Laser

History

The idea behind the photocopier was originally conceived of by Chester F. Carlson in 1938. Carlson sketched designs in his notebooks, including the one below. Working with Battelle and The Haloid Co., the first prototype was ready on October 22, 1948 at the Optical Society of America's annual meeting. About 10 years later in 1959, Haloid-Xerox (later Xerox Corp) released the first production-line automatic office copier, the Xerox 914. [Wolff]

picture from: [Wolff]

At the time laser printers were introduced, the primary means of plain paper printing was by character and line oriented impact printers. There was a clear advantage to using electrophotographic technology for high speed and/or high quality printing. The first commercial laser printer was delivered in 1976. [Graf]

Another technology that was used for higher speed printing involved using a number of LED's to replace the laser to expose the drum. Having multiple LED's allowed a line to be exposed faster than using a single laser. [Maier]

picture from: [Maier]