CompuServe Messages

(continuation of Birmy praise) Also, Birmy seems to be one of the few firms really tackling speed as an issue. In fact, I'm told plans call for a new RIP card with 52 Mbytes of RAM packed on it so that board sheet pages can approach the 1 pg/min mark. 52 Mbytes of RAM will also allow the 24×36 inch device to be driven without the need for a SCSI image buffer. Also, the new Birmy RIPs use the RIPS 4000i boards which use the new Intel 960 RISC. Previous boards had used the Weitek Hyperscript chip set. Granted this is not too objective a response. But for a product line that starts (for high-res) at $34,600 and delivers Type I support at 3000 dpi, more people should sit up and take notice. I did, and I'm very happy. Look, clones made the PC market what it is today – fruitful, expansive and, in general, more affordable. If you find a good product that's compatible, less expensive it's worth a test drive. If you're really worried about clones…ask Lino about who developed the RIP3 and where… D. Geller Washington, D.C. Oh yeah, about fonts…At extremely high resolutions, many vendors type faces look quite good. Hinting becomes less of an issue. According to Seybold, many of the Bitstream faces were truer to the original type faces. I've used Bitstream, URW and Adobe on the Birmy. All render quite well.