The Sinclair ZX Printer is a spark printer which was produced by Sinclair Research for its ZX81 home computer. It was launched in 1981, with a recommended retail price of £49.95.
The ZX Printer used special 4-inch (100 mm) wide black paper which was supplied coated with aluminium, this was electrically marked during the printing process to reveal its black under-surface. The printer's horizontal resolution was the same as the ZX81's video display, i.e. 256 dots (pixels) or 32 characters (using the standard character definition). The print quality was crude, but no other printer was compatible with the ZX81 without the use of additional software and interface hardware.
The ZX Printer was also compatible with the earlier ZX80 computer (when fitted with the 8kB ROM upgrade) and the later ZX Spectrum, and plugged directly into the expansion bus connector via a short cable. The printer drew its power directly from the expansion bus, and was sold with a larger (1-2A) power supply for the ZX81 to accommodate the additional power drain. The Spectrum's user manual noted that this was not needed for the Spectrum as its default 1.1A power supply was sufficient.
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