A sign of the times

I've been using a couple of Panasonic laser printers for years; a KX- P4455 (PS/PCL) and a KX-P4451 (PCL). They're real beasts of machines; I'd guess that they weight somewhere around 60 lbs. each-- heavy enough to cause me to grunt when lifting them. These are the kind of units that requires one to add toner to a compartment periodically. Drum and developer are separate cartridges. The time came to replace the OPC drum in one of these--after pricing the remanufactured ones and checking the deals on eBay, it turned out not to be practical. I found that I can get a factory refurb Brother 5240 from Staples.com for $40 shipped. When it runs out of toner, I can just buy another one at that price (1200 DPI, 23 PPM and most important--a parallel interface). So what to do with the old monsters? They use 68000 CPUs, with differing SIP and DIP memories. Scrappers, I guess. It's sad because both of these have pretty much been the only printer I've used since a Diablo Hitype II. It wouldn't surprise me if each has more than 250,000 copies on it. It's just a shame that such a nicely engineered piece of gear is now worth only its weight in scrap metal. But nobody collects printers, not even vintage ones. Cheers, Chuck