Ashamed to write this

Posted by tepancalli@reddit | talesfromtechsupport | View on Reddit | 75 comments

Years ago, fresh out of the University, i started as a tech writer and got promoted to tech support.

We provided everything IT-related to a grup of companies.

Then one day i got a call from a company couple of blocks away, one printer was not working, something about "the door" not closing. I grab some tools and head into the unknown.

Got into the office floor and ask for the printer, someone points to the machine and i start checking and old HP that's been overused for years, it was a consumer model, could have been bought at a supermarket.

the problem was obvious, one hook of the front panel was broken, printer went into maintenance mode and refused to print.

I went to the head of the office and tell him the issue, that he has to replace the printer since it deserves to rest, but he ask me to show him the problem.

I show him the broken piece, told him that it is used to press that little plastic switch; not wasting a second, this 50 something got hers a roll of electrical tape, put a piece over the switch and all someone to make a print.

I went back to my office not knowing what happened, this was almost 20 years ago and I'm sure that printer is still there, printing with that piece of tape faking a front panel.

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whyevenmakeoc@reddit

It takes a certain type of Masochist to actively work with and try to repair printers.

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syntaxerror53@reddit

An ex--colleague took a printer completely apart to fix it. My first day and I thought he's damn good, genius.

Next day wheels printer (still in bits) into workshop telling Workshop Manager that it's kanackered and beyond economical repair. Suspect he couldn't be bothered to put it all back together again.

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SlaughteredHorse@reddit

I remember a user (fresh out of college engineer) who took apart one of those Xerox solid ink block printers because he said every page they printed was dirty and he needed to clean it.

I walked in to see this guy elbow deep in this thing.

We had a Xerox tech coming out for another printer in the same area that same day. I told him...

"One... wtf, that is still under warranty. Two, put that back together before the xerox guy shows up. Three..." I reach over to the side that he has not disassembled yet, flip open a panel and pull what should be a white, but in their case a gray roller. (They called it a "maintenance kit"."

"Three... this is dirty, and you need to buy a new one. That's the problem.

Also, you pay us for tech support.

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SteveDallas10@reddit

The Xerox solid ink printer line was bought from Tektronix, who invented the technology. The method of making the holes in the printhead was an outgrowth of their CRT manufacturing expertise.

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Menard42@reddit

Hiiiii

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Stryker_One@reddit

Printer: I'm tired boss.

Boss: Too bad, you're still with the living.

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NotYetReadyToRetire@reddit

The older HPs were built like tanks and weren't picky about their toner cartridges. Back in the early Windows days, that was all we ever bought; we had a couple of LaserJet II's and several LaserJet III's that lasted 20+ years. Now, though, we won't touch them.

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ratsta@reddit

I worked for someone who rebadged LJ 2s and 3s. Brilliant machines, solid and reliable. We came out with a new page laser while I was there that used a Minolta engine IIRC. It fell to me to learn all about the new model and then train my colleagues on it before sending it upstairs to Sales.

I pulled the toner and had a look around. As I was putting it back in, I noticed how flimsy one of the guide tabs was. "That'll be our #1 breakage," I predicted. Anyway, did my job, delivered my training and dutifully took it upstairs to sales.

Less than an hour later the sales rep calls me to let me know he's broken that tab.

Ayup, yup, yup, yup.

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Gadgetman_1@reddit

The LJII and III were mostly the same printers. Same almost bomb-proof(but not user-proof) mechanism. The only thing that could kill them was impatient users who would grab the paper as it exited and yank it out. That would eventually destroy some gearing in there.

Mechanism was really a Canon design, and yeah, it got rebadged a lot. One rebadged version we had even ran HPGL.

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SteveDallas10@reddit

The Canon LBP-SX engine powered both of those printers. It was solid.

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LeomundsTinyButt_@reddit

Studied mechatronics engineering in the late 2000s, we were always on the hunt for dead printers to strip for parts because their motors were so damn precise (and free to boot). Built an awesome inverse pendulum for a class with the remains of my childhood deskjet, which had been gathering dust for a good decade at that point.

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DaHick@reddit

I stumbled on for a very short while with HP printers past laserJet III, went off to a few other brands, and now everything is Brother (except that OKI dot marix we use as an alarm printer, that thing will survive an emp and a lightning strike)

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NotYetReadyToRetire@reddit

Yes, we had a 30 year old OKI dot matrix that just wouldn't die

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OcotilloWells@reddit

OKI probably still makes it.

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OcotilloWells@reddit

I have a LJ V. I'm not using it at the moment, due to living space constraints. It works fine, though I need to get it cleaned. It does dim the lights when it prints though.

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OinkyConfidence@reddit

So, SO true! HP LJ 4000 series, 5si, 8100 series; unbelieveable tanks!!

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pebcak47@reddit

I remember my LJ4250 fleet on my old job. Around 50 printers. Absolute workhorses. You could feed them old cigarette butts or abrasion of rubber tires instead of toner, they would still run. They were sure build like tanks, if one dropped from the table, the floor would have a hole, thats for sure. And you can change the display messages very easy, had a good time on April fools day with that. I bet some of them still run today after all that time.

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rezwrrd@reddit

We're still running a handful of 4250s that have outlived some of the m506s that were supposed to replace them.

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syntaxerror53@reddit

Had to look it up. Yep!! Proper workhorses. Along with the LJ 2/3/4.

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OinkyConfidence@reddit

I forgot about changing the displays on the 4000's! That was fun. FEED ME PAPER. I AM ERROR. ID10T ERROR. Loads of fun.

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rezwrrd@reddit

PC LOAD LETTER

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No_Negotiation_6017@reddit

"What the fuck does that mean?" /Office Space

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GroundbreakingMap605@reddit

We're still running somewhere around 50 4200s and 4350s in my department. Most were purchased between 2004 and 2007.

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KelemvorSparkyfox@reddit

My first office job involved printing invoices from an AS/400 via HP tower-type printers, with three paper trays.

The only thing that gave them a problem was a road worker, putting his digger bucket through the main power cable.

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syntaxerror53@reddit

When HP had proper printers.

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TairaTLG@reddit

I had a 4L I got used, from a friend, who got it surplus probably from work. Requirement, DOS 3.

Ran that printer to 2007 before it retired. 4 pages a minute wasn't a speedy printer, black and white low resolution, but it worked great for just basic printing. Plug it in, go, done. Toner cartidges lasted halfway to forever.

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annoyedCDNthrowaway@reddit

The HP laserjet 1100. Took a 92A cartridge. My CFO made us find ways to make it print from a laptop, long after it should have been possible. He finally retired it in 2018 after we convinced him there was no such thing as a parallel to USB cable for his new laptop.

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millijuna@reddit

When I was a university student, we scored a Laserjet 4simx (ie with network card and postscript) for cheap at a bankruptcy auction. It was just a baby with only 800,000 pages on its engine.

That printer took 3 of us through our university degrees, including one person who was in the humanities and printing off reams of paper. When our geek coop finally broke up as we got good jobs and our own places, we gave the printer to a charity that needed a reliable, high volume printer.

I would not be surprised if itif was still printing 20 years later.

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FunnyAnchor123@reddit

Legacy of Hewlett Packard, before Carly Fiorina, when it was a gold standard of engineering.

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syntaxerror53@reddit

Boss: "Only the good die young. The Evil lives forever."

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Beach_Bum_273@reddit

Rise, son of Hewlett-Packard

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soberdude@reddit

Zombie printer might work in dude's IT game.

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DiligentCockroach700@reddit

Two essential tools for any tech support person. A roll of tape and a can of WD40. I also used to carry a small Leatherman multi tool and a BNC 50 ohm terminator. (That's how old I am!)

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jonas_ost@reddit

Can of contact cleaner

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nymalous@reddit

I think my dad still has that Ohm terminator. It doesn't work as well as it used to. It's seen a lot of use.

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Prom3th3an@reddit

I guess even terminators eventually terminate.

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MCPhssthpok@reddit

If it moves but it shouldn't - Duck tape. If it doesn't move but it should - WD40.

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paulcaar@reddit

The flowchart of champions

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bemenaker@reddit

Don't use WD-40 on plastic

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tuscaloser@reddit

Don't use WD-40 in place of actual oil either. WD-40 is intended as penetrant that makes seized bolts easier to remove. WD-40 has some oil in it, but something like a sprayable silicone lubricant (available at Walmart, "Supertech" brand) will keep a hinge squeak free for a lot longer.

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Inner_Speaker_335@reddit

My father-in-law had stuff called "Sili-Kroil" he'd use for just such a situation. He passed almost a decade ago, but we've still got three cans of stuff in the garage...they're about fifteen to twenty years old, I think. The big reason they're unused is that we can't mount an archaeological expedition to dig them out.

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xyzzytwistymaze@reddit

BNC 59 ohm, just call me the Terminator.

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Jezbod@reddit

My mate has just "retired" his second hand HP4015n after a feed gear decided to spit it's dummy out of the ~~pram~~ printer.

Bought second hand in February 2000...

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TankTiger8590@reddit

Those things are workhorses. Mine is still plodding along.

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LeomundsTinyButt_@reddit

The only downside of that for the non tech-savvy is finding the right drivers and cable adapters. Last year I finally convinced my grandpa to retire his 20 year old printer. It still worked fine, but I was sick of troubleshooting the connection every time grandpa took his laptop to the corner shop to "make it faster" (read: reformat to get rid of enough viruses to make the CDC jealous). Each new instance of Windows 10/11 stared at that serial-adapted-to-USB printer like a zoomer seeing a floppy disk for the first time, it took some persuasion to make it work.

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Mr_ToDo@reddit

Also toner/ink. Not always possible to find it, and when you do it can get expensive

Sure would be lovely to standardize the consumables but I'm not holding my breath, what with that being their profit centre. Would be neat though

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Prom3th3an@reddit

If they started making printers that could use ERC30 ribbons again, I'd probably buy one. All the parents are expired, so you can get a 48-pack on Amazon for the price of one or two modern inkjet cartridges.

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Dumbname25644@reddit

Toner is mostly standardised. The issue is the container that the toner goes into is not standardised. Then you get the likes of HP adding chips to their toner cartridges that are only there to ensure that you are buying HP cartridges and not a third party solution. That sort of anti consumer practices are why I got out of the printer repair game.

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Necrontyr525@reddit

if nothing else the new one won't make the old familiar clunk and whirr noises.

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Wise_Use1012@reddit

I miss my dot matrix printer. Tearing off the sides of the printed paper was fun.

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Mr_ToDo@reddit

They still have that kind of paper. I'd assume it's mainly for carbon copy stuff

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devin1955@reddit

"Carbon copy"? What's that? :-)

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tuscaloser@reddit

I have yet to visit a county-government office that doesn't keep an old bulletproof Okidata dot-matrix around for that exact purpose.

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LeomundsTinyButt_@reddit

Ngl I haven't noticed any reduction in noise on the inkjets I've owned in the last 30 years. Current one has a "silent mode", but that just prints slower (and is still pretty damn noisy).

Even the mysterious "I'm getting ready to print but not there yet" whirrs and clacks sound the same as the ones from the 90s.

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tuscaloser@reddit

Good old mechatronic systems have to "home" themselves to make sure everything works and is in the correct "spot" to being printing.

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Dumbname25644@reddit

Just install the HP universal driver or the other HP universal driver known as the HP4+ driver

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Jezbod@reddit

My friend is very tech savvy and has got me to support him if he needs it.

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HINDBRAIN@reddit

Huh, I remember something similar as a tiny kid. Somebody had stolen our car's radio's cover and it wouldn't start. While my dad was out on an errand I wedged a toothpick on a switch the cover would press and he came back to music playing.

Sadly intelligence went all downhill from there as the years went on.

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RIP_Sinners@reddit

Was it the drinking that did you in?

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ctvarlan@reddit

Ooohh, so many memories!

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Throwaway_Old_Guy@reddit

There is nothing more permanent than a temporary repair.

Nothing to be ashamed of.

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centstwo@reddit

OMG, I had an old laser jet that worked great. One day a package showed up in the mail. As a registered user, a class action lawsuit was settled, resulting in an update to the paper feed. The installation involved folding a perforated cardboard rectangle to guide applying a little rubber piece into the paper feed part of the printer.

Can you imagine a company sending out a fix for a consumer item today? I mean a helpful fix, not Apple or Elon Bricking your phone/Tesla, lol.

"In other news, HP sent out a firmware patch to all existing HP printers to print with any ink cartridge no matter how much yellow ink is left."

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tepancalli@reddit (OP)

I got similar experience with dell machines, i got directions for replacing keyboards and optic drives back in the day

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Dumbname25644@reddit

I was once a printer tech. I have seen so many dodgy repairs like this, most left me impressed by the users ability to troubleshoot and find a solution. But there was one that I had to shut down and take the printer with me for safety sake. This printer had been mistreated and a few switch fingers had broken in places. One was the finger that lets the printer know that the lid is shut with a toner cartridge installed. (If the lid shut with no toner cart the printer would report lid open). Another finger that had broken off was to pull back the cover on the print scanner. Both of these sensors had been taped up so that they always reported as closed (safe to operate). Now when this printer lid was open sitting on the desk that it was the laser was right at eye height. and all the safety features removed. Meaning if someone was standing in front of that printer with it open while someone else sends a print job. The printer would have started because all the sensors reported that the printer is ready to go. A LASER to the eye from one of these scanner units will blind a person, that is why in normal operations they are always covered while the printer is open. That was a risk I could not allow and had to take that printer away, until I was able to repair it properly.

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CalvinHobbesN7@reddit

You gave up too easy. Budgets don’t care how old the printer is.

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tepancalli@reddit (OP)

i was young but that job was the crucible where I was melted into a sysadmin

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Probably took about 2 to 3 hours including "design" printing and fixing, but hey after printing nearly 300 thousand pages, it roared back to life again ready for the next 300.

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