What Is An IPDS Printer Or MFP?
Question
I've heard the term "IPDS" used with host printing and I'm curious as to what is an IPDS printer or multifunction device. Can you help me?
Answer
IPDS is an abbreviation for Intelligent Printer Data Stream and it is a host-to-printer data stream that is generally, although not always, used in conjunction with AFP (Advanced Function Printing, or Advanced Function Presentation) data and applications. Think of IPDS as the "base" datastream, similar to PCL5e data, or PostScript data.
Printers and multifunction devices can accept an IPDS datastream using one of several methods. The most popular method is to have the device (printer or MFP) internally support an IPDS datastream. Several Ricoh devices now support this capability, and more will support it in the near future (see a related FAQ posted on our web site). For those devices that do not have an internal capability, it is usually possible to connect a third-party device between the host computer and the printer/MFP that converts the host's IPDS data into a data format (e.g. PCL) that is "understood" by the printer/MFP. While there are many manufacturers of these converters, two that come to mind are AXIS and Solimar.
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