Beam scanning apparatus and image forming apparatus using the same
AssigneesKabushiki Kaisha Toshiba, Toshiba Tec Kabushiki Kaisha
InventorsKenichi Komiya, Koji Tanimoto, Daisuke Ishikawa
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method and apparatus for scanning a common scan line in a main scanning direction with a light emitting device is provided. The method and apparatus preferably generates at least a first control signal and a second control signal for driving the light emitting device, the first control signal and the second control signal being generated from image data for the common scan line in the main scanning direction, drives the light emitting device with the first control signal to scan the common scan line in the main scanning direction, and drives the light emitting device with the second control signal to scan the common scan line in the main scanning direction.
Claims16
A light beam scanning apparatus, comprising:
- an image processor configured to generate a plurality of control signals from image data so as to form a series of pixels along a common scan line;
- a plurality of modulators configured to modulate said plurality of control signals for said series of pixels along said common scan line,
- each of said plurality of modulators having the same pixel clock time between successive pixels along said common scan line;
- a plurality of laser drivers configured to generate a laser driver signal from said plurality of the modulated control signals;
- a light beam generating unit configured to generate a light beam being driven by said plurality of laser drivers,
- wherein each of said plurality of laser drivers is coupled to a corresponding one of said plurality of modulators so as to generate a laser driver signal from a corresponding modulated signal, and
- wherein said plurality of laser drivers are electrically coupled to said light beam generating unit such that said light beam is driven by said laser driver signals.
A light beam scanning apparatus comprising:
- a light beam generating unit configured to generate a light beam;
- at least two modulators configured to modulate said light beam,
- said at least two modulators outputting a modulated signal including image data for a common scan line in a main scanning direction;
- and
- at least one image processor configured to transfer said image data to said at least two modulators,
- wherein said at least two modulators comprise a first modulator configured to output a modulated signal for odd pixel image data and a second modulator configured to output a modulated signal for even pixel image data,
- wherein the first modulator is synchronized with a reference clock, and
- wherein the second modulator is synchronized with a delayed reference clock.
A method of scanning a common scan line in a main scanning directing with a light emitting device, comprising:
- generating at least a first control signal and a second control signal for driving the light emitting device, said first control signal and said second control signal being generated from image data for the common scan line in the main scanning direction;
- driving the light emitting device with the first control signal to scan the common scan line in the main scanning direction;
- driving the light emitting device with the second control signal to scan the common scan line in the main scanning direction;
- and
- synchronizing the second control signal with a delayed clock, the delayed clock being delayed with respect to the first control signal.
An image forming device, comprising:
- means for emitting a light beam;
- means for driving said means for emitting a light beam so as to scan successive pixels along a common scan line in a main scanning direction;
- and
- means for modulating said light beam with a plurality of modulated signals including image data for each of the successive pixels along the common scan line in the main scanning direction,
- wherein said means for driving comprises a plurality of laser drivers, each of said plurality of laser drivers generating a laser driver signal from a corresponding modulated signal, and
- wherein the image forming device further comprises means for combining said laser driver signals.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.