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talpadk / ptouch-php

A php driver for Brother P-touch lable printers
MIT License
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Label Height Larger Than 128 px / 18mm #1

Open sonaro opened 8 years ago

sonaro commented 8 years ago

Hello,

Have you had any luck printing a larger label height? I am attempting to print to a 24mm label.

Thank you kindly!

talpadk commented 7 years ago

The label cartridge I have is the 24mm one that came with the printer. What kind of issues are you having with the printouts?

sonaro commented 7 years ago

I was not able to print the full label height of 24mm. It appears the print head is only 18mm wide, and therefore purchasing a label larger than 18mm has no advantage with the PT-P700. Can you confirm this?

talpadk commented 7 years ago

The 24mm role has 128 printable pixels, at the printer resolution of 180 DPI that should result in a 18.06 mm high image. Just like regular printers the label writer has some margins on which the printer cannot print.

Smaller rolls have less than 128 pixels of printable space: 3.5 mm -> 24px ~= 3.39mm 6 mm -> 32px ~= 4.52mm 9 mm -> 50px ~= 7.06mm 12 mm -> 70px ~= 9.88mm 18 mm -> 112px ~= 15.80mm 24 mm ->128px ~=18.06 mm

In other words there are some benefits of the larger labels.

talpadk commented 7 years ago

P.S. These values are for the TZe tapes, the heat shrink ones have slightly different print areas.

The information on the print height is from cv_pth500p700e500_eng_raster_110.pdf page 25 and 26 (pdf numbering, not the page numbers on the page fotter)

sonaro commented 7 years ago

Thanks for referencing the Software Developer's PDF. I was not aware this document existed and the guide is extremely helpful!

It appears the physical width of the print head for the PT-P700 is 18mm/128px, as mentioned in the Specifications here as "Max. Print Height". It appears the specification is incorrectly listed on the website in the "Software Features" section, rather than the "Hardware Features" section.

I am currently able to print with 0px margin (edge to edge) on the 18mm cartridges. I was attempting to print with 0px margin on the 24mm cartridge, but was unsuccessful since it appears the physical width of the print head of the PT-P700 is only 18mm/128px. Printing edge-to-edge is important for my application since I am stacking multiple labels together to attain a wider print area (2x18mm), and need a seamless transition between labels.

For reference, other Brother label printers listed below have a print head physically wide enough to print on the 24mm cartridges with 0px margin, although I have not tested them for edge-to-edge support yet. PT-9700PC / PT-9800PCN, p.49, Maximum printing width = 1.07" (27.1 mm), ESC/P Dev Manual PT-P900W / PT-P950NW, p.170, Maximum printing width = 1.26" (32 mm), Raster Dev Manual

Label Printer Development / Command Support Map

I will keep the PT-P700 for my application since the printer is much less expensive than the other printers that have a larger print head and I also do not need the higher DPI.