California Space Authority Crafts Custom Conference Badges With Portable Printer

Armed with a mission to ensure that California plays a leading role in space education, research, technology, manufacturing, services, and transportation, the California Space Authority holds an ongoing roster of conferences. To create on-site badges for attendees, conference managers recently looked for a portable printer that satisfied a range of requirements. “Previously, we were printing onto card stock and putting these into badge holders for our attendees,” reports Patti Ruiz, office manager for the Authority. “This was just not very professional looking. Although most ID badges are printed prior to our conferences, we still need to print quite a few at the show itself. Therefore, we wanted our new card printer to be portable and be able to print on-site.” Because Ruiz was given a minimal budget to procure a new printer, she carefully compared prices and abilities of various printers. Fitting the bill was Model P110i card printer, made by Zebra Card Solutions, a Div. of Zebra Technologies Corp. (Camarillo, CA). “We purchased a Zebra P110i in November of 2006, and the results have been good,” Ruiz notes. “It prints our logo, attendee’s name, and event, all on one side of the card.” The printer produces high-resolution (330 d.p.i.) ID cards in color or monochrome, at a speed of 30 secs. per card. An onboard, 16-digit LCD readout provides operating guidelines, plus displays printer status and routine cleaning information. To streamline installation, user just inserts a Load-N-Go ribbon cartridge into the printer. Companion printer drivers are available for Windows 2000 and Windows XP, ready to link with PCs. “Basically, all you have to do is type in the information, print out the card and, periodically, change the ribbon,” Ruiz explains. Overall size of the printer is just 7.75 ins. wide, 123.75 ins. deep, and 8.5 ins. high. Besides boasting a small footprint for easy placement at sites, the printer weighs only 9.5 lbs. for compact handling. Capabilities range from printing various bar codes to magnetic stripes. “We’ve printed different quantities of cards for each event,” Ruiz adds. “We also use the card printer for employee ID badging and look forward to printing on-site attendee badges at many more events.” Zebra Card Solutions, a Div. of Zebra Technologies Corp., Camarillo, CA