A look back: printing in the 1980s

Today, we don’t do much printing. Almost all content ends up as purely electronic media, such as HTML for a website, EPUB for handheld devices, or PDF for desktops and laptops. But there was a time when printing was the standard for professional work. Offices everywhere relied on paper printing to distribute information.

Printing technology has changed over time with improvements in technology. In the 1960s, TeleType and other typewriter-like devices were typical. Phototypesetters were expensive in the 1970s but within reach of large enterprises.

The desktop PC revolution of the 1980s brought with it an explosion in new desktop printing technologies. Common printer options at the time included:

• Daisy wheel printers, which produced fully formed type like a typewriter
• Impact printers, or dot matrix printers, which moved a print head across a page and tiny pins struck the page through a ribbon, forming letters through small dots
• Thermal printers, which printed to special paper
• Laser printers, using a laser to “draw” on a rotating drum with toner “ink”

If you’d like to take a step back in time, watch this 1983 episode of The Computer Chronicles, a technology program that ran on public television from the 1980s until the early 2000s. In this episode, hosts Stewart Cheifet and Herb Lechner (standing in for regular host Gary Kildall) explore office printing options available at that time.