[rescue] Various machines for sale

Thu Jan 9 17:17:18 EST 2025

I have a Sparc printer.  Never got it to work.  Don't think it's functional
after all these years.

On Thu, Jan 9, 2025, 13:22 Ville Laustela via rescue <rescue at sunhelp.org>
wrote:

>
> The original thread has been completely turned into something else :)
>
> I have an Asante SCSI-ethernet adapter for my Macs, when I first read of
> the concept I thought it was such a weird and neat idea :) The network card
> emulation is also coming up on some modern SCSI-emulators:
> https://bluescsi.com/docs/WiFi-DaynaPORT.
>
> Never heard of a SPARCprinter and can’t find a single picture of one.
>
> Regarding the NeXT laser printer, I’ve been working on one:
> https://www.nextcomputers.org/forums/index.php?topic=5676.0 Very little
> that has turned into goo, but so many kinds of other wear was encountered
> :) Most damage was cap-leak, especially on the PSU board. The main digital
> PCB caps were also leaking but the board sits upside down on the bottom of
> the printer so the juices couldn’t all leak down to the board so probably
> survived better.
>
> I was lucky to start working on it just after a service VHS was put online
> (link in the thread) as that really makes it easy to take it apart. The HP
> Laserjet II parts were reasonably easy to source, but the cartridges seems
> to be the issue. And the mess those make when the ink seals and wipers
> start failing and there is dust everywhere. Mine is now mostly working,
> only a few mystery parts remain and the printouts are mostly clean (I
> believe it’s now down to the cartridge and I haven’t bothered buying a
> third one). There are videos on transfering the wiper blades from another
> cartridge (I was thinking that as it’s basically a rubber part, perhaps one
> day it could be replaced with a 3D-printable part, perhaps).
>
> I found another document describing how it ”costs $1995 - very reasonable
> compared to other laser printers on the market that, which cost on average
> of $2500”.
>
>
> Sigh.  PDFs just ain't the same as holding the pages in your hands, still
> warm out of the output tray!
>
>
> Indeed! And don't forget about the unique smell!
>
>
> It’s one of those warm feelings that easily turn into ”I wonder how
> hazardous this stuff might actually be” (especially when looking at an
> half-assembled printer revving up and you suspicously take a look at what
> comes out :)
>
> —
> Ville
>
>
>
>
>
> Skeezics Boondoggle via rescue <rescue at sunhelp.org> kirjoitti 9.1.2025
> kello 9.10:
>
>
> On Thu, 9 Jan 2025, Dave McGuire wrote:
>
>>
>> On 1/9/25 00:22, Mike Spooner via rescue wrote:
>> > The SPARCprinter and NeWSprinters from Sun were not SCSI, they used a
>> > hacked graphics/video interface and a wierd connector.
>> >
>> > At least, according to the Sun documentation.
>>
>>    That's correct, though I don't think it's fair to call it "hacked".
>> Most of the laser printer engine manufacturers provided a direct video
>> interface to their packaged printers.  This was used by
>> manufacturers...NeXT, QMS, etc.
>>
>>
> Hacked?  No.  A bit abstruse?  Oh yeah.  The Canon "video interface"
> originated, I believe, with the 240dpi LBP-10, a tabletop sized beast that
> "only" cost around $18K in 1981, when that was real money.  At least when
> you bought one from Three Rivers Computer rebadged as the "PLP-10" to hook
> up to your PERQ.  It was also available on the LBP-CX, the hugely popular
> 300dpi desktop model that was in practically everything in the mid-80s.
>
> Having reverse engineered the Canon interface for software emulation based
> on the two manual scans from Bitsavers, the PERQ schematics, microcode and
> PROM dumps, all I can say is "the printer knows where the end of the page
> is, because it knows where it isn't."
>
> And it isn't telling _you_.
>
>
>>    The NeXT laser printer is driven via that direct video interface, and
>> QMS made an ISA board with a 68020 on it that executed PostScript and
>> drove a Canon CX or SX laser printer engine via the direct video
>> interface.
>>
>>    It was an intended, documented use of these engines, no hacking about
>> it.
>>
>>
> In the NeXT case it obviously made sense to use the direct interface since
> the OS obviously has the Postscript interpreter built in.  And those early
> PS printers weren't cheap!  IIRC, the $3500  SX-based NeXTprinter (400dpi!
> woo!) was around $1500 cheaper than the CX-based Laser{Writer,Jet}s at the
> time.
>
> Now the problem is that their innards have all turned to goo. :-(  Even if
> I ever could scrape the money to try to find an expert who could thoroughly
> disassemble, clean and revitalize my two old CX engines OR my old
> NeXTprinters, the people with that knowledge are all likely "aging out" by
> now too.  Way too many fiddly tiny parts, and my eyesight ain't what it
> used to be.  Sigh.  PDFs just ain't the same as holding the pages in your
> hands, still warm out of the output tray!
>
> -- c
>
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