To provide a portable printer which uses at least either of an AC source and a battery power source as a driving power source, and which can reduce power consumption during a recovery operation when the battery power source and the like are used as the driving power source without the use of the AC source.

It is determined whether the driving source is the AC source or the battery power source (S1). When a high-recording-quality mode 1 is selected (S7), a purge operation similar to a purge operation for the AC source 117 is performed even in the use of the battery power source. When a medium-recording-quality or low-recording-quality mode 2 or 3 is selected in the use of the battery power source (S7: No), the following number of times of purge operations are performed at a low speed in the case where the number of the times of the purge operations is small (S8: No). When the number of the times of the purge operations is large (S8: Yes), in addition, the purge operations are performed at the low speed in such a manner that the number of the times of the purge operations is limited to two, depending on the mode of recording quality and a power capacity.