I bought a LaserJet 6MP from CompUSA in 1998. It lasted more than 24 years. The MP had an AppleTalk serial port in addition to the parallel port on the P, and true Adobe Postscript.

As Apple changed over the years, first I added a LocalTalk to Ethernet converter box. Then I switched to a parallel to USB cable, plugged into an Apple Airport Time Capsule Base Station acting as a network print server. The amazing thing is that this all worked and the printer just kept going as well. It was kind of fun getting everything to keep working over the years.

I think it was on its second toner cartridge (they last a long time) and seemed to be getting low with a little streaking and ghosting. I installed a spare toner cartridge that has been sitting around in it's sealed box for probably 10 years and in addition to it leaking toner all over after I pulled the "tape" seal thing out, the ghosting got worse.

Could be a bad toner cartridge, as I've read that the wiper inside can degrade over time and fail to wipe the excess toner off the drum even if it is still sealed in the package. HP doesn't support or make this cartridge anymore, and NOS units seem to be about 30% bad from reviews on Amazon. Aftermarket cartridges are available, but then it could be the fuser going bad and not the toner - which would explain why the old and "new" toner are both getting bad results. It would be over $100 to get another cartridge to try.

I also have 6 year old HP Color LaserJet Pro All-in-One, but it has 4 toner cartridges (still on the original ones - 3 are at 40% and 1 is down to 10% so I bought a spare) and I prefer to use it only for color jobs and then use a B&W printer for everything else I don't need in color.

So I went to Best Buy, bought the smallest and cheapest B&W HP LaserJet for $109 and burned a $50 reward coupon taking the net down to $76 with tax. Got it set up with the terrible "HP Smart" app which sucks big time and had a few errors along the way, but now it's set up on WiFi and it works. Fast little thing, spits out the first page in less than 10 seconds. Print quality looks fine and is 600 dpi, same as the old one.

All the new HP printers seem to have a thing where they can only use OEM toner, and they push a monthly subscription at you with automatic toner shipments as you need them that "saves money". I'm not sure about that, so I'm holding off for now.

Pretty sure it won't last 24 years, and I'll probably get a fraction of the pages per toner cartridge. But for the price of another cartridge for the old printer, it'll do.

I love the large older work group printers because of that ridiculously large toner cartridge, they're literally rated for 10,000 pages and 24 or more pages per minute. Also, paper magazines that store an entire ream of 11x17 paper are a requirement for me when I print out electrical drawing packages.

I had a 5SI/MX that I got similar service from, it died a couple years ago and I replaced it with a refurbished 5200tn. My need for 11x17 and large toner and paper magazine capacity makes acquiring a unit locally almost impossible... Glad you found a work around.

Bought a lot of several HP 4300s.

Toner was rated 18k or 20K pages.

After 20 years the cartridges are saying low toner.

Going to run them until they die.

May outlast me.

Only printing a few pages a month now.

Everything is email based and stored digitally.

A great printer. Mine (RIP) ran like a tank.

1999 HP 4100 still chugging. I’ll probably toss it for a smaller faster model when the toner finally goes.