The HP LaserJet III laser printer from 1990 used the “Printer Command Language” PCL 5 by default, but could be upgraded with the “HP PostScript Cartridge Plus” cartridge, which contained 2 MB of ROM with Adobe’s PostScript Level 2 rasterizer. Let’s look at the ROM contents and some of its hidden gems.
With how printers have become the butt of jokes, it’s easy to forget they were sometimes kind of cool and had interesting technologies, features, and even expansions. The article has a follow-up, as well.
In my prior life (job) that was one of the printers I was certified by HP to fix (hardware). I never once came across these cartridges. I was aware of them but I guess GTE (now Verizon) didn’t supply them to their employees. Bummer. I wanted to experiment with them to see what they were capable of…
This would be sweet to get a hold of. Granted the real reason you would want one of these old LaserJets would be for old computers. Almost all platforms have drivers for these.
I managed to land an old Samsung laser that supports Epson and IBM Protocols, and has both a parallel and USB with network support. Only downside is no sheet feeder, so those cool Printshop banners are a no go. But I still have a 24pin dotmatrix for that!