Maybe a year ago I was trying to make my own PCBs by printing designs onto "Press-n-Peel Blue" to transfer onto blank copper-clad circuit boards. Thinking ahead around two years ago I bought a low-use LaserJet 4+ for this purpose and outfit it with a PostScript card. Many of my tests went fine, except that I wanted to panel many circuits onto an 8.5"x11" piece of PNP. This is not how people do it! Anyway I got lots of PNP stuck in my printer and after a few botched tried my printer had a permanent "13 paper jam" error. I got fed up with it and shelved the thing until now. Because now I am on vacation! And I like to spend my vacation solving technical problems I usually don't have time for.
To my surprise, I fixed the paper jam error quite easily! There is a spring on the side of the paper exit assembly which had come loose, probably from me frantically trying to unjam it. I figured out how to get the covers off and corrected the spring. Now the error is gone and the thing finally prints again! But now it prints badly. When I pulled the toner cartridge out, it seems to have developed a problem. Piles of toner leak out of the cartridge whenever I move it. And removing and inserting it into the printer has caused toner to get into parts of the printer where it shouldn't be. So now I am taking apart the whole thing to vacuum and wipe everything clean. Hopefully I can still use the transfer roller. And to be a complete idiot I am going to try taping up the toner so that it doesn't leak. I am completely broke, strapped, and simply cannot buy more toner now.
Over the past few months I have had great luck with PNP on my printer at work, and etched some nice boards at home. But I would rather do the whole process at home with my own printer.
Funny thing I noticed: even though my whole household network has changed a lot, my MDD G4 still finds and prints to my 4+ with no difficulty. But my newer Dell XPS Vista box does not seem able to detect the printer at all. HP has no drivers, says Vista uses the driver automatically and connects to the printer. Which is great, except, it doesn't. I want my SE to be able to print to it also.
If I am feeling really freaky, I might try to hook up my Atari SLM804 laser printer also. A guy sent this to me with an ST Mega I bought years ago, but I have yet to do anything with it.
To my surprise, I fixed the paper jam error quite easily! There is a spring on the side of the paper exit assembly which had come loose, probably from me frantically trying to unjam it. I figured out how to get the covers off and corrected the spring. Now the error is gone and the thing finally prints again! But now it prints badly. When I pulled the toner cartridge out, it seems to have developed a problem. Piles of toner leak out of the cartridge whenever I move it. And removing and inserting it into the printer has caused toner to get into parts of the printer where it shouldn't be. So now I am taking apart the whole thing to vacuum and wipe everything clean. Hopefully I can still use the transfer roller. And to be a complete idiot I am going to try taping up the toner so that it doesn't leak. I am completely broke, strapped, and simply cannot buy more toner now.
Over the past few months I have had great luck with PNP on my printer at work, and etched some nice boards at home. But I would rather do the whole process at home with my own printer.
Funny thing I noticed: even though my whole household network has changed a lot, my MDD G4 still finds and prints to my 4+ with no difficulty. But my newer Dell XPS Vista box does not seem able to detect the printer at all. HP has no drivers, says Vista uses the driver automatically and connects to the printer. Which is great, except, it doesn't. I want my SE to be able to print to it also.
If I am feeling really freaky, I might try to hook up my Atari SLM804 laser printer also. A guy sent this to me with an ST Mega I bought years ago, but I have yet to do anything with it.
