Brother MFC-5100c Multifunction

• All-in-one print, scan, copy, fax solution for your office
• Prints 10 pages per minute in monochrome, 8 ppm color
• 2,400 x 1,200 dpi print resolution
• 9,600 x 9,600 dpi scan resolution
• Quick Scan function scans page in 3 seconds

I recieved the MFC-5100C this afternoon, with some trepidation about MacOS X support. I''m happy to report that it works without a hitch in OS X, both for printing and scanning. No USB cable in the box, but that seems to have become standard practice for printer manufacturers.

Print quality is decent. Not on par with the latest/best inkjets, but they cost more than this machine, and don''t have scanner/fax capabilities. And inkjet printing has come so far in the last few years that this ''ok'' modern printer is far better than the standard a few years ago.

Scan quality (via the TWAIN driver) is good as well. Again, not as good as more expensive scanners, but quite acceptable for an economical multifunction machine. Scanning speed is good as well. Minor gripe, that may not be Brother''s fault i can scan with no problems into Adobe Photoshop and some other apps, but Image Capture.app goes haywire with this TWAIN driver. Might be Apple''s fault though, since the driver works fine with other apps.

So far my only concern is that the scanner light stays on permanently, and there is no on/off switch for the unit. So the unit is presumably sucking power and wearing out the scanner light 24 hours a day. :(

-robin

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Recieved the MFC-5100C this afternoon from Amazon.com. Was worried that some of the reviews indicated some problems existed with installation. Happy to report that it works without a hitch on Windows 98. Came with a USB cable in the box, but have been using the parallel line so far. Will have to add a USB Hub to attach the printer using the USB line since it was not included in the box --Didn''t think they would include a Hub.

Print quality is OK for home. Not on par with the latest/best inkjets, but at [this price] one can not complain, besides the best inkjets cannot do everything the 5100C can do.

Scan quality is good as well. Again, not as good as more expensive scanners, but quite acceptable for an economical multifunction machine. Scanning speed is good as well.

So far my only issue is that the scanner light stays on permanently, and there is no on/off switch for the unit. So the unit is presumably sucking power and wearing out the scanner light 24 hours a day. Which means it will break sooner than later. Hopefully Brother will read this review and add an on/off switch.

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This product is not as well-built as my previous fax-printer: HP K60. There are severl problems with this MFC: 1. When I connect it to my PC (Window XP) with a USB cable, my computer could not shut down properly. When I connect it to my PC with a IEEE 1284 cable, my computer was able to shut down properly. 2., I had to purchase the USB and IEEE 1284 cable. 3., The function screen keeps saying that I have a paper jam when I don''t have a paper jam. 5-10 years ago, I had a black and white laser MFC from Brother. I also encountered many paper jam problems with that MFC. At that time, the paper either kept jamming up, or the screen kept saying that there was a paper jam when there was not a paper jam. 4., The white scanning light bulb would not turn off. I don''t know if it''s supposed to turn off after a few minutes, but it''s on all the time, even after many days of non-usage. I wonder if the scanning light bulb will last long if it''s on all the time. 5., When I print with recycled printing paper (I use the back of non-essential printed papers), the feeder would often pick up two pages at once, instead of feeding one page at a time. 6., the quality of the Normal resolution of MFC 5100c is not as good as the Normal resolution of my previous HP K60. I need to go to SuperFine in order to get acceptable resolution.

The good qualities about this product is: 1., it prints much faster than my previous HP K60. 2., the MFC color is slightly richer than the HP K60. 3., the price is cheaper. 4., it''s has a flatbed, so it can scan bulky or hard documents.

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I don''t understand how this product could get a bad review from anyone, especially concerning problems with XP. I have XP Pro and have not had 1 single problem out of this machine in the 9 months since I bought it. The printing speed is good, the scanning speed is good, and the fax/pc fax is excellent. Of course I have common sense and some people seem to lack it; when you print color pics at high resolution it will take longer than printing black and white text at a draft resolution, something some folks just do not understand. Yes it has a large footprint, but I guarantee it is smaller than the footprints left by a separate printer, scanner, copier, and fax. I highly recommend this to anyone interested in a multifunction machine.

It''s a bit large but this is very functional unit. I had no trouble with Windows XP and was able to set it up as a Network printer for my other computers (Windows Me and 95 very easily. Unlike my old HP T45 unit which had a slow clunky startup everytime you turn on your computer this is much faster. There are fixes for the resolution of the scanner on the Website.When you are printing pictures or graphics I found it better to set it to Photo (not auto) in the Advanced setup.