Seiko Epson Corporation

Hideki Nishimura

Takashi Saikawa

Takaaki Taniguchi

Hiroyuki Motoyama

Junichi Arai

Shinichi Yoshie

Hiroki Abe

Katsuo Takeuchi

Ichimi Masuda

Satoshi Omoto

Toshihiro Hagiwara

Masanori Hayashi

Masahiro Takei

Akihiro Uno

Yuki Nishimoto

A control system includes a terminal device including a first communication unit configured to perform first Bluetooth communication and second Bluetooth communication, and a printing apparatus including a second communication unit that is connected by pairing to the terminal device to perform the second Bluetooth communication with the first communication unit, wherein the terminal device performs the first Bluetooth communication in a state where no pairing connection is made with the printing apparatus, and transmits a notification instruction command to the printing apparatus through the first communication unit, and wherein the printing apparatus performs a notification operation based on the notification instruction command when receiving the notification instruction command through the second communication unit based on the first Bluetooth communication.

Control system and printing apparatus for performing a pairing connection to a terminal device

Control system and printing apparatus

A thermal printer has a thermal head with multiple heat elements for printing on roll paper; a measurer that measures heat element resistance; printer memory storing a resistance evaluation table relating the resistance of the heat elements to heat element defect levels defined based on a specific range of reflectivity in the symbol image; and an evaluator that references the resistance evaluation table stored in printer memory, acquires a defect level based on the resistance measured by the measurer, and evaluates the defect state of the thermal head based on the defect level of a consecutively adjacent count of heat elements.

Thermal printer, control method of a thermal printer, and printing system

A printing apparatus connectable to a server, the printing apparatus includes: a printing apparatus communication unit that transmits printing apparatus information to the server and receives an address which designates a storage location of overwriting firmware of firmware from the server in a case where a predetermined condition is satisfied; and a printing apparatus control unit that receives the overwriting firmware from the server and executes overwriting of the firmware based on the address received by the printing apparatus communication unit.

Printing apparatus and control method of printing apparatus

A printing device has a print unit that prints on roll paper; a storage compartment that holds roll paper; a paper guide that limits the position of the roll paper in the storage compartment; a paper guide sensor that outputs different detection values according to the status of the paper guide; a memory unit that stores the paper width of the roll paper; and a control unit that causes the print unit to print based on the paper width stored by the memory unit, detects the status of the paper guide based on the detection value of the paper guide sensor when triggered by a specific event, changes the paper width setting to a value indicating 58 mm if the paper guide is installed, and to a value indicating 80 mm if the paper guide is not installed.

Printing device and control method of a printing device

A thermal printer with head elements enables accurately determining the state of deterioration of the head elements, and minimizing the amount of stored data. A printing device has a thermal head having multiple head elements; a voltage application circuit configured to apply a printing voltage and an inspection voltage to the head elements; a head controller configured to control the thermal head and the voltage application circuit; and data storage configured to store a conversion table relationally storing a divided voltage and a resistance of the head elements. At a specific timing, the head controller applies the inspection voltage to the head elements by the voltage application circuit, measures the divided voltage of the head elements, converts the measured divided voltage to resistance based on the conversion table, acquires deterioration information based on the converted resistance, and stores the deterioration information in the data storage.

Printing device, control method, and printing system

A system that controls and operates a plurality of media processing devices can also operate devices having different specifications. A multifunction device has a roll paper print unit; a first interface that receives data from a POS terminal; a conversion unit that converts a command contained in the received data to a first executable command that is executed by the roll paper print unit, or a second executable command that is executed by a printer; a second interface that sends the converted data to the printer; and a control unit that changes between a first operating mode in which the roll paper print unit executes the first executable command, or a second operating mode in which data including the second executable command is sent by the second interface to the printer.

Media processing device and POS system

A media processing method comprising receiving, by a first connection unit, a command sent from a host computer; and detecting, by an external device control unit, a process that can be executed by an external processing device. One or more controlling operations are performed by a control unit based on the command received by the first connection unit. Such control entails (i) executing a first process by a first processing unit, or (ii) executing a second process by a second processing unit when the external processing device cannot execute the command, the second process being different than the first process, or (iii) transmitting the command by a second connection unit to the external processing device when the external processing device can execute the command.

Media processing method using multiple processing units for performing multiple processes

When a label printer detects the paper width, the paper width detection operation scans the transportation path in the paper width direction by the paper width detector not once but twice, and conveys the recording medium transportation distance L, which is longer than the gap length of the gap between labels and is shorter than the label length of each label, between the first and second paper width detection operations. Of the two positions detected as the left edge of the recording medium in the first and second detection operations, the position that is farthest left is used. Likewise, of the two positions detected as the right edge of the recording medium in the first and second detection operations, the position that is farthest right is used.

Paper width detection method for a label printer, printing control method for a label printer, and a label printer

A roll paper print unitprocesses roll paper. A first interfacereceives commands transmitted from a POS terminal. A second interfacetransmits a command received by the first interfaceto a printerthat performs a same process as the roll paper print unit. A control unitcontrols processing by the roll paper print unit, and transmitting a command to the printerthrough the second interface, based on the received command. When the received command is a preset command, the control unitcontrols the second interfaceto transmit the preset command to the printer

Media processing device and systems with multiple processing units

A multifunction devicehas a roll paper print unit; a first interfacethat receives text data from a POS terminal; a second interfaceconnected to a printer; a data interpreterthat determines if a predetermined string is contained in the received text data; and a control unitthat, based on the result from the data interpreter, switches to a first operating mode for executing processes with the roll paper print unit, or a second operating mode that passes the received text data through the second interfaceto the printer

A hybrid processing device having printheads that records on a check conveyed through a medium conveyance path includes a first sensor that detects insertion of a check from the recording medium entrance of the medium conveyance path, a second sensor that detects discharge of the check from the recording medium exit of the medium conveyance path, and a third sensor that detects presence of a check between the first and second sensors. It is determined that the recording medium has been removed from the conveyance path, when the recording medium detectors change from a first state, in which at least one of the recording medium detectors detects that the recording medium is present, to a second state, in which none of the recording medium detectors detect that the recording medium is present.

Medium processing device, and control method for a medium processing device

The first reading start point D of a front contact image sensorand the second reading start point F of a back contact image sensorare managed using a previously measured sensor-to-sensor distance L. As a result, even if there is a difference in the distance between the sensors, the first and second reading start points D and F will still be a first margin length Lbefore the image reading positions A and B of the contact image sensorsand. Because the beginning of the front image information FDand the beginning of the back image information BDcontained in the back-side image data BDin the images captured by the contact image sensorsandmatch, the front image information FDcan be extracted based on the coordinates of the back image information BDcontained in the back-side image data BD

Image reading method for sheet media and a sheet media processing device

A label paper indexing control method for a label printer is provided that in one embodiment includes conveying label paper having labels affixed with a specific gap there between to a continuous liner through a path passed a printing position of a print head, detecting a reference position of the label paper at a detection position upstream from the print head, determining the position of a downstream label end of a label on the path as a first distance from the detection position based on when the reference position is detected, updating the first distance each time the label paper is conveyed, executing a power shutdown operation that writes the first distance to memory and turns the power off when a command instructing turning the power off is asserted, and reading the first distance from memory when the power turns on without the label paper having been replaced.

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Matsumoto, Japan

Hideki Nishimura