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Article: Leisure - Retro - Xerox 9700. How one man fought and won the battle to make laser printing a reality.
- Article from:
- Personal Computer World
- Article date:
- September 1, 2005
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2005 Incisive Media, published with the permission of Incisive Media. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Byline: Gordon Laing.
Launched in 1977, the Xerox 9700 was the first commercial laser printer.
The man who personally came up with the idea of laser printing was Gary Starkweather. He joined Xerox in July 1964 as an optical engineer on advanced copier technology.
His idea came while working with lasers as an alternative light source for high-speed facsimile systems. It dawned on him that, rather than scan and transmit someone else's document, you could generate one using a computer and send the electrical signals direct to the printer portion of the fax machine.
The idea was born, but Starkweather's management was less than impressed. ...