- All-in-one device prints, faxes, scans, and copies and has built in call center and wireless handset
- Print borderless photos at up to 6000 x 1200 dpi; prints at up to 33ppm black and 27ppm color
- Wireless networking built-in for easy sharing with multiple computers
- Built-in 4.2-inch touchscreen display for easy navigation
- Measures 18.4 x 7.1 x 14.8 inches (WxHxD); backed by a one-year warranty
Despite all the models on the market, and the rather cheap prices for All in ones, it seems to be impossible to find one unit that does everything well. It''s sort of like finding a mate, you just might have to settle on some things.
I previously had the HP 7310 all in one, which I previously reviewed on here, but a lightning storm fried the fax board in it. The rest of the unit still worked, but I didn''t want to get a separate fax machine. I called HP''s customers service, and all they wanted to do was sell me a new expensive unit, at what they told me was a discount price. It was actually much cheaper elsewhere online.
This would be a five star unit if not for some major flaws. I chose this unit mainly because it has an answering machine and cordless phone built in. I also liked the glossy black look of the unit.
The unit has a very nice 4.3 lcd touchscreen which works quite well. Its responsive, has good color and easy to use. It tilts up and down, but this is largely unnecessary. The menus however, are a bit tricky to use, and it takes some playing with it to find out where all your settings and adjustments are located. Also when using the screen to scroll answering machine messages, I found it somewhat difficult to scroll back to listen to a previous message. It keeps taking you back to the beginning of the message you are listening too. It''s actually easier to scroll forward and go back around, if you don''t have many message saved.
The buttons on the front are raised and are the perfect size. They have good tactile feel and they allow you to easily change your functions, fax, copy, scan or photo capture.
There are some slots on the front of the unit for things like a USB flash drive which you can print your pictures directly from. It shows them on the lCD screen, and you scroll through them. It also is Bluetooth and WIFI capable, though mine is hooked with a wire, so I haven''t tried these.
As far as the design of the unit, its mostly good. Its smaller and more compact then many units. It only features a 15pg Adf, versus the 30-50pg ones you see on some machines, but I rarely need to fax or copy more then 5pgs at a time anyway. What matters more is that this unit actually scans all the pages one at time, where my HP, frequently would grab too many pages and you ended up having to send them through one at time.
Faxing or printing in black in white was relatively quick, though trying to fax in color took about a minute per page. You do not want this unit for printing pictures. The people came out looking so red, it looked like they had been severely burned. Granted it was on regular paper, but I''ve printed decent pictured on regular paper before. You also will probably don''t want this unit if you are going to do a lot of scanning photos. It has a 36bit scanner versus the 48bit seen on some other units.
The software in general I felt was good, but the OCR software sucked. It scanned all the words right, unlike my previous hp''s software, but it completely ignored all spacing and format. Not ideal, if you want to scan and edit a form.
The power cord is not detachable from the unit, not a big deal to me, but it was datachable on my old HP. What I really didn''t like was that the USB cord instead of attaching at the back, is threaded up inside the machine. Because of the bulb near the end of the wire, it requires bending and folding the wire some to get it attached and down in the triangle space provided. This is not good for the wire.
The paper tray which pulls all the way out, is rather flimsy, is made of cheap plastic and only holds about 100pgs. However, it''s not as flimsy as some units such as Epson''s Artisan 800, and a number of other units. More importantly though, I''ve had no paper jams and the pages don''t drop on the floor after printing.
This unit like a number of Brother units, also supposedly uses it own ink to periodically clean itself. You cant shut this off, so even if not using the printer, you will find your ink is being lowered. You only have to replace one cartridge at a time though.
The real flaw with the unit is actually its biggest marketing feature, the fact that it has a built in 30 min answering machine and an attached cordless phone. I use my phone and fax on the same line and was tired of having my answering machine conflict with the fax. By having them in the same unit I hoped to avoid this conflict and guess what? It did. The machine knew when to pick up for messages or fax. No more conflict. Coodles to Brother for being the only manufacturer to offer a built in answering machine and cordless phone in some of their all in one units. Unfortunately, Brother apparently chose to use cheap mics or speakers for its built in phone system. So much to my disappointment, the answering machine messages come out garbled. Not all the time, but about half the time. Why bother to include an answering machine if you are going to do such an unacceptable job? I use my answering machine a lot and I don''t want to have to guess what the message is saying. I tried just turning on my old answering machine, and turning off Brothers, but its fax then continues to try and pick up during calls. So I have to unplug the phone cord from the Brother, which means you cant use the cordless phone.
The cordless phone looks and feels nice, has raised buttons (though not backlit) and a decent orange backlit lcd screen and caller ID. Unfortunately the cordless phone also has speaker and or mic problems. Sometimes I can hear my echo while talking, and sometimes other people complained of static noise on the other end.
I sent my first one back, and ordered another one from a different place thinking maybe I got a lemon, but its has the same problems. Brother''s customer service line was of no help at all. So now I''m torn, the unit looks nice, prints text fast and well, and faxes text quickly. Those are the main things I use it for, so I''ve thought about keeping it despite its major flaws. However I don''t like the idea of keeping a brand new unit that comes with one of its major features being defective. Every unit on the market seems to have some types of flaws or problems, so I''m not sure where to settle.
UPDATE 9/5/2009I decided to keep the unit, and for the most part I am content with it. I would probably raise the the star rating to 3 or 4, despite the problems I mentioned. I managed to change the settings so that the fax doesn''t always try to pick up and only does so now when I actually get a fax. I rarely use the cordless phone due to its speaker problems, and I keep the answering machine off.
The USB port displays the pics from my flash drive on the LCD screen, but takes awhile to load them, and they are difficult to scroll through to find the ones you want.
I still haven''t tried the wireless and probably won''t since it''s hooked to my computer. The paper tray needs to be a little bit bigger, as I find I have to refill it a little too often. Also be warned, this machine really burns through ink with it''s automated cleaning process. I''ve had to replace the black ink a few times already and the color inks are all half empty despite the fact I almost never print anything in color. I do think the text print quality was slightly better on my old HP, but it''s not a major difference. The scanner door feels like it isn''t properly attached, like it''s going to come off, but I beleive this is so you can lay bulky items on the scanner bed and still lay the door somewhat flat.
Overall I like the design of the unit and it has performed well with black & white printing and faxing, which are my primary uses for it.
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Absolutely frustrating. Its been anything but a hassle-free setup from the moment it was removed from the box:
1) It has flimsy parts. The paper tray has lots of internal parts you move around, the hinges of which will bend or snap easily without much effort. The scanner lid is bizarrely loose, acting like it would lift completely off, but it doesn''t, resulting in an opening that isn''t smooth but rather clunky. There is no manual feed area, so anything like envelopes or labels you will need to load directly into the main paper area real pain.
2) Printing quality is just OK. Perhaps good enough for general document printing, but certainly not for images. You have to really crank up the settings to get anything but washed out colors even then, not a deep as desired. Very disappointing. Speed is quick enough, loud however.
3) Scanning is decent enough for documents (just not great for pictures you''re trying to convert to high quality scans) but has some behavior you have to get used to. If scanning from the bed and not the sheet feeder, you can''t select the area to scan, instead it scans the whole region and you have to crop later. When scanning from the sheet feeder with items thinner than 8.5 inch, the end scan always has the document correct on one side, but lots of blank space on the other, as though it only cropped part of it.
4) There is external media (USB Keychain, SD, CF, etc.) slots in the front, but the USB slot is recessed making it impossible to use any keychain drive that has a bulky body. If you plug in an external media (USB Keychain, SD, CF, etc.), the printer dedicates itself to scanning it for pictures. If you have a large capacity media with lots of files that are not media, you can have quite a wait.
5) If you use the phone, you can''t scan or copy. It tells you line in use, and you need to either unplug it from the phone line, or wait until you''re off the call.
6) In Windows Vista with the printer attached to the network wirelessly, I''ve had the OS tell me the printer is offline, while the local printer software tells me it''s online, requiring a reboot or two of Vista to get printing capabilities back.
On the plus side, the touch-display is nice and easy to use, the devices looks nice, has a small enough footprint, and does do a decent enough AIO job that it isn''t the worst purchase I''ve ever made, but my next one won''t be a Brother. As a parting comment, their tech support is friendly, which is good as you will be calling them.
Read Best Reviews of Brother MFC-990CW Color Inkjet All-in-One Here
I don''t really print all that much, so I haven''t really "put it through its paces", but can say it was very easy to set up. I still haven''t really got the fax part set up. The instructions indicate there could be confilcts between the fax function and voice mail, which turned out to be true in my case, and I still haven''t wanted to get back to it. Every all in one I''ve ever had (HP, Canon Pixma)was a hassle to get phones, faxes and voice mail all on the same page. My only disappointment was with the cordless telephone that comes with the machine. I had hoped that having it''s own phone might eliminate that problem, but it didn''t. I then ordered two more handsets, thinking the mix of the Brother machine and older Panasonic phones might be the problem. I never got around to fine-tuning the fax vs. voice mail with the new handsets because they are pretty cheesy and I just didn''t like them. For example, the display is tiny, does not let you know when you''ve missed a call, and most annoying, you have to do phonebook entries separately on each handset. That got real old real fast, so I returned the Brother handsets and went back to my old phones. The other features of the machine, such as the touchscreen menu screen, ease of wireless network set up, Bluetooth, and ease of use, accessibility of the print cartridges et. outweigh that one issue, and I would buy it again.
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If time is not a factor, then this product is great. But if you mind waiting 5 mins for something to print or copy, then DO NOT purchase! It''s THAT slow. Had to return it immediately.
DO NOT BUY BROTHER PRINTERS! We bought it mainly for the wireless feature. Less than 3 months after we bought this printer, it stopped working. It will not print in ''black'', only colors. Tried cleaning it as per the instructions but this did not help. Even bought as new black ink cartridge. Found out that the problem is quite common, complaints on this are all over the internet. Called customer support and it was a joke. They asked us to clean it again twice, then perform a deep cleaning procedure. Nothing worked. Their only objective is to find a excuse for you not to return the printer. I have called them 4 times so far, more than 2 hours on the phone for a $200 printer. On my last attempt the rep refused to process the return request unless I faxed them my receipt while I was talking to her!!! I am really disappointed by Brother product quality, but mostly by their incompetent customer service. My old Canon i860 photo printer still works after 8 years.
