[PLUG] New laser printer advice needed

[Fred James]

John Jason Jordan wrote:
> I need a new desktop laser printer (no inkjets). Black and white is
> preferred, and a duplexer and ethernet are essential, but speed is
> irrelevant. For quite a few years I have been using an HP 4+ decked out
> with a duplexer, as much RAM as it will hold, and genuine Adobe
> Postscript, however it has developed the dreaded "13-paper jam"
> syndrome. From reading a dozen web pages I'm pretty sure it's a sensor
> somewhere, but figuring it out would take hours of my time. I'm ready
> to say kaddish for it. (But if anyone here wants to have a go at fixing
> it, it's all yours.)
>
> There is such a massive number of small desktop printers currently on
> the market that it will take hours and hours of research to figure out
> which will suit my needs. But I am not partial to buying brand new
> printers anyway; I would much prefer older printers that have a
> reputation for years and years of reliable performance.
>
> Does anyone have any recommendations?
>
John Jason Jordan
I have an HP 4m+ that is of course very old, and still running well, 
except that I have to physically hold the back door tight to make an 
envelope feed completely ... sigh.

I say "still running" ... actually I have applied a few "maintenance 
kits" along the way.  That means paper pickup pads, fusers, and that 
like ... instructions are pretty easy to follow, or you can get a 
reputable repair shop to do it for you.  The "other major maintenance" 
is cleaning ... I have found that opening all the "doors" and sucking it 
out with a good vacuum does wonders for stopping the paper jam issues 
... don't neglect the last rollers and brushes (in the output slot).  
And I always use genuine HP toner, and parts, and a good quality, clean 
(as in dust free) paper.

This advice is garnered from years of experience, personal and 
professional.  Professionally, I ran many 4m+ printers into the dirt, 
returned them to life, and ran them into the dirt again.  We got our 
moneys worth out of those little workhorses, yes.

Hope that helps ... good luck
Regards
Fred James