Back in the day, circa 1984-85, when I had an Atari 800XL as my primary computer , and daisy chained to my “happy” 1050 disk drives was my good ol’ 1020.

Before I had a proper dot matrix or daisy wheel (laser printers were prohibitively expensive), I was lucky enough to have something that could print text and graphics in four colors with little ballpoint pen nibs, sort of like a computer-driven multicolor Bic pen / spirograph.

The downside was that it printed on a roll of paper, kind of like register receipts, about 4 and a half inches wide, so turning in term papers was kind of out of the question. However, it made for a lot of use in electronics and drafting class, and for keeping notes. You could also print in very small print if you needed a crib sheet or to put script lines on for drama practice. Also good for hardcopy of code I was working on.

I wonder how hard it would be to build a new plotter,  or if cheap ones are out there for label making or stickers?

I found this article about adding plotter functionality to a 3D printer, which might be feasible for occasional application. Or maybe I could get a sub-$100 plotter bot, but I don’t think I have room in my workshop for such a limited-use item.

Maybe I could dig up an old 1020 somewhere and refurbish it, and set up an old Atari 800xl next to it for nostalgia?