LOFTWARE AND NICELABEL COMBINE
Extend Global Leadership in Enterprise Labeling and Artwork Management
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LOFTWARE AND NICELABEL COMBINE
Extend Global Leadership in Enterprise Labeling and Artwork Management
Thousands of leading, global companies use the Loftware Print Server (LPS) to manage and process mission critical barcode labels, RFID smart labels, and documents across their supply chain. The Loftware Print Server is barcode software designed to integrate within your enterprise, allowing you to drive supply chain labels directly from your enterprise systems (ERP, WMS, PLM, SAP, or Oracle Applications). With a 99.999% uptime, our solutions are built to support high availability environments (load dividing, fault tolerance, and automatic failover) to assure continuous high-volume label production.
The
The
The
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LPS Version |
Windows Server 2012 R2 |
Windows Server 2008 R2** |
Windows Small Business Server 2011 |
Windows Server 2016 |
Windows |
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12.1.1 |
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12.1 |
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12.0.2 |
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12.0.1 |
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11.1.1 |
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11.1 |
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11.0.1 |
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11.0 |
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NOTES:
** 64-bit only.
+ Windows Server 2012 only.
† Windows Server 2012 R2 support for clustered environments
‡ Windows Server 2003 support by Microsoft ended July 14, 2015.
See Legacy OS Compatibility below for older versions.
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LPS Version |
Windows 7 Pro |
Windows Vista Business |
Windows XP Pro |
Windows Server 2003 |
Windows Server 2008 |
Windows Server 2012 R2 |
Windows Server 2008 R2 |
Windows Small Business Server 2011 |
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10.2.2 |
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10.2.1 |
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10.2 |
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10.1.2 |
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10.1.1 |
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10.1 |
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10.0.2 |
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10.0.1 |
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10.0 |
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9.8 |
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9.7 |
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9.6 |
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9.5 |
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9.1 |
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9.0 |
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8.4 |
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8.3 |
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8.1 |
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8.0 |
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7.3 |
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7.2 |
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7.1 |
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7.0 |
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NOTES:
* 32-bit only and ** 64-bit only
Version 12.1.1 March 2021
Version 12.1 April 2020
Version 12.0.2 August 2018
Version 12.0.1 June 2018
Version 11.1.1 October 2017
Version 11.1 . April 2017
Version 11.0.1 September 2016
Version 11.0 . January 2016
Version 10.2.2 | Version 10.2.1 | Version 10.2 | Version 10.1.2 | Version 10.1.1 | Version 10.1 | Version 10.0.2 | Version 10.0.1 | Version 10.0
Release Notes: September 2016
Barcode Color – A new color selection control provides the Label Designer with the ability to set the foreground color of a Barcode and its human readable text.
Operating System Support – Added support for Windows Server 2012 R2 Clusters. For a complete list of supported operating systems and other requirements, refer to the Loftware Label Manager and Loftware Print Server Installation Guide.
QR Codes with trailing tilde – Fixed the issue in which tilde (~) character was inconsistently scanned when printed as bitmap. When a QR Code is configured to include a trailing tilde character, it did not always scan to show the tilde character in Auto mode.
Global Batch Print Logging Level – Fixed an issue in which setting logging levels to DEBUG was not retained and reverted back to WARNING.
LPS job processing sequence – Fixed an issue in which print jobs with higher job numbers were printing before those with lower job numbers sent to the same printer.
LWMigrate process when processing large volumes of labels – Fixed an issue that occurred when processing a large number of labels at the same time. Some labels successfully completed the migration process while others resulted in an error and all label processing stopped.
Status Client application – Fixed an issue that occurred when two servers were being monitored and a print device was selected. The LLMWStatus.exe process stopped and the status viewer closed unexpectedly.
Installing LPS 11 on a fresh system – Fixed an issue in which installation failed with an error of LPS -J scan failed if Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 was not installed.
Rendering QR Code symbols as bitmaps to multiple printers simultaneously – Fixed an issue in which Imaged QR Code Labels for multiple printers in multiple print groups caused contention for resources.
Text Box issues
Known issues include:
Color Barcodes – Code 39 color barcode and human readable text fields with same RGB value may be printed in a lighter shade. If this occurs, select the Send TrueType Fonts as Images option for Windows printers.
Release Notes: January 2016
LPS 11.0 licensing All customers upgrading their software to version 11.0 will need their current software licenses converted to an 11.0 license.
Customers should contact the Loftware Customer Account Management group (CAM) to have a new licensed issued. Customers with hardware license keys upgrading to 11.0 and wanting to use the new print group feature will also need to contact CAM.
Loftware's Customer Account Management team is available to assist customers between 8:00 AM and 5:00 PM (Eastern Time), Monday through Friday. E-mail and Faxes are received 24 hours a day. Contact information includes:
TextBox Control A new label field that allows the Label Designer control over dynamic font sizing, justification, vertical alignment, line spacing, line breaks, and the ability to automatically fit variable text to a TextBox area. This feature enables enhanced control and flexibility of variable data on label templates, while reducing the amount of design work by adjusting the text within the text box area. This feature is especially useful when printing multi-language labels.
Native PCL5c Printer Driver In addition to the PCL5e native printer driver, LPS 11.0 adds native printing via PCL5c, providing color support to a broad range of printers, increasing overall printing performance and reducing network traffic.
Print Device Groups A new print device management and configuration function, that enables the grouping of print devices when managing a large number of print devices on a single LPS server. In addition to improving the management of large printer deployments, large print jobs that may have been memory-constrained will see improved performance by taking advantage of the new multi-threaded printer group architecture that better utilizes server processing and memory.
To optimize server utilization when using Print Groups, consideration should be given to the server platform size, configuration and available resources. Loftware recommends having a server configuration of:
Operating System Support Added client-support for Windows 10 (not print server).
Note: As of Version 11.0, Windows Server 2003 is no longer supported.
Please refer to the Loftware Label Manager and Loftware Print Server Installation Guide for a complete list of supported operating systems and other requirements.
Updated the *VERSION alternate command The alternate command was changed to LWVERSION to avoid conflicts with labels using Version in field names. This affects any LPS integration including the ODP Client. This does not affect ODP 32.
Large database ODBC lookup issues Large database lookups (for example, a million+ rows) are now limited to not exceed the physical memory limits on the server.
Reprint after a print job interruption Fixed an issue where LPS was not properly handling label reprint requests when a job was interrupted by a printer error when using detailed status before the print job starts.
Labels referencing Excel data Fixed an issue where LPS was not shutting down properly after printing a label that has a database key field referencing an Excel spreadsheet.
High ASCII Datamatrix Fixed an issue to properly handle High ASCII characters in PAS files when printing Datamatrix symbols.
LPS was not resetting *INDEX back to 1
Center Justification with Paragraphs and Windows Printers Fixed an issue where center-justified Paragraph fields were not printing as expected on Windows printers.
Alpha characters not encoding in QR Code Fixed an issue to properly encode a single alpha character that follows multiple numeric characters.
Known issues include:
TextBox specific issues include:
Release Notes: February 2015
Blank Fields on Labels Contain Previous Label's Data When Using *DELINKODBC
Affected Version: 10.2.1– Print jobs that contain the *DELINKODBC command did not correctly print blank fields after the first label of the print job. Instead of the field being blank, data was added from the preceding label. This issue occurred when printing from On- Demand Print Client, LWA, Integrations, or any situation where the *DELINKODBC command was being sent.
Leading Zeros in Barcodes Encoded as Spaces When Using Serial-Number Data Sources and ZPL II Printers
Affected Versions: 10.1.2, 10.2, 10.2.1– There was a condition in the Loftware ZPL II printer driver where leading zeros were encoded as spaces in the barcode. The condition occurred when using Serial-Number Data Sources with leading zeros on a barcode and the label was printed to a ZPL II printer. This issue did not occur if the serial number had a leading character (A, B, etc.), or was provided from a different Data Source (keyboard, database), or printed to a non-ZPL II printer.
Incorrect Julian Week Calculation
Affected Versions: All released versions– Date/Time fields using "WW yy" or "WW yyyy" in previous versions incorrectly reported the Julian week as one less than actual. For example, Monday, Jan 5, 2015 displayed as "01 2015" when the correct value should have been "02 2015". This affects all versions of LPS.
Logging Improvements
Affected Versions: All released versions – Logging has been enhanced in this release.
Release Notes: December 2014
Windows Server 2012 R2 Support – Support for non-clustered Windows Server 2012 R2 has been officially added.
Increased Paragraph Field Character Limits – The character buffer size for paragraph fields has been increased by over 150%, allowing greater flexibility when providing complex instructions or localized content.
Character Level Formatting Improvements – Enhanced line break and paragraph support, baseline shifting has been fine-tuned when shifting characters in both directions on the same line.
Fields Moving on Label Save From Older Versions – In certain circumstances, primarily when moving from a significantly older version of LLM/LPS where the display attributes were different, fields could move when resaving a label. This would not occur if the label was opened without saving. If encountered, a new setting has been added which will correct the issue.
Printing Field Flag with Character Level Formatting – Fixed an issue where the Printing Field flag was being ignored if RTF was selected.
High ASCII printing via On Demand Print Client – Fixed an issue where the ODP client was not printing high ASCII characters (128-255) as expected.
Memory or Resources are Low – Fixed an issue where Windows Server 2012 was reporting memory issues when displaying the form for certain labels via On Demand Print.
Logging and Quality Improvements
Incorrect Native Field Envelope – For label templates created via RDP, if the setting to fix the field moving issue is set, and you edit the template outside of an RDP session, the native field envelope may not appear as expected.
Incorrect Julian Week Calculation – Date/Time fields using WW yy or WW yyyy will incorrectly report the Julian week as one less than actual (for example, Monday, Jan 5, 2015 will display as "01 2015" when the correct value should be "02 2015"). If you are impacted by this issue, please contact Loftware Technical Support for further assistance.
CLF and Horizontal Scaling – When using the RTF Formatter on text fields, leave the Horizontal Scaling property at 100%.
Release Notes: August 2014
Character Level Formatting – Support for Rich Text Format (RTF) commands has been added to format text strings, which allows label designers to use formulas and scripts to bold, italicize, resize, color, underline, subscript, superscript, and baseline adjust text strings. This allows customers to meet regulatory standards and gives designers additional flexibility to manipulate characters within a single text field without having to change their source of data.
Performance Improvements – Early customers have seen printing performance increase over 10% in high-volume printing environments. System optimizations were made to streamline printer connectivity and improve networking performance.
GHS Images – The nine pictograms required for Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labeling of Chemicals (GHS) labeling are now a part of the standard images provided with Loftware solutions.
Intermec Printer Support – Added named printer support for the PD42 (IPL), PD42 (FP), PF2i (IPL), PF2i (FP) and the PF8.
TrueType Font Intercharacter Spacing – Fixed an issue where the spacing between characters of certain fonts would change when upgrading to newer operating systems.
cab Windows Driver Configuration Settings – Added configuration settings for the cab Windows driver to enable color printing to XC two-color printers.
Windows Color Printing Improvements – UTF-8 variable data fields print in color as expected.
Datamax Family Driver Improvements – Fixed minor issues in UI that did not impact printing.
Zebra Font Recall – Updated the PA Command default to 0,1,1,0, which can be set in the Recall TTF dialog. Fixed issue with some accents not printing in Right-to-Left languages.
Small Print Job Performance Improvements – Added the ability to override an operating system network setting, which was adding a 200ms delay when sending small packets to TCP/IP connected printers.
Logging and Quality Improvements
Image transparency not working with some PDF drivers – Some PDF Windows drivers don’t support transparency mode with images, resulting in clipped images if images are overlapped.
Character Level Formatting and Inc/Dec Fields – If using character level formatting to an Inc/Dec field in a script, certain conditions (for example, bolding every 10th label) require applying the formatting to a non-printing field and then setting the data to a printing field in order to achieve the desired behavior.
CLF Right-to-Left termination – When using the \rtlch command (Right-to-Left) you must close the text with \ltrch.
CLF and Horizontal Scaling – When using the RTF Formatter on text fields, leave the Horizontal Scaling property at 100%.
Release Notes: April 2014
Enhanced Zebra Font Recall–The Zebra printer drivers have been enhanced to allow for the usage of TrueType Fonts (TTFs) that are stored on Zebra devices. This feature allows the user to create and modify a label using TTFs within the Design application, while also taking advantage of native printing capabilities using the TTFs that are downloaded on a Zebra ZPL II Printer.
Two new fields were added to the Printer Specific Options (PSO) screen:
Horizontal Scaling for TrueType Fonts–With TrueType Fonts, you can now scale the font width as a percentage of the font point size. The Character Height and Width properties of a field have been replaced by the Horizontal Scaling property. The field's font size can be changed by adjusting the point size and horizontal scaling properties or by using the mouse on the field's resize handles.
Operating System Support–Added support for Windows Server 2012.
Web Listener–Added new logging capabilities, including the ability to log to a file.
Release Notes: October 2013
Release Notes: (10.1.0.21) July 2013
Release Notes: September 2012
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Font Types |
Zebra Firmware Version Required |
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.ttf (default) |
X. 13.X or higher |
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.tte and .ttf |
X. 14.X or higher |
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.fnt |
All versions |
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Vendor |
ZPL II |
EPL2 |
IPL |
Direct Protocol |
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Avery |
ZPL II |
EPL2 |
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Citizen |
ZPL II |
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Datamax |
PL-Z |
PL-E |
PL-I |
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Eltron |
ZPL II |
EPL2 |
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FOXIV |
ZSim |
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IPL |
Direct Protocol |
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IBM |
ZGL |
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IGL |
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Intermec |
ZSim |
ESim |
IPL |
Direct Protocol |
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Monarch |
ZPL II |
EPL2 |
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Printronix |
ZGL |
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IGL |
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Sato |
ZGL |
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IGL |
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Zebra |
ZPL II |
EPL2 |
IPL |
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Who should I contact for more information? For specific questions regarding this release, please contact the Loftware Product Management team ProductManagement@loftware.com
| Note: If you upgrade to the Loftware Print Server version 10.0, labels that contain the DTD DOCTYPE declaration will still print by default, but the XML will not be validated. |
| Note: Older EPL control language printers do not support this option. |
| Note: Zero KB PAS, XML, and CSV files WILL block the processing of valid PAS, XML, and CSV files until the Zero KB files are removed. |
Where can I get more documentation on the Print Server? 1. The Loftware Print Server and Label Manager Installation Guide on your CD or download package.
2. The Loftware Label Manager and Loftware Print Server User's Guides from the Help menu in Loftware Label Manager.
3. The loftware.com Document Center or Knowledge Base.
Who should I contact for more information? For specific questions regarding this release, please contact the Loftware Product Management team ProductManagement@loftware.com
In order to understand the differences between the various editions of the LPS, you need to study the specifications and product matrix. After choosing the edition that is appropriate for your use, you must then learn about the types of 'seats' that you can add to your base license. The graphic shown below is called a key string. This is what you will see in the 'help|about' box as your license after purchasing your software. The most important parts of the 
This number has a 'dual' meaning. It refers to the total number of barcode printers and smart label printers that will be available to you. It also indirectly reflects how many traditional barcode label printers will be available. For instance, suppose you have a number like 10/4. This means that you can have up to 10 total devices, 4 of which can be smart label printers, but you can use them in any way you wish.
So, If you configured 4 smart label printers, you would be able to configure up to 6 regular barcode label printers. 4+6 = 10. Another example would be if you configured 9 regular barcode printers, you would only have one seat left for a smart label printer. Each product configuration comes standard with a certain number of seats that can be expanded as your system grows.
The maximum number of RFID Smart Label printers the system allows.
Refers to separate programs interfacing to the Loftware Print Server (LPS) for the purposes of making label requests. Client seats are NOT based on concurrency. A seat is needed for each workstation that will need to connect to the LPS, regardless of how many will need to connect simultaneously. Host programs using the file interface do not require client seats. You may purchase additional client seats above the base configuration at the initial time of purchase, or at a later date by calling our Customer Service department.
Components of the LPS that require client seats are:
A Terminal Server seat license is only required if you are running the stand-alone LLM applications in a Terminal Server or Citrix environment. It is not required for LPS running on Terminal Server or Citrix. Please contact Customer Account Management for migration options if you currently have Terminal Server seat licensing.
| Loftware Label Manager® | LPS™ Starter Edition | LPS™ Standard Edition | LPS™ Premier Edition | |
| Key Product Components | ||||
| Family Drivers for the most popular printing languagess | X | X | X | X |
| Embedded Image Support | X | X | X | X |
| Label Versioning with label comments | X | X | X | X |
| Character Level Formatting (RTF) | X | X | X | X |
| Advanced Language Wizard with extended Language support | X | X | X | X |
| Audit Files | X | X | X | X |
| 2D Symbology Support, including GS1 DataBar | X | X | X | X |
| Graphical User Interface WYSIWYG | X | X | X | X |
| Native Driver Support for Thermal printers | X | X | X | X |
| 32-bit ODBC Support | X | X | X | X |
| GM Wizard for generating the (1724A) label | X | X | X | X |
| Label Wizard (Creates "ready to edit" compliance Labels) | X | X | X | X |
| PCL 5e and PCL 5c Native Drivers (B&W and Color support for LaserJet compatible printers) | X | X | X | X |
| Printer Configuration Wizard | X | X | X | X |
| Language Wizard (Print multiple language labels including Japanese/Chinese) | X | X | X | X |
| Unicode Input Methods | X | X | X | X |
| Printer groups and management console | X | X | X | X |
| Stand-Alone Printing | ||||
| Barcode printing software allows the user to print from a PC using a standard "off-the-shelf" package (No programming required) | X | X | X | X |
| Support for browser-based LWA | -- | X | X | X |
| Support for Terminal Server/Citrix Metaframe | -- | X | X | X |
| Support for Terminal Server/Citrix Metaframe (Label Design Module) | X | -- | -- | -- |
| Server-Based Printing | ||||
| Use Loftware® Print Server (LPS™) to service all printers in a building, region, or enterprise. Print from any application including ERP/MRP, WMS Supply Chain and Legacy applications | -- | X | X | X |
| Accepts Requests from Windows, UNIX, LINUX, AS400, HPUX, AIX, SCO, etc. | -- | X | X | X |
| Loftware® Direct Printing Integration with SAP, Oracle WMS and other enterprise applications. | -- | -- | -- | X |
| Internet/Web Printing Features | ||||
| Loftware WebAccess™ (Browser-based on-demand printing. Loftware WebAccess™ sold separately) |
-- | -- | -- | X |
| Premier Features | ||||
| Windows applications integration using ActiveX and .Net controls | -- | -- | -- | X |
| Integration using Loftware Web Services™ (*Loftware Web Services™ sold separately.) |
-- | -- | -- | X |
| E-mail notification for printer and server error conditions (Notification Agent) | -- | -- | -- | X |
| Monitor condition of printer and server status remotely (Status Client) | -- | -- | -- | X |
| Fault tolerant Clustering 24x7 failover of printer network (Failover Licensing sold separately) |
-- | -- | -- | X |
| Loftware Connector™ capabilities | -- | -- | -- | X |
| Loftware Connector™ for SAP integration capabilities (Loftware Connector™ for SAP sold separately.) |
-- | -- | -- | X |
| Loftware Connector™ for Oracle integration capabilities (Loftware Connector™ for Oracle sold separately.) |
-- | -- | -- | X |
| Loftware Universal Connector integration capabilities (Loftware Universal Connector sold separately.) |
-- | -- | -- | X |
| Licensing | ||||
| 4 Printer Seats | X | -- | -- | -- |
| 2 Printer Seats and 1 Client Seat, 1 Terminal Server Seat* | -- | X | -- | -- |
| 8 Printer Seats and 2 Client Seat, 1 Terminal Server Seat* | -- | -- | X | -- |
| 10 Printer Seats and 4 Client Seat, 1 Terminal Server Seat* | -- | -- | -- | X |
| RFID Features | ||||
| RFID Smart Label Printing with up to 2 seats** | -- | X | -- | -- |
| Smart Label Printing expandable to 499 seats, optional | -- | -- | -- | X |
*Note: The Loftware Print Server™ is scalable. Each Loftware Print Server may be configured to serve up to 499 printers. Additional Print Seats may be purchased at anytime.
**The only exception is that the RFID Starter Edition can not have more than two RFID Smart Label Seats.
The available Editions of the Loftware Print Server are listed below. Please refer to the following links to understand the differences between them.
| Printer Seats | 10 (expandable to 499) |
| Client Seats | 4 (expandable to 499) |
| Terminal Server Seats | 1 On Demand Print, Unlimited label design seats |
| RFID Smart Label Seats | 0 (expandable to 499) |
| Printer Seats | 8 (expandable to 499) |
| Client Seats | 2 (expandable to 499) |
| Terminal Server Seats | 1 On Demand Print, Unlimited label design seats |
| RFID Smart Label Seats | Not Available in Standard Edition |
| Printer Seats | 2 (expandable to 499) |
| Client Seats | 1 (expandable to 499) |
| Terminal Server Seats | 1 On Demand Print, Unlimited label design seats |
| RFID Smart Label Seats | 0 (see Starter Edition + RFID in the next section) |
| Printer Seats | 10 (expandable to 499) |
| Client Seats | 4 (expandable to 499) |
| Terminal Server Seats | 1 On-Demand Print, Unlimited label design seats |
| RFID Smart Label Seats | 5 (expandable to 499, inclusive of the total number of Printer Seats) |
| Printer Seats | 2 (expandable to 499) |
| Client Seats | 1 (expandable to 499) |
| Terminal Server Seats | 1 On Demand Print, Unlimited label design seats |
| RFID Smart Label Seats | 2 (expandable to 499, inclusive of the total number of Printer Seats) |
All Loftware Products are sold with a one year, renewable Annual Support Contract which includes unlimited technical support from Loftware's technical support call center and free software upgrades.
The Loftware Print Server® (LPS) is a scalable high-speed, high-volume marking solution for barcode labels and RFID labels. The LAN/WAN and Internet adaptable technology can act as both a middleware solution for automated business processes and as a back-end component for small, medium, and largescale business systems that desire per-client printing and encoding.
Explore the wide range of benefits Loftware Print Server and Loftware Label Manager customers have achieved by moving to Spectrum. You too can seamlessly migration to the industry’s most powerful Enterprise Labeling Solution to easily create, manage and print labels throughout your organization.
