Thermal transfer printer with a plurality of cassette holder plates

A thermal transfer printer comprising:

• a carriage with a thermal head mounted thereon, said carriage being adapted to reciprocate along a platen;
• a ribbon take-up mechanism for taking up an ink ribbon of a ribbon cassette loaded onto said carriage;
• a holding cover disposed at a position opposed to said carriage;
• a plurality of cassette holder plates for holding ribbon cassettes respectively, said cassette holder plates being arranged side by side on said holding cover on the side opposed to the ribbon cassette loading side of said carriage;
• and
• a carrier disposed on said carriage for the transfer and replacement of the ribbon cassettes between said cassette holder plates and said carriage,
• wherein a ribbon cassette containing an ink ribbon of a desired color is selected and loaded onto said carriage, said thermal head is driven in accordance with image information to effect a desired printing on a printing paper fed between said platen and said thermal head, said cassette holder plates can hold said ribbon cassettes stackedly in two stages, and the total number of the ribbon cassettes held on all said cassette holder plates is smaller by at least one than the total number of the ribbon cassettes capable of being held by the cassette holder plates.