In an age of lightning-fast computer chips, exasperated office workers are asking why anyone can't invent an instant-on photocopier?
Even though the modern copier is a singing, dancing, wonder machine that can email the same brochure to 100 co-workers and can copy, cut, and collate an entire book, it can still take the best part of 10 minutes to get going in the morning.
"It's a big pain in the ass," said Jeff Kelley, publisher of the Temp Slave! zine. "Especially if you're in a hurry."
In the early days of Temp Slave! -- a publication for temporary workers -- Kelley surreptitiously copied issues on the copy machine where he was working, as a temp, of course.
Kelley, better known as Keffo, noted that access to the copier is one of the few benefits of temp workers with a bent for publishing. And in most cases, the window for an unofficial print run is a limited one.
"I used to stand at the window waiting for the boss to leave for lunch," Keffo said. "As soon as he left, I was on the copier."
Temps aren't the only ones flustered by the snails-pace of a warming-up copier.
Customers at a quick-print copy shop can become quite frustrated by the endless wait for a copy machine leisurely waking itself from an energy-saving sleep mode, or one that has been reset after a paper jam.
Johnny Lee, owner of a Sir Speedy copy shop in San Francisco, said the wait doesn't bother him personally but it sometimes unhinges his customers.
"It's a hassle for them to wait five minutes," he said. "Some of them get quite upset."
So why is it Transmeta can invent a 700MHz chip for Web pads, but Xerox and Canon can't get a copier to get a move on when they're turned on?
The trouble is that while almost every aspect of the copier has been steadily improved, the fundamental process hasn't changed in more than 60 years since American physicist Chester Carlson invented dry photocopying, or Xerography, in 1938.
The process works like this:
Thanks to an intricate mechanism of lights and lenses, an image of the original is transferred to a rotating drum coated with an electrically charged, light-sensitive material.
The light-sensitive material attracts a dusting of toner, which is transferred and melted onto a sheet of paper at about 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
And that's where the problem lies: It's nearly impossible to build a high-temperature fusing mechanism economically.
"Basically, you're dealing with physics here," said Charles LeCompte, editor and publisher of the Hard Copy Observer, a trade publication for the printer and copier industry. "It's almost impossible to make the big fusers heat up quickly without spending a lot of money. It's ... a cost constraint as much as anything."
There are instant-on copiers, LeCompte noted, but they tend to be small desktop models that produce lower-quality copies.
Then there's the issue of leaving the machine on. Copiers and computers both take a long time to warm up, but it's considered OK to leave a desktop on all the time. Not so with a copy machine.
Why? Copy machines are a drain on power, requiring as much as 2,000 watts for a small-office model. A typical desktop uses about 350 watts of power.
Nancy Rees, vice president and general manager of Xerox's Office Products Business Unit, offhandedly dismissed the problem of the instant-on copy machine.
"It's not a big customer request," she said. "Customers want greater speed [of copying], better reliability and greater ease-of-use."
Despite the inability of copier scientists to significantly cut warm-up time, Rees outlined the transformation of the photocopier in recent years:
Copiers are no longer simple copy machines, but gateways to digital networks, Rees said, functioning as digitizers as well as faxes and scanners.
They can pump out as many as 180 pages a minute, deliver sensitive documents into locked mailboxes and simultaneously email hundreds of people electronic copies of a document.
They can be controlled over the Web and even be configured to alert office managers by email when they run low on paper or toner.
By contrast, the earliest automatic copiers, introduced by Xerox in 1959, put out only four or five pages a minute and routinely shipped with a "scorch eliminator," a euphemism for a fire extinguisher.
"The copiers of yesterday bear little resemblance to the copiers of today," Rees said. "It's the difference between a Miata and a Model T."
But still they take seven or eight minutes to warm up. The best the industry can do is have the machine automatically turn itself on first thing in the morning.
It's enough to turn a temp to sabotage.
