9.2 Buying a Printer
9.2.2 Print quality and resolution
Quality
Both inkjet and color laser printers can produce professional quality photos. However, if an inkjet printer is being considered, be aware that all inkjets are not made equal. Not all are capable of professional quality printing. Generally, the higher-end inkjets are better quality. As a matter of fact, there are inkjet printers that are specially designed to produce top quality photos, but these units tend to do poorly on printing text. The print quality is a factor of the resolution capabilities of the printer, and it is discussed later in this section.

Resolution
Print resolution refers to the number of tiny dots the print head is capable of fitting per inch when forming an image. For most laser printers in the market today, the standard resolution is 600 dots-per-inch (dpi). This resolution is sufficient for normal everyday printing including small desktop publishing jobs. However, the high-end production printer, mentioned in the previous section, might have a resolution of 2,400 dpi. It is possible to find some laser printers that still use a resolution of 300 dpi. Note that this resolution can cause jagged lines to appear on the outer edge of an image. Some manufacturers have created a solution for this. The Hewlett Packard Resolution Enhancement Technology (RET), for example, is designed to correct this problem. RET works by inserting smaller dots at the edges of lines and smoothes the rough edges. Although RET does not improve the resolution, the printed document looks better. Therefore, if a printer with 300 dpi is purchased, make sure it has RET or comparable RET capabilities.

The printer resolution is an important factor to consider when buying a printer, or recommending the purchase of one by a customer. Always check the resolution to see how many dots per inch (dpi) the printer is capable of. The higher it is, the higher the image quality. In this process, the standard resolution of 600x600 will be more than adequate for most printing, except for photo quality. Additionally, check to see if the printer offers a range of resolutions, so the user can choose different resolutions for different printing jobs, such as draft mode.