BTW, I've had my Brother laser MFP for 11 years and still on the original toner.
If any representative from Brother is reading this, hear me.
DON'T ENSHITTIFY! You see this? You can own the market if you just LEAVE IT ALONE.
Exactly. You can join the club of “Do Nothing and Win” club along with Gabe Newell
They have started chipping their toners, or so I've read. They're still the least shitty printer manufacturer, AFAIK, though.
Let's hope it's just for quality of life and not to bully their customers...
DON’T ENSHITTIFY!
They kind of already did, at least they did in the past.
They fought pretty hard to make you only use their toners, and they would warn you to change your toner cartridges way earlier than it was necessary to do so, disabling the printer if you didn't. I remember having to put tape over the optical device in the printer that looks at the toner cartridge, just so I can keep using my toner cartridge.
Don't get me wrong, I love my brother mfc7840w printer, but it's so weird to hear so much praise for Brother, it's like there is group amnesia about how they used to be on some of this stuff themselves.
They already started. I think it's too late
I honestly don't remember my printer brand. And that's a good sign. I bought it years ago, and it now lives under my basement stairs on a static IP via wifi, accepting the on average bimonthly print job that I need from it. Then I walk down, fetch the print, and close the door on it again. I should name it Harry Potter.
Harry Printer
Harry Plotter ?
Give a lightning scar across the top
I hope it’s at least in standby mode, and not always on.
Nah, it's been running since '11 and because of a critical network vulnerability that op never patched, it's been a bitcoin slave since '15. But the paper is always nice and toasty.
I've used tons of dot matrix, inkjets and lasers since the 80s. I've used them in MSDOS, ProDOS, Linux, BSD, Windows, MacOS, OSX, and BeOS. I don't know how many I've owned or how many different OS versions but I know I've had exactly 1 printer that wasn't constantly a problem and its a Brother laser printer.
can you recommend a good printer ?
Get a brother laser. 👨
can you tell me how to kill a High Ganzonian ?
Get a laser, brother. 👽
I would take any laser printer with a scanner/copier that doesn't have a subscription model that has Linux drivers for all features .
Brother is the only one I've found to check all the boxes
A "printer"? Oh right, those things we used to spray ink on dead trees back in the 20th century.
Come to Germany, the only country in the EU where paper usage is still going UP.
My (German) roomie's father called us a while back to excitedly tell us that his doctor has digitalised. By digitalised he meant that the doctor will fax any prescription he issues to whatever chemist the patient requests.
Here in Sweden, I log on to 1177.se to refill my prescription, usually a nurse will call me with some general questions, then I can log on to any chemist's website (both systems are tied to your national identity), and have the prescription delivered to my door the next day. I live in a small town of like 20k inhabitants too, so it's not like it's a big city only type thing.
We clearly have very perspectives on the term "digitalisation."
Interestingly a Lemmy user in another thread has a very negative view of Brother because he only uses Brother cutting machines (for craft projects) and it's filled with DRM and HP style lock in.
We need to lobotomize our "smart" devices ...
There need to be open source "smart" devices. Like, I've read and edited the source code running on my 3D printer. I was able to do that in my own home because it's got an Arduino Mega for a motherboard.
its why i dont like buying by brand, but rather specific product.
buying by brand gives companies a pass when they push out a shit product.
Brother has already started to enshitify, Kyocera is an alternative company that does simple laser printers, with easy and cheap to source generic toners
Brother gets recommended a lot by virtue of being the least shitty option in the hellish wasteland of consumer/office printers. They aren't perfect, but Brother printers have been the only option in the entire office to reliably print from a Linux computer over the network. Honestly, any day I don't have to interact with a printer is a good day.
Just don't update the printer's firmware! Mine's being going great for years now, but I'm scared that I might accidentally update it and the toner will be labeled unauthorised
In fairness you should do this on Windows as well.
95% of home printing needs can be handled by a mono laser. If you need a photo, usually cheaper to print it online or at a supermarket. Only for larger prints might it be cheaper to do it at home, and you'd better be sure to use it often because most inkjets clog like a motherfucker when not in use.
Greatest article ever: https://www.theverge.com/23642073/best-printer-2023-brother-laser-wi-fi-its-fine
I do love my Brother:
And miss the ~2020 pricing! (But it should last a long time)
R.I.P. to my real brother though. Forever 29 because heroin.
As of this post, still happily using the initial starter toner ✅
My father had a Brother laser printer. It outlived him. (...Anyway. Have you ever had to do Windows tech support for family? Not always nice. Ever had to do Windows printer tech support? Hoo boy. Ever had to do Windows printer tech support when the printer is hooked through a Centronics-to-USB adapter? Uggh. ...though I was kind of surprised that Windows 10 still had built in drivers for the damn thing.)
Me, I bought a Canon laser which technically has Linux drivers but damn me if I ever got it to print more than the CUPS test page. ...actually I'd rather not talk about CUPS. I have too many bad memories about it. (You can't escape the Printer Madness just by using Linux, oh no.)
My father had a Brother laser printer.
So it was an Uncle laser printer?
(I’m sorry I’ll see myself out)
I'm a big proponent of buying government surplus office printers. I have this huge print center collater thing that came with more toner than I'll ever use in my life. $55
Oh gods yes. Government surplus equipment is amazing when you can find it.
My state used to send all their decommissioned IT equipment to a warehouse where the public could buy it. It was a wonderland. My first few laptops all came from there (was poor and that was the only way I could afford one).
About 5 years ago, though, they stopped that and only send old furniture there. Anything electronic now goes to some 3rd party e-waste service where it probably ends up in a landfill in some poor country.
Not just a Linux user, anyone that needs a printer/copier.
Brother laser printers are good for everyone, not just Linux users.
Helped my gfs mom troubleshoot her HP printer (I know, ew. She bought it before we met) and finally figured out from the stupid app that it was out of one color.
The app doesnt indicate this in words though, Oh no. Just a stupid infographic that doesnt say ANYTHING. Just shows a nondescript bar at the top.
Only reason I downloaded it was i thought it would be a bit more user friendly.
Long story short I recommended a brother laser printer because the last time I replaced a cartridge in it was a couple years back and that was after printing things for god knows how long. And mine is old af.
The only reason I ever got rid of my original brother laser printer is because computers stopped coming with parallel ports, and the adapters I tried all sucked.
2nd Brother laser printer is still going strong after 15yrs.
Tbh, get a Brother printer for any OS. At least they don't buy into the shitfuckery that HP and others do with ink and firmware updates.
Recently bought a Brother laser printer. We use Linux, macOS, Windows 11, Android and iOS in the house and it just works.
I'm not even a linux user. Just here to learn. Windows is my daily driver for work and play...
Still all my printers are brother lasers.
My oldest is around 10 years old still running on the same toner... Picked out of the trash from an office move even.
Laser printers are great, althought I've got me a Pantum because I don't anticipate printing more than one page a month.
If you are a casual printer user, just use the local print shop. It's cheaper that way.
Ironically, the last time i needed a Windows PC was to set up my Brother laser printer. You needed to do it with some utility that was only available for Windows.
Brother Laser
I use Arch btw
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