Brother HL 1040 Laser Printer

Pros: Long-lasting, efficient, ultra-fast, small footprint, flat paper path.
Cons: Smallish paper tray; unit facade tends to attract toner dust and dirt

I’ve owned my Brother HL-1040 since the summer of 1998. I’ve been using laser printers for a long time, but I was immediately impressed by the printer’s performance on test prints. When the first sheet was printed, it was completed so quickly that I...

Pros: Fast, sharp text, great price, prints of various media
Cons: Toner cartridge separate from drum unit, low lasting toner

The brother HL 1040 printer is rather sleek and compact. In terms of design, the paper tray is somewhat problematic. I have had a small number of paper jams which grow rather annoying if there is not enough paper in the paper tray. However, it is a...

Pros: Easy to use, fast, good quality, clear and sharp texts, great unit design, reasonable price
Cons: no colors and little smear on first few pages after cartridge changes (that's normal)

This printer came out in Spring of 1988 and I bought it at OfficeMax in Summer of 1988 when it was on sale. I bought this printer for professional-like printing like for resumes, etc. and very clear and sharp texts. Also I use this for fast printing ...

Pros: Excellent speed and quality, ideal tech support.
Cons: No cons.

I've been using the fantastic HL-1040 for over a year
now. It prints at a fascinating speed of 10 pages per
minute and produces crisp 600 dpi images and text.

No problems with print whatsoever.

After a year of use the drum...

Pros: Great price, great quality
Cons: None

At 10 pages per minute this is very fast for it's price range. And the 600dpi laser quality is excellent for term papers and resumes.

When you first turn it on it sucks alot of power to heat up the drum. This dims your lights for a moment....

Pros: Good print quality. Reasonably priced
Cons: Unreliable drum units

This is a fine printer as long as the drum unit lasts - which in my case was 2 years of light use. New drum unit is prohibitively expensive. If you think the inkjet people rip you off with expensive ink cartridges you'll do no better here! When I...

Pros: durability, reliability
Cons: small paper tray, paper tray is exposed

I got a tremendous 8 years and ~5500 pages from my HL-1040. Its durability and ease of use were awesome and reliable. The smaller-than-not form factor was handy. It had a general inability to be jammed even with envelopes or thick business cardstock. Its paper "tray" is just paper inserted atop, so it was definetly targeted for personal home use. It handed even a brief stint in dusty storage without issue. Sadly, a print command now causes the "Data" light to blink but then it won't print anything. I suspect the board has failed, but after 8 years, I could be barely happier. I'm getting the HL-2040N for sure.