Abstract: Disclosed are the following: a wide format thermal printer for printing a multicolor graphic product on a printing sheet; a vacuum workbed for supporting a sheet material for performing work operations, such as cutting, printing or plotting, thereon; a replaceable donor sheet assembly, which includes a memory, for use with a thermal printer; methods and apparatus for improved thermal printing, including methods and apparatus for conserving donor sheet and reducing the amount of time required to print a multicolor graphic product; a thermal printhead including a memory; and methods and apparatus for the alignment of a sheet material for printing or performing other work operations on the sheet material. The wide format thermal printer can include provision for the automatic loading of cassettes of donor sheet from a cassette storage rack.

Abstract: Disclosed are the following: a wide format thermal printer for printing a multicolor graphic product on a printing sheet; a vacuum workbed for supporting a sheet material for performing work operations, such as cutting, printing or plotting, thereon; a replaceable donor sheet assembly, which includes a memory, for use with a thermal printer; methods and apparatus for improved thermal printing, including methods and apparatus for conserving donor sheet and reducing the amount of time required to print a multicolor graphic product; a thermal printhead including a memory; and methods and apparatus for the alignment of a sheet material for printing or performing other work operations on the sheet material. The wide format thermal printer can include provision for the automatic loading of cassettes of donor sheet from a cassette storage rack.

Abstract: A wide format thermal printer for printing a multicolor graphic product on a printing sheet; a vacuum workbed for supporting a sheet material for performing work operations, such as cutting, printing or plotting, thereon; a replaceable donor sheet assembly, which includes a memory, for use with a thermal printer; methods and apparatus for improved thermal printing, including methods and apparatus for conserving donor sheet and reducing the amount of time required to print a multicolor graphic product; a thermal printhead including a memory; methods and apparatus for the alignment of a sheet material for printing or performing other work operations on the sheet material; and methods and apparatus for controlling the tension of the donor sheet during printing with a wide format thermal printer. The wide format thermal printer can include provision for the automatic loading of cassettes of donor sheet from a cassette storage rack.

Abstract: Disclosed are the following: a wide format thermal printer for printing a multicolor graphic product on a printing sheet; a vacuum workbed for supporting a sheet material for performing work operations, such as cutting, printing or plotting, thereon; a replaceable donor sheet assembly, which includes a memory, for use with a thermal printer; methods and apparatus for improved thermal printing, including methods and apparatus for conserving donor sheet and reducing the amount of time required to print a multicolor graphic product; a thermal printhead including a memory; and methods and apparatus for the alignment of a sheet material for printing or performing other work operations on the sheet material. The wide format thermal printer can include provision for the automatic loading of cassettes of donor sheet from a cassette storage rack.

Abstract: Data is communicated between redundant channels formatted in blocks having an initial command word followed by a destination code, starting address and a variable number of data words including a word count. The blocks are transmitted between each channel and all of the channels over cross-channel data links, each channel receiving the data blocks and determining the validity thereof by counting the number of data words received and comparing that number to the word count transmitted for that block. An interrupt signal indicative of invalidity of a block is provided in the event of a miscompare. A stop address is generated for each block received for storage at the start address. A memory address is generated for each valid word received for storage in sequence starting immediately after the start address. The next block received has its start address placed immediately at the end of the previously received block.

Abstract: Arbitration access to an IOC's RAM between the IOC's I/O bus and a signal processor is accomplished by always granting the signal processor access to the IOC's RAM for one machine cycle and disallowing any signal processor operations which would otherwise permit preemptive demand access to memory for more than one machine cycle. The signal processor's activity is then monitored for detecting the signal processor engaged in an activity which does not presently require access to the IOC's RAM and which will occupy the signal processor in a non-memory access activity for a predictable period of time. The IOC's I/O bus is then granted access to the IOC's RAM for a period of time less than the predicted period. In addition to this transparency feature, the present invention may be used in a context of a unique method of transferring data between sensors and actuators on one side of the IOC and the signal processor on the other side.

Abstract: A plurality of n-dimensional modular entities are internally interconnected via as many as n duel port random access memory devices (DPRs), each memory device dedicated solely to the interchange of information between two modular entities in an n-dimensional lattice of modular entities. One or more of the modular entities may itself be a separate multiprocessor architecture.