Will this printer work with modern and old macs?

[Hopfenholz]

Hi everyone 

I need a new colour laser printer. My IT guy is recommending the following - will this work with system 6/7 Macs on the same network running the LaserWriter driver? Not easy to tell 

Brother MFC-L8690CDW

 

[NJRoadfan]

Supports PostScript, but lacks AppleTalk support (support was dropped in new printers awhile back). No it will not work out of the box.

 

[trag]

Please keep us posted.   If you find a current model printer that supports AppleTalk (over Ethernet) many of us would like to hear about it.

Printer companies used to list the protocols supported (TCP/IP, SPX/IPX, AppleTalk, etc.) as one of the categories in their specifications, but now days they just say, "Works with Windows 10, Mac OS 10.9, etc., which is fairly useless.

 

[Cory5412]

Some more notes from a couple people on this topic and what works with system 7 here:

Which printer should I get? - Peripherals - 68kMLA Forums

To the best of my knowledge, nothing brand new still supports AppleTalk, you're looking at printers roughly a decade old to get AppleTalk, and it was about a decade out of use then.

If your workplace is buying this printer for you, they will probably not want to buy a 10-15 year old printer, but if they have an HP LaserJet or other similar market midrange/workgroup-aimed network laser from the early-mid 2000s, there's a moderate chance it'll work. Datasheets on those, as mentioned, usually specify what protocols they speak, because they often spoke more than one and it was a printer-is-doing-the-thinking protocols, versus what started happening in the second half of the 2000s where  the least expensive laser printers moved more toward host-based printing where the computer does the thinking.

 

[Hopfenholz]

Thanks to everyone for their contributions on this. I got the Brother, and will have to figure out how to print from classic Macs, for now I will stick with PDF > Sneakernet usb stick into the printer

 

[MrFahrenheit]

Thanks to everyone for their contributions on this. I got the Brother, and will have to figure out how to print from classic Macs, for now I will stick with PDF > Sneakernet usb stick into the printer

On the forum post above mentioned by Cory there’s a link to an item on Amazon that supports AppleTalk and plugs into the USB port of a printer. You might be able to give that a shot.