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My Brother HL-1250 was rescued from a skip outside a closing-down local authority office where a relative worked. There were at least ten just thrown out in the

My Brother HL-1250 was rescued from a skip outside a closing-down local authority office where a relative worked. There were at least ten just thrown out in the street. I got it home, it worked perfectly and has done ever since, with no toner change. This was FOUR YEARS ago--they must have thrown it out with a full cartridge. (I still feel a bit guilty when I look at it and see "Property of Cheshire County Council" stamped on the front, but they shouldn't have skipped it!) I agree, the thing is built like a tank. It's not the fastest machine in the world, and it's about as elegant as Kryten from Red Dwarf's head, images are an indistinct mass of foggy grey, but for what I do, churning out black and white text documents, the quality is perfect. It works flawlessly under Ubuntu too. You can't argue with the price, either--but even if you can't nick one from a skip, they're about £20 used. (I've been beaten in the "beater" printer category, though. The workplace I left this week has an HP LaserJet 5 of a 1995 vintage still clunking away in the corner printing news scripts for the radio, with a page count in the 300,000s. I believe it could soon be coming to the end of its life, though, not because it's knackered, but because they've stopped selling the cartridges. I love using old tech like this, for some reason.)

pasbesoin 15y ago
There is still a significant used market for the old HP printers, for reasons such as you describe. There have been several posts mentioned/referred to here or elsewhere about how they differ from the current HP SOHO line -- plastic and much less durable, as I understand it. Actually, I'm reminded that a relative has a 4MP purchased... a decade or more ago?, that is still chugging along just fine. It's awfully slow by today's standards, but -- while small and designed for the SOHO -- it is indeed "built like a tank", for the most part. By the way, the Brother 2[1|2]40, 70, etc. look all right, and their image quality is ok (for a basic B/W printer -- don't expect an Ansel Adams print ;-).

pasbesoin 15y ago

There is still a significant used market for the old HP printers, for reasons such as you describe. There have been several posts mentioned/referred to here or elsewhere about how they differ from the current HP SOHO line -- plastic and much less durable, as I understand it. Actually, I'm reminded that a relative has a 4MP purchased... a decade or more ago?, that is still chugging along just fine. It's awfully slow by today's standards, but -- while small and designed for the SOHO -- it is indeed "built like a tank", for the most part. By the way, the Brother 2[1|2]40, 70, etc. look all right, and their image quality is ok (for a basic B/W printer -- don't expect an Ansel Adams print ;-).