Laser printer with reduced banding artifacts
AssigneeMarvell International Technology Ltd.
InventorDouglas Keithley
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A laser scanning assembly generates a laser beam and scans the laser beam through a plurality of scan lines to form desired dots. Each scan line is positioned to overlap an adjacent scan line and each dot includes a plurality of segments. The scanning assembly scans the laser beam through multiple scan lines to fully discharge each segment of each dot. The laser scanner assembly would typically be part of a laser printer.
Claims24
A laser scanning assembly operable to generate a laser beam and operable to scan the laser beam through a plurality of overlapping scan lines to form desired dots, each dot including a plurality of segments and a portion of a desired amount of charge being removed from each segment by each one of the plurality of scan lines overlapping that segment.
A printer, comprising:
- a photoconductive drum;
- a motor circuit operable to control movement of the photoconductive drum;
- and
- a laser scanning unit operable to generate a scanning laser beam;
- a reflective element positioned to receive the incident scanning laser beam and to reflect the beam onto the photoconductive drum;
- and
- a controller operable to control the motor circuit, laser scanning unit, and reflective element to scan the laser beam through a plurality of scan lines to form desired dots on the photoconductive drum, each scan line being positioned to overlap an adjacent scan line and each dot including a plurality of segments, the controller operable to scan the laser beam through multiple scan lines for each segment, each scan line overlapping a given segment removing a portion of a desired amount of charge to be removed from that segment.
A method of scanning an image beam to discharge regions on a photoconductive surface, each discharge region including a plurality of segments and the method comprising:
- scanning the image beam through a plurality of scan lines on the photoconductive surface, each scan line being positioned to overlap adjacent scan lines and a plurality of scan lines overlapping each segment;
- and
- for each segment, partially discharging that segment in response to each scan of the image beam through the associated scan lines.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.