 17 power transistors 4 for 1st stepper motor 4 for 2nd stepper motor and 9 for 9 pins in printhead. It is strange why are those arrange in groups of 4, 6 and 7 transistors ?? Maybe this has something to do with microcontroller pins?
My first instinct regarding the broken sprocket covers was: maybe 3D-print replacements? Dunno if something like that would be sturdy enough, though. Would be kind of poetic if it worked :3c
So pity you didn't have a problem with needles. Actually not. But I have Epson LQ-100 and there are couple needles are stuck. Would be interesting to see a way of fixing them
Submerge print head in ultrasonic cleaner? Then relubricate with very light sewing machine oil?
Excellent work Jan!
Right not I'm going through the same process with a Star NX-1000 Dot Matrix Printer, well used but with the original box & manual along with two Centronics cables. This printer can also emulate an Epson LX-800 and IBM Proprinter II. This printer will need some serious retrobriting 🙂
Well done again Jan.
Congratulations. Great nostalgia. For the paper retainer, what about drilling a small hole and glueing in a metal pin with super glue. It would be better than forcing in a screw which could crack the plastic. Maybe?
if you decide to try and fix those clips again you could use a Rivit coller take those clamps off completely and drill small hole and glue in the rivit collor from behind should work as long as when closed they dont obstruct the clamps.
This brings back memories. I could load a new ream of paper & tension it with my eyes closed.
thanks, it actually let me through so i could download it.
i feel the old printers are just as important as the computers they were used with.
You need to find a dfx-5000 used to service them quite often...
Love this - it's helping me to refurb my LX-86!
That was my first printer and I loved it! Yes, very reliable!
Those small spring-loaded flaps over the tractor feed gears are not the best design in terms of durability. I prefer Star Micronics dot matrix printers that use a spring-loaded metal bar to hold the paper in place, they are truly indestructible.
I still have a commodore mps 803, witch only need a new ribbon but can't find one.
Is the interface board for GPIB?
Recently I went through my C64 box-stash and actually found my old C64-Centronics-Adapter which I used with my Star-Dot Matrix back in the day which I used to print out the listings of my self-written basic programs for fault-finding. 😆Its for the Userport and gets 5V via the Datasette-port. I think the printer must be somewhere around still, just can´t find it...
This is ace! I was pleasantly surprised to see I can still get stuff for my Star printer! Maybe these matrix units are still being used in industry somewhere?
Our pharmacy printed labels with a matrix untill a year or two ago
I had the lx-86 on my c64
Growing up in the 80s
Was actually my father's setup
Now with the plastic you could use a soldering iron and try to weld the pieces back on or use metal from a paper clip washer etc and if you have soldering tweezers heat it up and stick in
Very nice dot matrix printer :) Never had these myself, but I remember that noise from various places.
My oldest printer is Canon BJC-2100 inkjet printer from 2001 and it still has the parallel / Centronics port, which I've always used with HP Brio PC & Windows 98SE. It has USB port as well, but I just somehow chose to use the parallel port, and never changed it.
I still have this HP PC and the Canon printer, but now I have also more modern HP Deskjet all-in-one printer with scanner built in it.
As the Canon has the parallel port, I wonder if it would work with Amiga 500, if there would be suitable printer driver? My Amiga OS is the Workbench 1.3.3. version.
The Epson dot matrix printers were great but very expensive. The rx 80 was the price of a c64 plus the 1541 at some time. I had the star sg 10 around, not quite that expensive and it used basically normal type writer ribbons, so you could spool up a new rippon if a ribbon was out... Boy, those printers were loud....
You too, I used (and abused a Star model something- don't recall the number) from late high school to when I graduated college (1984ish to 1991ish). very loud but the ribbons were extremely cheap.
We used to have acoustic/acrylic shields (with sponge insulation) at work in 1986 to cut down on the noise of dot matrix printers. They weren't very effective! 😁
I love the sound of matrix printers. I bought a Citizen MSP80 (i think) with my first paycheck which was a tractor feed 9 pin matrix printer. Printed thousands of pages on it (which kind of annoyed my parents as I was living at home at the time although they never complained) - I think I got through a box and a half of fanfold before I moved out which thinking of it was probably at least 5000 pages. I used to like to sit and read listings to work out where problems were in programs I was writing, and so the printer was pretty much on the go whenever I was at home!
You certainly got your money's worth back in the 80s. Look at them caps and that meaty transformer. I always remember the print head having a "hot don't touch" sticker on it or near it. Makes a nostalgic noisy racket. Loverly
I had an LX-80 for my C64 and Atari ST. They are tanks. These printers are used heavily where multi-layered forms are used. Epson printer commands were the defacto standard for most printers. Probably why drivers are still available.
Reglue the two parts to the cover. Remove the latch from the printer. Cast a negative in silicone, and then a positive/copy with black urethane, that will have the two nubbins in one part.
I use a Commodore MPS-803 to print signs and monthly calendars using PrintMaster on the C64, since everything still works perfectly fine. PrintMaster is also available for the Amiga (although the interface is pretty crappy) though there is better printing software out there like Pelican Press or Deluxe Print.