It is May 2006, George W Bush is President, Twitter had just launched and the movie Crash won best picture. This is also when HP released their HP 1018 laser printer. It was around this time that laser printers first broke the $100 price point. Before this ink jet printers were the king of home printers. Ink Jet printers were slow, low resolution and ink was expensive. Laser printers were fast, sharp and toner lasted forever compared to ink cartridges. I bought my HP 1018 around 2006. I’d guess I paid around $80, which is $135 adjusted for inflation. I used the printer to print out stuff like MapQuest directions since I didn’t have a smart phone.
My first toner cartridge probably lasted 10 years. Which was good because genuine HP branded toner cartridges cost as much as the printer did. But over the years cheap knockoffs showed up on the market.
They didn’t last nearly as long as the OG ones did, but they were a tenth of the price. Once Pin Headz got rolling and my printer started drinking toner like water I started buying these cheap toner cartridges. I would buy them 4-10 at a time for $6-10 each. I would pick them up from 3rd party sellers on Amazon or eBay. As for paper, I bought most of my paper from Costco. They sell a 800 page package for $10 these days. It was $7 in 2021.
But one thing stayed constant, my HP 1018 churning out page after page. I printed at least 15,000 pages over the last 6 years and a few thousand envelopes. The envelopes had to be fed one at a time by hand. And for one of the Bonus Junks I printed on glassine envelopes which the printer did not like. Paper jams were frequent on the glassine envelopes. It was a nightmare.
Regular envelopes would jam once in a while, but regular paper almost never jammed. I’ve never done any maintenance on the printer. No cleaning or repairs. It just keeps working. Which is nice because newer printers have microchips designed to block refills or third-party cartridges. So they are much more expensive to operate. So if you have an old working laser printer in the closet or basement don’t toss it out. Use it, sell it or donate it. I am sure people like me are constantly searching for these old work horses. Now that my HP 1018 isn’t printing 100s of Pin Headz every month, hopefully it will last another 20 yrs. I will be sure to post a proper eulogy if it ever dies.
