Proposed is a method for producing a portable data carrier starting out from a film carrier having disposed on its upper side a contact layout, and on its underside a semiconductor circuit connected to the contact layout. The printer also includes a plurality of reflectors disposed in the exposure head housing, the plurality of reflectors including a plurality of elliptical reflectors and a plurality of planar reflectors. Consistent with the high availability nature of the system, a single CP system implements a firmware change by loading new firmware onto the system, saving state information pertaining to the old firmware, preventing the old firmware from communicating with the switches, bringing the new firmware to an active state and applying the saved state information to the new firmware.