Fixed the printer, feeling good
So I have this medium-old ink printer sitting on the shelf and it’s just new enough to support AirPrint, which is great. It glitched once and lost the connection to the wireless hub, thus becoming unavailable to the rest of the network and forcing everyone in this house into a choice: either do a direct connection dance every time they needed to print a page or choose not to.
And you can probably already guess where it’s going, but here I’m gonna say it: most of the time, the need to print something was not, in fact, justified by the actual requirement to have something printed. There were some moderately stupid reasons to print something out, because it’s Germany, but for the most part the one who needed a paper print would wave their hand, and things would be just fine afterwards.
So when I decided that this machine must not sit on the shelf untouched, several years had passed before that moment. Everyone in this house kind of learned to rely on other means to getting stuff printed on paper, if need ever be. There’s a printer at the shop nearby, it’s priced per sheet of paper, but the price is affordable and the cost was never an issue, (lack of) convenience was. Actually, even that wasn’t a problem. I guess I just wanted to prove something to someone, that I still can, that I’m still someone’s nephew who can install and set up a printer and create a website over the weekend. So that’s the motive.
And after less than an hour, after having installed some HP junkware, after figuring out how to make it reserve a network address and never ever give it up, it works. Has anyone needed it? Absolutely freakin’ not. Am I beaming with pride? Brighter than a thousand suns.
I can’t imagine doing this again any time ever in my life. No one prints anything anymore. Why set up a printer if nothing is ever durable and stuff’s ephemeral and made to last a minute at most and maybe make the person on the receiving end smile for like a few seconds? It’s all changing for a good reason, I guess.
For now, I’m just happy the ink hasn’t dried, and I was able to print a fun photo from the recent trip on a sheet of plain DIN A4 paper, cut it, and glue it into a notepad. Should be a reminder that late May 2026 was fun, the weather was trash, but the time together was great.
🐝 pirkka
May 18 · 4 days ago · 👍 cipres, love
🚀 SavaRocks · May 19 at 09:15:
I believe WPS was invented just for setting up printers 😅 and it still doesn't work. Connecting a printer to WIFI is something aweful. I understand your pain and your joy. Well done 😁
🚀 stack · May 19 at 13:38:
Inkjets clog up if you don't use them regularly. Laser printer toner often costs more than a new printer, and third party toners are generally junk.
My best printer is an old B&W HP which came with a sizable amount of toner almost 20 years ago. Still works well on original toner, with warning that it's low for the last 5 years.
All newer printers are in the trash heap or will be soon.
I have an Epson dot matrix and two big boxes of fanfold paper. I use it occasionally to print little snippets of code to whump on, and tear off as much as I need.
Although I am never sure that the nex Linux update will support it, via some usb-parallel contraption...