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Laser – Unless you need color, it is hard to beat the quality of a decent laser printer. While color laser printers are available, most of our customers consider $1000.00 & up out of budget for occasional color printing. You can find laser printers as low as $250 & up. When shopping for laser printers you should compare the following features:

Prices, DPI resolution (600-2400), pages-per-minute, paper sizes, number of paper trays, paper capacity, memory for speed & graphics, quality of output, and consumable cost (toner cartridges).

I would recommend 16 PPM+ with 600-1200DPI with two paper trays. If you plan to share a laser printer, spend at least $600 - $1000. By having two paper trays, you can load our pre-printed invoices in one tray and load plain paper in another tray. Even though laser printers have a page-per-minute rating, you cannot expect 1 page to arrive in x seconds. For example, 16 PPM does not deliver the first page in 4 seconds. Okidata’s LED printers publish a "time to first page" rating, and their printers are much faster than other brands with similar PPM ratings. HP and Lexmark both offer good higher-end lasers for $400 & Up.  I would be cautious of some of the lower-end laser printers (less than $250).  We have several customers that have had problems with 2 of the lower-end lasers: the HP 1000 and the Samsung 1710.

Please make sure you purchase your printer from a store that will allow refunds or exchanges in case you have problems with the printer.  Return policies on printers can vary, but I have found the policies at Office Depot, Best Buy, Circuit City and Micro Center to have the best return policy.  For the last several years, Comp-USA has charged a 15% restocking fee on all open hardware returns.

Receipt Printers - Receipt printers easily pay for themselves in short time frame. You must have another printer to handle checks and reports. Programs Plus sells Star Receipt printers. Dot Matrix Receipt printers have speeds from 2.5 Lines/Second to 5.5 lines/second. Some thermal receipt printers can crank out 30-60 lines/second (1-2 seconds/receipt). Many people do not like thermal paper, but you get a much better look plus custom logo capability. Thermal receipt printers should have an automatic paper cutter.

Dot matrix – These printers are getting harder to find everyday. Dot Matrix printers are very noisy, produce less attractive output, a hassle to change forms, and considered much slower than most alternatives. Despite many dot matrix disadvantages, they still provide an economical solution. Okidata. Panasonic and Epson are the three most likely brands to consider today. I would recommend the Okidata 320 or 520. Using 2 Part tractor fed pre-printed forms, you can print invoices in 5 – 6 seconds. Settlement reports will print much slower than the laser solution. Expect to spend $325 & Up for a decent Dot Matrix printer.  Please note that we DO NOT recommend using Dot Matrix report printers (dot matrix receipt printers are OK).

Programs Plus only sells MS brand Cash drawers and Star Receipt Printers. If you purchase cash drawers or receipt printers from a source other than Programs Plus, we may charge additional support fees to assist in the installation of these devices.

AMAS is actually installed on each workstation and the data only resides on one computer (the server). Each user/workstation must have access (Read, Write and Create rights) to the directory on the server where AMAS is installed. For example, you might create a directory/folder named AMAS2000 on the C drive of the server. Today, most computers have hard drives and CD-ROMs , each workstation might connect to server’s C Drive using the E or F Drive letters. Choose a drive letter high enough so that each workstation may be use the same drive letter.