JPH03280077A - Electrophotographic recording system printer - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To display accurate residual quantity of toner without using a sensor and an electric circuit accompanied with the sensor by providing a non-volatile memory, a display means and a control means for displaying the residual quantity of toner on the display means. CONSTITUTION:Every time the data plotted with as much as one page of paper in a memory for plotting 5 and the data already plotted is transmitted to a video signal output means 3, the number of dots printed in black is measured based on the number of bits corresponding to the dot printed in black in the bits of the data already plotted. This printer is provided with a control means 2 by which the measured number of dots is added to the number of dots, which is obtained until previous time and stored in the non-volatile memory 6, and stored in the memory 6, the residual quantity of toner is obtained based on the number of dots which can be printed with the initial quantity of toner in the case that printing is not performed at all and the number of dots stored in the memory 6, and the residual quantity of toner is displayed on the display means 7. Thus, the accurate residual quantity of toner is displayed without using a mechanism such as a sensor because the number of dots equivalent to black printing of the data already plotted is integrated and the residual quantity of toner is obtained based on the integrated value.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention [Industrial Application Field] The present invention draws received print data in a drawing memory in correspondence with one bit of the print data, and when drawing for one page of paper is completed, The present invention relates to a microprogram-controlled electrophotographic printer that converts completed data into a video signal and prints by applying toner to paper based on the video signal.

[Conventional technology]

Conventionally, there are two ways to determine the amount of toner remaining in this type of electrophotographic printer: one is to use a sensor to directly determine the amount of toner remaining, and the other is to estimate the amount of toner used from the number of sheets of paper printed. There was a way to find out the remaining amount.

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] Among the conventional methods for determining the remaining amount of toner described above, the method using a sensor requires a sensor to be installed inside the toner bottle, and a mechanism and an electric circuit for this purpose are required. This method increases the cost and complicates the microprogram, and the method of determining the amount of toner remaining based on the number of sheets of paper printed significantly increases or decreases the amount of toner used per sheet of paper depending on the printed content. It is impossible to accurately estimate the amount of toner used, and there is a particular drawback that it may be determined that there is a sufficient amount of toner even though the remaining amount of toner is O.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An object of the present invention is to provide an electrophotographic printer that can accurately display the amount of remaining toner without using a sensor or an associated electric circuit.

Means for Solving Problem 1] The electrophotographic recording printer of the present invention has a non-volatile memory, a display means, and a drawing memory in which one page of paper is drawn, and the drawing method data is sent to a video signal output means. Each time it is sent, the number of black print dots is measured from the number of bits corresponding to black print dots in the bits of the drawing method data, and the number of dots is added to the previous number of dots stored in the non-volatile memory. The remaining amount of toner is calculated from the number of dots that can be printed with the initial amount of toner when no printing is performed and the number of dots stored in the non-volatile memory, and the remaining amount of toner is calculated. and control means for displaying on the display means.

[For production]

The number of black print dots is calculated from the bits of the drawing method data, this number of dots is stored in non-volatile memory and integrated, and the amount of toner used is calculated based on this integrated number of dots to calculate the remaining amount of toner. Therefore, it is possible to accurately determine the amount of remaining toner without using a mechanism such as a sensor.

C Embodiment 3 Next, an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an electrophotographic printer according to an embodiment of the present invention.

The electrophotographic printer of this embodiment has an input interface l for transferring received print data to the microcomputer 2, and a drawing memory in which one bit corresponds to one print dot and has a capacity equal to or more than one page of paper. 5 and
A video signal output means 3 for converting drawing method data from the microcomputer 2 into a video signal, a printing means 4 for printing by attaching toner to paper based on the video signal, and a non-volatile device for storing the number of dots for black printing. When the drawing for one page of paper is completed, the drawing method data in the drawing memory 5 is sent to the video signal output means 3. The number of bits corresponding to black printing is counted among the bits of the drawing method data sent to The amount of toner remaining is calculated from the number of dots that can be printed with the initial amount of toner when no printing is performed and the number of dots stored in the non-volatile memory 6, and the remaining amount of toner is displayed on the display means 7. Microcomputer 2 with microprogram control that displays the amount
and display means 7 for displaying the remaining amount of toner.

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be explained.

Toner is replenished and a state in which there is a prescribed maximum amount of toner in the toner bottle is set as an initial state. When the toner is replenished and the initial state is set, the nonvolatile memory 6 is cleared and 0 is stored. Further, the number of dots that can be printed with the initial amount of toner is set as No.

The print data received by the input interface 1 is decoded by the microcomputer 2 and sent to the drawing memory 5.
is drawn on. Here, the bit corresponding to the black printed dot is set to "1", and the bit corresponding to the non-black printed dot is set to "1".
0”, the number of bits that are “1” included in the drawn data stored in the drawing memory 5 is the number of black printed dots.The drawing for one page of paper is Upon completion, the microcomputer 2 transfers the drawn data from the drawing memory 5 to the video signal output means 3, and causes the printing means 4 to print the drawn data on paper. By counting the number of bits that are '1' in the completed data, the number of black printed dots for one page of paper is measured. Then, the contents of the non-volatile memory 6 are read out, and the number of black print dots just obtained is added thereto and stored in the non-volatile memory 6. Since the content of the non-volatile memory 6 is O in the initial state, the content of the non-volatile memory 6 is the sum of the number of black print dots that have been printed since toner was replenished.

The microcomputer 2 reads the number N of dots printed so far stored in the non-volatile memory 6 when the power is turned on and each time a page of paper is printed. Number of dots printed on N
The number of dots that can be printed after subtraction is No-N, which is proportional to the remaining amount of toner, so the microcomputer 2 calculates this No-N and if this is close to O, the toner is almost out. As a result, the display means 7 displays a toner out warning. Further, the remaining amount of toner is displayed by converting the above-mentioned No-N into data to be displayed on a bar graph, for example, by the microcomputer 2, and displaying it on the display means 7.

The number N of dots printed so far is stored in the non-volatile memory 6, so even if the power is cut off, it will be retained.
It is possible to always accurately calculate the remaining amount of toner.

〔Effect of the invention〕

As explained above, the present invention integrates the number of dots corresponding to black print in drawn data and calculates the remaining amount of toner based on this, thereby determining the accurate amount of remaining toner without using a mechanism such as a sensor. This has the effect of suppressing cost increases.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an electrophotographic printer according to an embodiment of the present invention. 1... Input interface, 2...
Microcomputer, 3...Video signal output means, 4...Printing means, 5...Drawing memory, 6...Non-volatile memory, 7... ...Display means. Nippon Electric Engineering Co., Ltd. Representative Patent Attorney Hiji Uchihara Figure 1

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. Decode the print data received by the input interface and draw one print dot in the drawing memory in correspondence with one bit of the drawing memory to draw one page of paper. When the drawing data is completed, the drawn data in the drawing memory is sent to the video signal output means, and the video signal output means converts the drawn data into a video signal and sends the video signal to the printing means. In a microprogram-controlled electrophotographic printer that prints by attaching toner to paper based on a video signal, one page of paper is drawn in a nonvolatile memory, display means, and drawing memory. Each time the drawn data is sent to the video signal output means, the number of black printed dots is measured from the number of bits of the drawn data corresponding to the black printed dots, and the number of dots is stored in a nonvolatile memory. The toner is added to the previous number of dots stored in the non-volatile memory, and is calculated based on the number of dots that can be printed with the initial toner amount without any printing and the number of dots stored in the non-volatile memory. An electrophotographic printer comprising: a control means for determining the remaining amount of toner and displaying the remaining amount of toner on a display means.