Konica Minolta 7450 User Manual

Page 4

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A test suite was developed to determine the font-handling capability of the 7450 printer, including
TypeOne PostScript, TrueType, and OpenType fonts — all font formats commonly used in the
Macintosh environment.

The color capability of the printer was tested in several ways: demanding test images were printed
on the 7450 and were evaluated under controlled conditions by color experts; ICC color profiles
were created for the printer and tested along with industry standard ICC profiles on the Macintosh;
and the color profiles were analyzed using ColorThink Pro 3.0, a tool designed to evaluate and
compare ICC profiles by generating a 3D rendering of their color space.

Printer Setup and Support

When the printer arrived, it was quickly setup by our in-house Information Technology Consultant,
Jon Sehmer. Jon has set up many printers in a Mac environment and noted that the Konica Minolta
7450 was easy to set up. It unpacked easily, loading consumables was simple, and when turned on it
printed a startup sheet containing useful information, including networking. The printer supports
the main networking protocols found in an Apple Macintosh environment as well as the legacy
AppleTalk protocol. Because it is an outdated technology which is rarely used today, we did not test
the AppleTalk networking capabilities of the 7450, although we noted that the printer was instantly
able to correctly grab our building’s AppleTalk Zone Name.

Ethernet on the printer can be setup with either a fixed IP number or DHCP. It was tested both
ways and worked flawlessly. The printer’s settings are accessible via an internal web server and
we were easily able to access the printer’s home page and make numerous settings on the self-
explanatory screens. The printer is capable of sending a variety of notifications via an internal
e-mail capability, e.g., paper jammed or consumables low. We did not test this capability, although
in some settings it could be very useful.

The Konica Minolta printer came with a printed setup guide in several languages and 2 CDs:
one for printer drivers and one for documentation. Konica Minolta maintains an up-to-date web
site with extensive support information about the printer, and a link to purchase supplies and
accessories. We opted to download the most current Macintosh printer driver and documentation
from the web site. The User Guide is a clearly written 254 page PDF with bookmarks and hot
links in both the table of contents and index. The Reference Guide is 272 pages and is similarly
structured and provides comprehensive details about the 7450 printer. Both publications have
thorough information about using the printer in a Macintosh environment.

We successfully installed the printer driver on 37 Macintosh computers on our network, including
G5 Macintosh computers (PPC) and Intel-based Macs. After installing the driver, the printer can
be set up manually on each client using the Macintosh Printer Setup Utility or it can be accessed
within its Ethernet Subnet as a Bonjour printer which automatically installs and configures itself.
We tested both methods and both worked without problems.

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