No more printed smartcards.

[daverob]

I kind of understand what a smart card is. But what was the printer (model) and why was the printer special? e.g. Why can't any inkjet be used?

The printer was special as it was an ID card printer that prints directly onto the PVC plastic cards by using a dye sublimation process to form the image, and then covering it in a transparent resin overlay. This results in a very good quality image as the wax dyes are melted into the surface of the plastic card and the colours mix together in the space of a single pixel (rather than the dithering effect needed by inkjet printers). It also has the advantage of being very durable. Typically a new one will cost you around $1000 for a basic model rising to several thousand for one with all the options.

The printer I was using was a Javelin J300C, which is a UK specific model that is basically the same internals as the Eltron/Zebra P300C but with a different style case and a small LCD status display. My one was manufactured in 1998 and they were discontinued in 1999, with support ending in 2004 (which is probably why I got it so cheap in 2007!).

Normal inkjet printers can't be used as the ink would just rub off the plastic cards. I believe that you can now get plastic ID badge type cards with a special coating on them that is inkjet printable (the same as the printable CDR/DVDR discs), but I haven't seen this type of card available with a smartcard chip embedded in it. If you had to use an inkjet printer, then I'd expect that it would be better to print on a separate sheet of film and then laminate it to the card.