Integrated Design and Control of Media Advance System for Thermal Inkjet Printers

Inkjet printer offers an attractive feature set that fits well to the consumer’s needs at the low-end color hardcopy market. Better performance at the lower cost is and will always be the driving force for the future product development. In this paper, we presented an integrated approach to the design and control of the media advance system in thermal inkjet printers. Using H∞ analysis and synthesis approach, the effects of design tolerance and system disturbance on the achievable performance is characterized. We will use the media advance system of thermal inkjet printers to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach. The benefit of using an integrated design and control approach will also be discussed.