A highly reliable, low-noise, printer for providing good print quality while configured to print and feed paper using a single motor. A cam mechanism is used to provide simplified control over paper feeding operations. A print head carriage is driven by a belt drive gear assembly that also drives the paper feed cam directly. A paper feed roller is rotated by a drive lever assembly which interacts with a first cam profile formed on a surface of the paper feed cam, and the resulting torque is controlled by a contact release mechanism driven by interaction with a second cam profile also formed on a surface of the paper feed cam.