| abstract |
An apparatus and method are described for maintaining the proper operation of an ink recorder having an ink recording head which prints an image on a recording medium by selectively depositing ink drops from a plurality of ink ejectors in response to image data. The ink recorder supports a plurality of performance modes and may be a color image recorder having a plurality of color inks and a plurality of ink ejectors for each color ink. A time period during printing is determined and the number of print drop commands received by each of the plurality of ink ejectors is counted during the time period. A target value for the number of print drop commands received by each ejector is set based on a pre-determined one of the plurality of performance modes, the image data, and a characteristic of each color ink in the case of a color ink recorder. If, during the time period determined, all of the ejectors receive the appropriate target number of print commands, then a purge ink procedure is not executed and printing is not interrupted. The print quality, overall printing speed, and ink waste are optimized by utilizing all of the factors cited in setting the target values for the number of print commands to be received by each ink ejector in order to avoid unneeded purge ink procedures. |