【Fujitsu】 FACOM 6982A Japanese Language Line Printer

This was a wire dot impact type Japanese language line printer (line printer for Japanese language processing) completed by Fujitsu in 1981. It was equipped with multiple printing heads to achieve high-speed printing at 150 lines per minute.

At the time, type-based impact printers were widely used in OA (Office Automation) systems as line printers capable of high-speed printing of multiple copies at once. In the 1980s, there was a growing need for impact line printers capable of printing kanji (Chinese characters) due to the dissemination of Japanese language processing. On the other hand, 24-dot serial printers capable of freely expressing kanji were also coming into wider use. The FACOM 6982A Japanese language line printer was developed for Fujitsu's FACOM V Series of small computers, and was equipped with 4 printing heads, which origin were the 24-dot serial printers mentioned above, to enable printing at 150 lines per minute. Noise of this printer was reduced by using a sealed structure.

In 1983, Fujitsu developed the FACOM 6907A, which increased printing speed to 200 lines per minute by using 5 heads. And in 1987, Fujitsu developed the FACOM 6908A which achieved both high-speed printing at 300 lines per minute and reduced noise by using a moving coil printing head and a linear motor based shuttle unit.