JP2006240144A - Inkjet recorder - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an inkjet recorder of which the first print-outputting time is shortened and which can obtain a beautiful output image excellent in color reproducibility possible only by inkjet. <P>SOLUTION: A plurality of reception data amounts for starting printing according to a printing mode are set. According to a printing quality, a used medium and the number of printing passes designated by a user, printing is started when the data amount received from a host computer reaches a data amount enoght for a head to print one line. Also printing is started when the data amount received from the host computer reaches a data amount enough to print one page. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2006,JPO&NCIPI

Description

  The present invention relates to a recording apparatus and a recording method, and more particularly to a recording apparatus and a recording method using a recording head that performs recording by ejecting ink according to an ink jet method.

  In recent years, OA equipment such as personal computers, copying machines, word processors, and the like has become widespread, and a recording apparatus that performs digital image recording by an ink jet method as a kind of image forming (recording) apparatus of these equipment has rapidly developed and spread. ing. In particular, along with the enhancement of the functions of OA devices, the colorization of these devices is progressing, and various color ink jet recording apparatuses have been developed accordingly.

  In general, an ink jet recording apparatus includes a carriage on which a recording head and an ink tank are mounted, a transport mechanism that transports recording paper, and a control circuit that controls these. In such a recording apparatus, ink is ejected while serially scanning a recording head having a plurality of ejection openings for ejecting ink droplets in the direction (main scanning direction) perpendicular to the recording paper conveyance direction (sub-scanning direction). On the other hand, the recording operation is executed by intermittently conveying the recording paper by an amount equal to the recording width of the recording head while ink is not ejected from the recording head. Further, in the case of a recording apparatus capable of color recording, a color image is formed by superimposing ink droplets ejected from a plurality of recording heads.

  In the ink jet recording apparatus, as a method of ejecting ink, a heating element (electrothermal energy converter) is provided in the vicinity of the ejection port, and an electric signal is applied to the heating element to locally heat the ink to change the pressure. Conventionally, a method for causing ink to discharge from an ejection port and a method for ejecting ink by applying a mechanical pressure to the ink using a piezoelectric element such as a piezoelectric element are known.

  This ink jet recording method records characters and figures by ejecting ink as fine droplets from a discharge port onto a recording medium according to a recording signal, and has low noise because it is non-impact. Because it has advantages such as low running costs, easy downsizing, and relatively easy colorization, it can be used in combination with computers and word processors, etc. Are widely used as image forming (recording) means in recording apparatuses such as copying machines, printers, and facsimiles.

  1 and 2 are block diagrams showing schematic configurations of a controller unit and an engine unit of the ink jet recording apparatus, respectively.

  First, the function and schematic operation of the controller unit will be described. The CPU 101 is connected to the host computers 120 and 121 via the USB interface 108 or the IEEE 1394 interface 109. The CPU 101 receives the control program, the updatable control program, the processing program, various constant data, and the like from the ROM 105 and the host computer 120. The RAM 104 for storing the command signal and the image information is accessed, and the recording operation is controlled based on the information stored in these memories. The instruction information input from the keys of the operation panel 107 is transmitted to the CPU 101 via the operation panel interface 106, and the LED lighting and LCD display of the operation panel 107 are similarly controlled via the operation panel interface 106 according to commands from the CPU 101. Is done. The HDD 110 has a larger storage capacity than the RAM 104 and is a secondary storage device that stores image data and the like. The image information is converted into dot data of each ink color by the image data processing block 111 and output to the engine (FIG. 2). Similarly, various commands and status information are transmitted and received between the controller and the engine via the image data processing block 111.

  Next, the function and operation outline of the engine unit will be described. The engine unit is connected to a controller (FIG. 1) via a band memory control block 209. The CPU 201 accesses a ROM 203 storing a control program, an updatable control program, a processing program, various constant data, and the like, and a controller (FIG. 1) RAM 202 for storing received command signals and image information. The recording operation is controlled based on the stored information. The carriage 220 is moved by operating the carriage motor 208 via the carriage motor control circuit 207. Further, by operating the paper feed motor 205 via the paper feed motor control circuit 204, the paper transport mechanism 206 such as a transport roller is operated. Further, the CPU 201 can record a desired image on a recording medium by controlling the band memory control block 209 and the recording head control block 211 based on various information stored in the RAM 202 and driving the recording head 212. .

  A power supply circuit (not shown) is supplied with a logic drive voltage Vcc (for example, 3.3 V) for operating the CPU and various control circuits, various motor drive voltages Vm (for example, 24 V), and a heat voltage for driving the recording head. Vh (for example, 12V) is output.

  As a method of binarizing multi-value data to obtain binary data and reproducing a gradation image in a pseudo manner using the binary data, for example, (1) density pattern method, (2) systematic pattern dither And (3) error diffusion method.

  In the density pattern method, one pixel is developed into M * N recording dots (M and N are integers of 1 or more), and gradation expression by binary is performed by area modulation, and dots are recorded per unit area. The area modulation is realized by changing the number (number of ink particles).

  In the pattern dither method, a pattern dither matrix including threshold values configured in a matrix is prepared, and one-to-one pixel comparison between each threshold value and each pixel of input data is performed to determine ON / OFF.

  In the error diffusion method, a diffusion coefficient is assigned to a peripheral pixel for a target pixel, and a quantization error generated in the target pixel is distributed to the peripheral pixels according to the diffusion coefficient. As a result, the density of the entire image is preserved, and a favorable pseudo gradation expression is possible.

  In general, the pattern dither method tends to have a lower image quality than an image to which the error diffusion method is applied. However, since parallel processing is possible, high-speed processing is easy. In the error diffusion method, it is difficult to perform high-speed processing because it is not possible to shift to processing of the next pixel until an error propagates.

  In the conventional ink jet recording method, it was necessary to use a special coated paper having an ink absorbing layer in order to obtain a color image with high color development without ink bleeding. A method of giving printability to plain paper that is used in large quantities on a machine has been put into practical use. Furthermore, it is desired to support various recording media such as OHP sheets, cloths, and plastic sheets. In order to meet these requirements, recording media (recording media) having different ink absorption characteristics were selected as necessary. At the same time, development and commercialization of a recording apparatus capable of performing the best recording irrespective of the type of the recording medium are being promoted. In addition, regarding the size of the recording medium, large-sized posters and woven fabrics such as clothes for advertisements have been required. Such an ink jet recording apparatus is in high demand in a wide range of fields as an excellent recording means, and it can be said that there is a demand for providing higher quality images, and the demand for higher speed is further increased.

  Generally, the color ink jet recording method uses three color inks of cyan (C), magenta (M), and yellow (Y), and further uses four color inks added with black (Bk). Realizes color recording. In such a color ink jet recording apparatus, unlike a monochrome dedicated ink jet recording apparatus that records only characters, various factors such as color development, gradation expression, and uniformity of an image are recorded in recording a color image. It is necessary to consider.

  However, the quality of the recorded image largely depends on the performance of the recording head unit. The slight differences in the characteristics of each nozzle that occur during the printhead manufacturing process, such as the shape of the printhead discharge ports and the variations in the quality of the electrothermal transducer (discharge heater), are due to the amount and direction of ink discharged. The direction of the image is influenced, and these effects appear as density unevenness in the finally formed recorded image, which causes deterioration in image quality. As a result, there are “white” portions that do not meet the area factor of 100% periodically in the main scanning direction of the recording head, or conversely, the dots overlap abnormally or white streaks occur. Will be. These phenomena are usually perceived as uneven density by the human eye.

  Therefore, a method called a multi-pass recording method has been proposed as a countermeasure against such density unevenness. Here, for the sake of simplicity, a case where a recording head that performs recording using a single color ink consisting of 8 nozzles is used will be described as an example.

  In the first scan of multi-pass printing, even-numbered row patterns are used, and in the second scan, odd-numbered row patterns are used. In the first scan, print data is thinned using a staggered pattern and a second scan is an inverted staggered pattern. A case where two-pass printing is realized by adopting a fixed mask method for generating pass data according to FIG. The staggered pattern is recorded in the first scan, the paper is fed by half the recording width (4 dot width), and then the inverted staggered pattern is recorded in the second scan to complete the recording. That is, the recording area in units of 4 dots is completed for each scan by alternately performing paper feeding in units of 4 dots and recording in a zigzag / reverse zigzag pattern.

  Next, two-pass printing is realized by adopting a table reference method that generates pass data by thinning out print data using a random mask pattern in which print dots and non-print dots are randomly arranged. The case will be described. FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an example of a mask table for each printing scan. Table areas A and B are complementary mask tables used in the first pass and the second pass, respectively. The table is 1 bit / dot, 0 indicates a mask target, and 1 indicates a non-mask target. Mask tables A and B are tables each having a size corresponding to 12 pixels in the main scanning direction and 4 pixels in the sub-scanning direction, and are repeatedly developed in each direction and used as mask data. The number of nozzles provided in the recording head is 8, and the number of pixels corresponding to the paper conveyance amount in 2-pass recording is 8/2 = 4, which matches the sub-scanning direction sizes of Tables A and B.

  FIG. 4 is a diagram for explaining the state of recording scanning using the mask table shown in FIG. For 8 lines of data corresponding to 8 nozzles, A and B are applied as mask patterns every 4 lines. In each recording scan, image data masking (replaces recording dots with non-recording dots) is executed using the stored mask table to generate and output pass data. Specifically, by taking the logical product of the image data and the mask data, if the mask data is 1, the image data is output as it is, and if the mask data is 0, the image data is This is realized by replacing with 0. All image areas are always masked in the order of A and B by two scans to generate print data. Here, the mask OFF (1) ratios of A and B are equally about 50%.

  Similarly to the table reference type two-pass recording, an example of the table reference type four-pass recording is shown below. FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an example of a mask table for each printing scan. The table areas A, B, C, and D are complementary to each other used in the first pass, the second pass, the third pass, and the fourth pass. It is a mask table. The table is 1 bit / dot, 0 indicates a mask target, and 1 indicates a non-mask target. The mask tables A, B, C, and D are tables each having a size corresponding to 12 pixels in the main scanning direction * 2 pixels in the sub scanning direction, and are repeatedly developed in each direction and used as mask data. The number of nozzles provided in the recording head is 8, and the number of pixels corresponding to the paper conveyance amount in 4-pass recording is 8/4 = 2, which matches the sub-scanning direction sizes of the tables A, B, C, and D. .

  FIG. 6 is a diagram for explaining the state of recording scanning using the mask table shown in FIG. For 8 lines of data corresponding to 8 nozzles, A, B, C and D are applied as mask patterns every 2 lines. In each recording scan, image data masking (replaces recording dots with non-recording dots) is executed using the stored mask table to generate and output pass data. Specifically, by taking the logical product of the image data and the mask data, if the mask data is 1, the image data is output as it is, and if the mask data is 0, the image data is This is realized by replacing with 0. All image areas are always masked in the order of A, B, C, and D by four scans to generate print data. Here, the mask OFF (1) ratios of A, B, C, and D are equally about 25% each.

  Thus, by recording one line using two different nozzles, it is possible to form a high-quality image with suppressed density unevenness. In addition, the multi-pass printing method has the effect of suppressing bleeding (bleeding) by printing while drying the ink, and the print head temperature rise, which causes ejection failure, by reducing the printing dots for each scan. The suppression effect can be achieved at the same time. Although the main scanning direction has been described here, it is possible to further improve the image quality by thinning out and recording continuous dots in the sub-scanning direction. Further, when it is desired to realize image formation in the sub-scanning direction at a resolution higher than the nozzle resolution, the thinning recording in the sub-scanning direction is an essential process.

  As described above, the pass data for each scan is generated by thinning out the print data using a random mask pattern in which print dots and non-print dots are randomly arranged as described above. In addition to the method of generating the data (referred to as the table reference method), the method of generating the pass data by thinning out the recording data using the even / odd column pattern or the zigzag / reverse zigzag pattern (referred to as the fixed mask method) In addition, a method of generating pass data by performing a thinning process while paying attention to recording dots (referred to as a data mask method) or a method using these in combination is known.

As another conventional example, Patent Literature 1 and Patent Literature 2 can be cited.
JP 2000-23130 A JP 2003-292221 A

  It is a great advantage that the ink jet recording apparatus can be stopped between recording scans, which is different from the laser recording apparatus. However, in recent years, the image quality of the ink jet recording apparatus has also been improved, and the variation in the wait time between the scanning scans has an influence on the image quality. From the viewpoint of image quality, it is desirable to record one page with a fixed wait time.

  Recently, connection interfaces with host computers have become faster and more diversified, and inkjet recording apparatuses having various computer interfaces such as IEEE1284, USB, and IEEE1394 have been commercialized. These computer interfaces have a large difference in image data transfer rates, and the throughput that can be realized by the high-speed interface connection is not necessarily realized by the low-speed interface connection state. Furthermore, the data transfer capability may be limited depending on the connection status of the interface.

  In general, as a recording mode that can be selected from the host computer, a high-speed mode aimed at speeding up the recording time even if the image quality is a little worse, or aimed at increasing the image quality even if the recording time is slow May have high quality mode. In order to prevent the influence of the data transfer capability by the connection interface with the host computer as described above, that is, the variation in the wait time between the scanning scans, a large-capacity secondary storage device such as an HDD is provided. There is a method in which image data is first recorded on the HDD and then ink-jet recorded based on the image data recorded on the HDD.

  However, since a printer having the above-described mode performs image recording based on the image data after the image data is recorded on the HDD, even when the purpose is to speed up the recording time such as a high speed mode. However, there is a problem that ink jet recording cannot be started only after all image data is recorded on the HDD.

  The present invention has been made in view of the above problems, and its purpose is to perform first print output time by performing ink jet recording without HDD recording when the recording mode is mainly intended for high speed recording such as high speed. (FPOT) is shortened and other standard / high-quality image recording is performed. By switching to inkjet recording after recording on the HDD, there is no color unevenness by keeping the wait time between recording scans constant. An object of the present invention is to provide an ink jet recording apparatus capable of printing.

  In order to solve the above problems, an ink jet recording apparatus according to a first aspect of the present invention has the following configuration.

  Equipped with an interface for transferring multi-value or binary image data / control data to / from a host computer, and a print head having a plurality of ink ejection sections is scanned on a print medium and inputted An inkjet recording apparatus for forming an image by ejecting ink from a recording head to a recording medium based on the image information, wherein a plurality of received data amounts for starting printing are set according to a printing mode. A device that starts printing when the amount of data received from the host computer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one line by the head, and the amount of data that can be printed on one page when the amount of data received from the host computer Select the printing start means according to the printing quality specified by the user and the printing quality specified by the user. An ink jet recording apparatus characterized by comprising a capacity control means.

  Further, the ink jet recording apparatus according to the second invention of the present invention has the following configuration.

  Means for starting printing when the amount of data received from the host computer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one line by the head, and the amount of data received from the host computer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one page An ink jet recording apparatus comprising: means for starting printing; and control means for selecting the printing start means in accordance with the number of print passes.

  Furthermore, an ink jet recording apparatus according to a third aspect of the present invention has the following configuration.

  Means for starting printing when the amount of data received from the host computer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one line by the head, and the amount of data received from the host computer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one page An ink jet recording apparatus comprising: means for starting printing; and control means for selecting the printing start means in accordance with the print medium.

  Furthermore, the ink jet recording apparatus according to the fourth aspect of the present invention has the following configuration.

  An ink jet recording apparatus, wherein data received from the host computer is stored in a secondary storage other than a main memory.

  Furthermore, an ink jet recording apparatus according to a fifth aspect of the present invention has the following configuration.

  An ink jet recording apparatus, wherein the recording head is a recording head that discharges ink using thermal energy, and includes thermal energy conversion means for generating thermal energy applied to the ink.

  Furthermore, an ink jet recording apparatus according to a sixth aspect of the present invention has the following configuration.

  An ink jet recording apparatus, wherein the recording head ejects ink using a pressure generating element.

  As described above, an interface for transferring multi-value or binary image data / control data to / from a host computer is provided, and a print head having a plurality of ink ejection units is scanned on the print medium. In the inkjet recording apparatus that forms an image by ejecting ink from the recording head to the recording medium based on the input image information, a plurality of received data amounts for starting printing are set according to the printing mode and used. Printing starts when the amount of data received from the host computer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one line by the head, depending on the print quality specified by the user, the media used, and the number of print passes. If the amount of data received from the printer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one page, the FPOT speed can be increased. It is possible to provide an ink jet recording apparatus capable of obtaining a beautiful output image with excellent color reproducibility of the inkjet unique.

  Details of the present invention will be described in accordance with the description of the embodiments.

(First embodiment)
Hereinafter, a first embodiment of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

  FIG. 7 shows the structure of the recording unit of the ink jet recording apparatus according to the present invention.

  Reference numeral 701 denotes a recording head, which is an ink tank in which four color inks of black (Bk), cyan (Cy), magenta (Mg), and yellow (Ye) are sealed, and four independent heads corresponding to the ink tanks. It is comprised by the multihead which consists of. The number of nozzles for each color is 16 nozzles. A carriage 702 supports the recording head 701 and moves them together with recording. The carriage can move in the X direction using the stay 706. The carriage 702 is at the home position HP shown in the drawing during standby such as a non-recording state. Reference numeral 703 denotes a paper feed roller that rotates while suppressing the recording paper 704 and feeds the recording paper 704 in the Y direction as needed. Reference numeral 705 denotes a paper feed roller that feeds the recording paper 704 and plays the role of suppressing the recording paper 704 in the same manner as the paper feed roller 703 and the auxiliary roller. Here, the recording head 701 has 1024 nozzles respectively arranged in the paper feed direction for the four colors Bk, Cy, Mg, and Ye.

  A basic recording operation in the above configuration will be described.

  The carriage 702 at the home position HP at the time of standby performs recording by ejecting ink onto the recording paper 704 according to the recording data by a plurality of nozzles of the recording head 701 while moving in the X direction by a recording start command. When the recording of the recording data to the end of the recording paper 704 is completed, the carriage returns to the original home position. As the paper feed roller 703 rotates in the direction of the arrow, the paper is fed by a predetermined width in the Y direction, and the carriage 702 again ejects ink while moving in the X direction and starts recording. Data recording is realized by repeating such scanning operation and paper feeding operation.

  The ink jet recording apparatus of this embodiment converts an interface for exchanging image information and various control information with a host computer or the like, and converts input image information into dot ON / OFF data for each ink color. And a controller (FIG. 1) configured with an image data processing block, and an engine (FIG. 2) that transports recording paper and drives a carriage and controls the recording head to form an image. ing.

  In this embodiment, a USB interface and an IEEE1394 interface are provided. The user can select and use one of the two interfaces, and can send and receive image information and control information to and from the host computer using the actually connected interface. Here, it is assumed that the effective rate of the USB interface is 0.5 MByte / S, and the effective rate of the IEEE 1394 interface is 4 MByte / S.

  Further, the ink jet recording apparatus according to the present embodiment employs a multi-pass recording method in which the same recording area is scanned a plurality of times to form an image. As described above, multi-pass printing forms an image using a plurality of nozzles for one line, thereby suppressing density unevenness due to slight differences in the ink discharge amount and discharge direction for each nozzle, and simultaneously passing This is a recording method in which the recording duty is reduced to prevent image quality deterioration due to ink bleeding or the like.

  Here, description will be given by taking two-pass printing as an example. The carriage is driven at a speed equal to or lower than the maximum ejection frequency, and each scan completes an image by two print scans while referring to a mask table. The amount of paper transport performed between scans corresponds to the width of nozzles obtained by dividing the number of used nozzles by two.

  As described above, the recording head has 1024 nozzles for each color, and the nozzle numbers are assigned as # 0, 1, 2, 3,. In the present embodiment, a fixed mask method is employed in which even columns and odd columns are alternately formed. In the first pass, only even-numbered rows of X coordinates = 2n are formed. Then, after carrying the paper having a width corresponding to half of the number of used nozzles, in the second pass, only odd-numbered dots with X coordinates = 2n + 1 are formed. Then, paper is transported with a width corresponding to half of the number of used nozzles. Thereafter, even-numbered dot formation, paper conveyance, odd-numbered dot formation, and paper conveyance are sequentially repeated.

  Next, description will be given by taking 4-pass printing as an example. The carriage is driven at a speed equal to or less than the maximum ejection frequency, and each scan completes an image by four print scans while referring to a mask table. The amount of paper transport performed between scans corresponds to the width of nozzles obtained by dividing the number of used nozzles by four.

  As described above, the recording head has 1024 nozzles for each color, and the nozzle numbers are assigned as # 0, 1, 2, 3,. In the present embodiment, a fixed mask method is employed in which even columns and odd columns are alternately formed. In the first pass, only the dots in the row with the X coordinate = 4n are formed. Then, after carrying a paper having a width corresponding to ¼ of the number of used nozzles, only dots in a row where the X coordinate is 4n + 1 are formed in the second pass. Similarly, paper having a width corresponding to ¼ of the number of used nozzles is conveyed, and in the third pass, only dots in the row where the X coordinate is 4n + 2 are formed. By performing this operation four times, recording is performed for the X coordinates 4N to 4N + 3, that is, all dots.

  Next, an ink jet recording apparatus characterized by setting a plurality of received data amounts for starting printing in accordance with the print mode, which is characteristic in the present invention, will be described. Hereinafter, the print start determination method will be described with reference to FIG.

  In step S801, the print mode is acquired from the host PC. Here, as an example, the draft mode (high-speed printing mode) is divided into other modes.

  In S802, if it is the draft mode, it is determined in S803 whether data sufficient for a printing operation (hereinafter referred to as “one-line printing”) associated with one carriage movement is received. This is because the resolution of the input data is not necessarily equal to the printing resolution by binarization processing such as error diffusion. For example, when original data having an input resolution of 600 dpi is printed at a resolution of 1200 × 1200 dpi using a multi-valued ED + 2 × 2 halftone dot, 600 × 600 × paper width (inch) when a 1-inch head is used. You only need to input data for the minute. If not, wait until it is received. If received, one line is printed in S805.

  In step S807, a print end determination is performed. If not completed, in step S803, the data reception for one line is awaited again.

  In S804, a mode other than the draft mode, for example, a standard mode, a high quality mode, a photo print mode, or the like is selected. In these cases, in order to prevent color unevenness due to the time difference from one printing operation to the next printing operation varying from line to line, it waits until data for one page is received. In S806, since data for one page has been received, one page is continuously printed. In step S808, it is determined whether printing has ended. If not, the process returns to step S804.

  Although not described in the above description, data reception can be continuously performed even during printing. This is because the bus, 101 CPU, and 111 image data processing block in FIG. 1 are sufficiently faster than the printer engine, and therefore parallel processing by a multitasking OS or the like is possible.

  By performing such processing, it is possible to output a beautiful print with no color unevenness in the first print output time (FPOT) in the draft mode and in the high image quality print mode.

(Second embodiment)
In this embodiment, the difference between the media used is used as information for determining the start of printing.

  Since the difference between FIG. 8 and FIG. 9 is S1001 to 1004, the description centering on that part will be described below.

  In this embodiment, media information designated by the host PC is used as information for determining the start of printing.

  For example, plain paper has a large “smear” from the beginning and is not suitable for high-quality printing, so it is often used for checking the layout of printed matter and printing for offices with a low print duty.

  Therefore, this information is acquired from the host in S1001, and it is determined whether or not it is plain paper in S1002.

  If plain paper is used, it is unsuitable for high-quality printing for the above reasons, and color unevenness occurs, but printing is performed every time one line of short FPOT printing is received. The received data at this time is for one line, and since the absolute amount is not large, it can be stored in 104 RAM in FIG. Since these memories are generally semiconductors, the response speed is very fast as several hundred nsec. However, when the 110 HDD of FIG. 1 is used, the response time is several msec because the magnetic disk is rotated by the motor. It often takes. Since the difference between the two reaches about 10,000 times, there is a possibility that it may become an obstacle to high-speed printing. As described above, since the memory is used in S1003, there is no overhead for using the 110 HDD of FIG.

  In the case of high-quality printing other than plain paper, it waits until data for one page is received, and printing is performed from there, so that beautiful printing without color unevenness can be performed. At this time, since it is necessary to hold data for one page, a large-capacity HDD device is required. Therefore, it is necessary to store in the 110 HDD of FIG. Compared to the case where only 104 RAM in FIG. 1 is used, an overhead is generated. However, since printing is performed after all data is received, writing to and reading from the HDD do not interfere with each other. It is a value that can be ignored.

(Third embodiment)
In this embodiment, the number of print passes in multi-pass printing described in the prior art is used as information for determining the start of printing.

  This will be described with reference to FIG.

  The difference from FIG. 9 is only S901-902.

  In this embodiment, what is designated by the host PC is not the printing mode designated by the user, but the number of printing passes. Therefore, this information is acquired from the host in S901, and the determination is made in S902.

  At this time, if one-pass printing is performed, there is no overlap in printing between the lines, so there is no need to wait for one page, so printing is performed every time one line is received.

  In the case of multi-pass printing, there is an overlap of printing between the lines, so that it waits until data for one page is received, and then printing is performed.

  The present invention is not limited by the operation principle or configuration of the recording head. That is, the recording head is provided with a heating element (electrical / thermal energy conversion element) in the vicinity of the discharge port, and by applying an electric signal to the heating element, the ink is locally heated to cause a pressure change, and the ink is discharged. A thermal system that ejects ink from an ejection port may be used, or a piezoelectric system that ejects ink by applying mechanical pressure to the ink using an electrical / pressure converting means such as a piezoelectric element.

  The form of the ink jet recording apparatus according to the present invention is not limited to an image output apparatus of an information processing apparatus such as a computer or a word processor, but is provided integrally or separately, and a copying apparatus or a communication function combined with a reading apparatus. It may be a facsimile machine having

It is a schematic block diagram of the controller part in an inkjet recording device. It is a schematic block diagram of the engine part in an inkjet recording device. It is a figure which shows an example of the mask table for multipass 2 pass data production | generation. It is a figure explaining the mode of multipass printing using the mask table of FIG. It is a figure which shows an example of the mask table for every scanning of 4 pass printing of a table reference system. It is a figure explaining the mode of the recording scan using a mask table. 1 shows a configuration of a recording unit of an ink jet recording apparatus. 6 is a flowchart illustrating a recording control operation in the first embodiment of the present invention. 6 is a flowchart illustrating a recording control operation in the second embodiment of the present invention. 10 is a flowchart illustrating a recording control operation in a third embodiment of the present invention.

Claims (7)

Equipped with an interface for transferring multi-value or binary image data / control data to / from a host computer, and a print head having a plurality of ink ejection sections is scanned on a print medium and inputted In an inkjet recording apparatus that forms an image by ejecting ink from a recording head to a recording medium based on the image information,
An inkjet recording apparatus, wherein a plurality of received data amounts for starting printing are set in accordance with a printing mode. Means for starting printing when the amount of data received from the host computer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one line by the head, and the amount of data received from the host computer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one page 2. The ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising: a means for starting printing, and a control means capable of selecting the printing start means in accordance with a print quality designated by a user. Means for starting printing when the amount of data received from the host computer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one line by the head, and the amount of data received from the host computer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one page 2. An ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising: means for starting printing, and control means capable of selecting the printing start means in accordance with the number of printing passes. Means for starting printing when the amount of data received from the host computer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one line by the head, and the amount of data received from the host computer reaches the amount of data that can be printed on one page 2. An ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising: a means for starting printing, and a control means capable of selecting the printing start means in accordance with the print medium.   5. The ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the data received from the host computer is stored in a secondary storage other than the main memory. 6. The recording head according to claim 1, wherein the recording head is a recording head that ejects ink using thermal energy, and includes thermal energy conversion means for generating thermal energy applied to the ink. Any one of the inkjet recording apparatuses. The ink jet recording apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the recording head ejects ink using a pressure generating element.

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