Patent ID: 6880905

Claim:
An image printing apparatus which prints an image while scanning a carriage holding a printing head relative to a printing medium in a main scanning direction at a predetermined speed on the basis of image data received from a host apparatus in units of data frames, which are obtained by dividing, into a desired number of data frames, image data necessary to print an image by one scanning at a width corresponding to a number of print elements of the printing head, comprising: storage means for storing the image data received from the host apparatus, said storage means storing the received image data in a plurality of storage areas, each corresponding to one of the data frames; printing control means for controlling to start image printing using the image data stored in said storage means before an end of storing image data in a plurality of data frames corresponding to a print area to be printed by one scanning of the printing head, wherein image data further received from the host apparatus is stored in said storage means after the image printing is started by said printing control means; detection means for detecting interruption of image printing during the image printing by one scanning; and carriage control means for, when the interruption is detected, controlling to cause the carriage to stand by at a position returned by a predetermined distance from an interruption position toward a printing start position, and when a cause of the interruption is eliminated, controlling to move the carriage from the position returned by the predetermined distance to the interruption position and start the image printing, wherein said printing control means interrupts the image printing when image data corresponding to a data frame next to a data frame storing image data in printing is not received, and wherein said carriage control means moves the carriage at a speed higher than the predetermined speed in at least movement of the carriage from the interruption position to the position returned by the predetermined distance and at least part of movement of the carriage from the position returned by the predetermined distance to the interruption position.