Chip Cards and their types
Chip cards are plastic cards with an integrated memory chip. At All About Cards you get smart cards as blank cards as well as printed cards. We will be happy to advise you on the right technology and the right card printer and card reader. You want to print smart cards with names, photos, layout and other data? We offer printed chip cards in all variations. If required, you can also personalize your chip cards yourself with a Zebra chip card printer, an EDIsecure chip card printer or a re-writable card printer. We have the right card reader and accessories (blank cards, ribbons, cleaning material).
Chip Cards and their applications
Basically we distinguish between two types of chip cards depending on the application: Memory chip cards and smart cards. Memory chip cards include customer cards and loyalty solutions. The main applications of the smart cards are high-security identity documents, debit cards, credit cards, identity cards or passports. To find out more about the different types and processes visit our pages about contact chip cards and contactless chip cards or just give us a call for personal advise.
We offer you professional advice on choosing the right card printer, if you want to print cards flexible by yourself. Due to its special printing process, the Zebra ZXP Series 7 card printer is perfectly suited for printing contact or contactless chip cards.
Selection of chip card variants
The following variations are independent from the chip type and represent a selection:
- chip card blanko (in various colors for self printing)
- chip card with printing (free design choice including company logo, barcode, QR-Code, signature field and many more)
- chip card with encoding
- chip card with offset printing (high value and cheap card projects)
- chip card with security features (hologram, embossing, microprinting, watermarks, barcodes and many more)
- chip card with personalization (individual with name, date of birth, membership number)
- chip card with photo personalization (personalized incl. photo)
Application fields of chip cards
Encoding chip cards
For coding your cards with contact or contactless chips, All About Cards offers a variety of professional devices. For all common chips, such as Mifare, Infineon, Atmel, Intel or Legic, you will find devices for beginner and professionals. All About Cards will be happy to answer any questions you may have about your chip card project.
These printers are available at All About Cards:
- Value card printer, ideal for short runs and desktop use
- Performance printers: they offer more technical features and are well suited for small and medium runs.
- Security printers are able to equip cards with various security features and thus make them forgery-proof.
- Re-transfer printers deliver the highest quality print results and, of course, encode all common chip types in medium and large runs.
- If you want to encode and rewrite cards, we also offer so-called Re-Writable Card Printers.
- For special cards, for example in oversize or in special formats, there are the special card printers
- In addition, you can obtain laminators, card embossers and wristband printers from us.
Do you want your cards to be printed individually with names, numbers, photos or other titles? Of course, we also offer various methods of personalization.
Contact chip cards
Processor cards basically correspond to chip cards, but the implanted chip contains a CPU, a memory (ROM) for the operating system, EEPROM for the coding and data, RAM and possibly a coprocessor. To control these resources, a Chip Operating System (COS) is required, which coordinates data transfer, memory management and data processing in the chip.
We offer chip cards from the following manufacturers: ATMEL, Arizona Microchip and Infineon.
Contactless chip card
Data transmission is divided into low-frequency systems with 125 KHz and high-frequency systems with 13.56 MHz. Information can thus be read at a distance of up to 0.7 m. The data can be transmitted at a distance of up to 0.5 m from the system. RFID cards are insensitive to moisture, dirt and mechanical influences. This enables practically wear-free use of the card information. Segmentation makes it possible to integrate various applications (e.g. access control and canteen system) into a single card.
We offer contactless chip cards from the following manufacturers: ATMEL, NXP, Legic, EM Marin, Inside and Infineon.
Chip card reader
A chip card reader is a handy device which can read out and encode stored information from chip cards and RFID-cards. In principle a chip card reader can be installed directly in a plastic card printer or can be operated as an independent device.
If you want to know which chip card represents the optimal solution for you, contact our security experts and get a free consultation without obligations.