[javadocmd]

I wish the first thread I saw was this enthusiastic about Brother. I've got an HP delivering today because it sounded like the Linux driver support was more solid -- didn't see a mention of this proprietary cartridges nonsense. Mea culpa for not doing more research I guess.

[the_pwner224]

The latest Brother lasers also have proprietary cartridges, but the chip that does the DRM just slides out of a slot in the cartridge and so as long as you don't discard it you can keep reusing that chip in unofficial cartridges.

With IPP (AirPrint) built into CUPS now, my Brother actually works better (has a bigger range of print options) without their drivers installed.

[lscotte]

I've found cheap Chinese replacement cartridges on Amazon for my Brother color laser that come with the chip. Not that it's hard to move the chip over, but the price was the same as ones without the chip. Hopefully firmware updates won't break these working.

[bluGill]

The brother drivers are junk. However there is no reason to use them - the printers are completely standard and don't need drivers. Though in some cases it is some effort to figure out how to configure the printer.