#: 17338 S1/General Interest
    07-Jan-93  15:47:36
Sb: #17322-Happy New Year
Fm: Lee Veal 74726,1752
To: Bob van der Poel 76510,2203 (X)

I recently bought a HP Deskjet 500 (no color).

I like it.  I bought the FX-80 Emulation cartridge that's mentioned in the back
of the User's Manual.  By using the emulation cartridge I haven't had to find
or develop new drivers.  I've used MVCanvas to dump existing .VEF pictures
using its Epson print driver.
   One drawback from using the emulation cartridge is that there's not
"pass-thru" capability. Once it's in emulation mode that's where it stays.  You
can't access the native features by using some sort of special pass-thru
sequence that will cause the emulation cartridge to be by-passed.  Ergo,
there's no way, that I've found anyway, to do the landscape printing that is
supported in the native (non-emulated) mode.

As for quality and quietness, the DeskJet 500 is great.  It's hard to tell the
difference between it an laser quality.  It's pretty speedy, too.

I got mine at BizMart for $349 + tax.  The Emulation cartridge was an extra
$79.  I had to mail-order it, but it came very quickly.

Lee