Brother MFC-845cw Color Photo Inkjet Flatbed All-in-One with 5.8GHz Cordless Handset

• 5.8 GHz Digital Cordless handset (expands to a total of 4 handsets)
• 2.5" Flip-up Color LCD display
• Wireless 802.11b/g and Ethernet Interfaces
• Prints up to 27ppm black and 22ppm color
• Built-in Digital Answering Machine holds up to 29 minutes of messages

Voice quality is great -printing, faxing, etc. excellent. Only shortcoming is that it doesn''t have an envelope bypass. Had to buy another printer for envelopes because changing paper in try from letterhead to envelopes too cumbersome.

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I bought this product primarily because I wanted a FAX/TAD that had a cordless phone. I needed to replace my Panasonic and the store that I went to did not have a Panasonic in stock. The only fax that also had a cordless phone feature was the Brother All-in-One so I decided to give it a try. It was the worst purchase I have made in a very long time. Having an extra printer/copier around was just a bonus to me and in fact it is the only part of the machine that is not a disappointment.

The restrictions on how the TAD can be used make it complicated and ineffective. Callers who leave a message have limited time to do so and that cannot be adjusted. I have had numerous clients have their messages cut off and I think that they find it insulting. When monitoring calls I have to listen to the outgoing message each time. Also during monitoring: if the caller hangs up we have to listen to a dial tone blaring in the room for several minutes. It''s very distracting. If you are in the middle of a project and do not to stop to pick up the phone you will wish you had when you hear this racket. As an added annoyance: If the caller hangs up right away you have to hear the outgoing message on top of the dial tone (both at the same time). It''s hard to imagine why Brother thought that was a good feature.

The outgoing message is limited to 20 seconds for the message center to work properly. I have confirmed with customer service that there also must be a delay of 5 seconds before our outgoing message starts. I have had clients who when confronted the with the five seconds of silence when they first called have assumed that they misdialed and hung up before the message came on. It even happened to me the first time I called my number after installing the Brother MFC-845CW...

Picking up calls from a remote phone is cumbersome enough that we just do not do it. If you are used to calling your phone and typing in your three or four digit code you will not be pleased with this system.

I finally gave up and spent a $114 on another answering machine thinking I could just use the Brother for faxing and copying. I was then told that I cannot bypass the TAD on the Brother but still receive faxes without a number of new restrictions: My new TAD needs to be set to pick up on two rings if the Brother is to work as a fax machine. I am not interested in trying to run to pick up each call within two rings in order to avoid having the answering machine pick up. There is one possible way to get around this: having distinctive ring for faxes. Unfortunately that is not available though my local phone company (I am located in the Virgin Islands).

I am not alone in hating this device. The two other people working in our small office also find it intolerable. Having purchased the Brother All-in-One, and an auxiliary answering device I am still without what I needed in the first place: a TAD/ FAX with a cordless fax.

As for the the great customer service: we did not find them exemplary. The three people we spoke to did speak English (not as a first language but well enough that we were not frustrated) but we did get conflicting information. I guess it is hard to be a great customer service representative for a really bad product.

After a month of frustration I am going to discard it unless I can find someone to give it to that just wants a copier. I''ll get the Panasonic that I originally wanted. I hope I can save someone else from this product.

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This is an excellent mfc, I am extremely satisfied with its print, scan, fax, and copy functions as well as the wireless networking. I''m also very happy with the display, which is large and color and very usable. Overall, this MFC works flawlessly! Kudo''s to Brother for this.

Now for the negative info. I was so hoping when I bought this that I could replace my Panasonic KX-TG5110 phone system with this MFC so I could consolidate all my "stuff". Sadly, the phone sound quality is so-so and it has an annoying high frequency hiss in the background of a phone call. Mind you, this is after I adjusted the echo cancellation and played with the various settings. The phone sound quality out of the box was hideous with huge echo''s, the Brother default settings are ridiculous.

After all tuning and adjustment, switching between my Panasonic and the Brother phones during a phone call was night and day. Panasonic wins hands down.

Needless to say, I''m keeping my Panasonic and junking the Brother phone. However, at the price, I still think the Brother MFC is a high value and high quality product.

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I''m with all who praise the functions of MFC-845CW. I bought mine in November 2006.

The only thing that bothers me is that my color printer cartridges became empty sooner than I expected. I rarely used them, at least I thought so. I was presented with slide instructions on the display about how to replace the cartridge and basically forced to do it. Any attempts to print another single page in black ink were prevented. That''s very limiting in my opinion. My black cartridge was still available but that didn''t matter. The reason I mention this is that I didn''t have that type of obstacles with my HP printer. I was allowed to print just in black.

The Brother''s manual states that the cartridges lasts Black ~500 pages and Color ~400 pages. Well, I haven''t printed as many pages; 100 the most. After about 6 months I started noticing decreased level of the color ink cartridges on the display. I was surprised because what I printed was mostly a black text. Earlier I also made appropriate adjustment in printer settings just for that purpose (Grayscale). Yet, I assume those cartridges were used for my prints instead of the black one because the latter was used very little. And there is no setting available to choose just the black ink cartridge for printing.

The manual also says that every time you turn the device ON, the cartridges perform self cleaning. If you leave it ON all the time, they will periodically clean themselves using "very little ink". I''ve heard that whining sound on many occasions.

Anyway, my impression is that maybe the routine of self cleaning cartridges used more ink than my printing. That''s why I run out of it after six months and what worse was prevented from using the printer all together. I hope it helps.

i just bought this mfc 2 days ago i love it ,it has everything you need works perfectly faxing copying priting pics is awsome love the network capablity and not to mention the wireless phone set w/answer machine.

i bought this to replace an old hp printer and a dust collecting canon scanner i looked @ hp product but i couldn''t find any thing w/the same functions at least not for about the same price the closest thing from hp was about $150 more i bought mine @ office depot about the same price @amazon but office depot offer a mail in rebate (hopefully i''ll get it)

the only part about this that kindda bugged me was set up w/wireless network & 3 pc''sit just took a while really the main issue was my router not the mfc.

if you are looking for a all in one printer you can not go wrong with this one not to mention ink is cheaper than hp''s.i give brother 5 shiny stars.