Patent ID: 7581797

Claim:
An element board for a , which has a plurality of printing elements and drives the printing elements in accordance with serially input printing data, comprising: a shift register which serially receives printing data corresponding to the number of printing elements from a data input terminal, receives a clock signal from a clock input terminal, and outputs the received printing data in parallel to a latch circuit; an input terminal which receives an enable signal of at least two pulses, said enable signal serving both as a heat enable signal and a latch signal; said latch circuit latches the printing data input to said shift register in response to said latch signal; a driving circuit which selectively drives the printing elements in accordance with the printing data latched by said latch circuit and the heat enable signal representing a driving period of the printing elements, said heat enable signal is delayed with respect to the latch signal; and a signal conversion circuit which converts said enable signal of at least two pulses into a single pulse signal, the pulse signal converted by said signal conversion circuit being used as the signal for controlling a latch state of said latch circuit.