Brother MFCs :: reliable?

[twistingo]

I am in the market for a low cost MFC with a proper fax. I'm leaning towards the Brother MFC-215C as I've found a couple of positive reports on it but compared to brands such as Canon and HP there doesn't seem to be too much said about Brother products.

The main usage will be for printing plain text, medium quality scanning and faxing. It seems to be cheap to run compared to some brands, photo printing not important.

As l'm not familiar with the brand l was interested in any comments you might have regarding performance and reliability of Brother printers in general.

 

[Osage]

To twistingo,

I wish I had more definitive answers. But I do comment that brother does seem to have a line of very attactively priced all in one ink jets. I also note that brother seems to be the last of the ink jets with non-chipped cartridges and that third party cartridges are readily available in the $4. to $5. price range. I also note that a brother ink jet was reviewed on THG--as I recall there was some complaint about the ink being somewhat stretched to give an artifically high page count. In terms of actual user experience there seems to be a total dearth of posters citing user experiences. --although this question has received some play on both this forum and on Anand Tech.

What few comments seem to emerge seems to indicate that the brother ink jets have a poor long term reliability record. So I would say buying one is a gamble. But as someone interested in printing economy, I certainly think that if brother gets it together in the inkjet area, they could be well poised to increase market share.

But one ink jet all in one I can recommend with no reservations is the Canon MP780---quite a few refurbished ones are available on ebay for
about $140.---but shipping gets pretty salty on top of that. As a non chipped Canon, third party cartridges can be found in the under two buck range, and they are rock solid reliable. I just wish I had an MP780--but I am still limping along on the one generation back MP730.

 

[twistingo]

Thanks Osage. Canon MP-150 seems to be the only Canon MFC option easily available locally. Looking at my local Canon website suggests the MP780 is at least double the price of the Brother, unfortunately e-Bay is not an option for me.

A couple of comments (maybe on this forum) suggested that sticking to original Brother cartridges was the key to reliability as the price difference between Brother and after market cartridges isn't that great unlike perhaps HP or Lexmark. Some other comments/reviews l've seen on Brother suggest they're best at making laser printers but l don't really want to spend that much as my printing requirements are not high anyway

One conclusion l could hopefully draw from the lack of posts might be that people who have complaints make more noise than people who are happy so maybe few comments is a good thing. It could also be because Canon and HP etc. have a greater share of the market, l don't know, so that's why l thought l'd ask here. When l look at the features and the pricing Brother does seem good value so l will probably go with the 215c unless l find something concrete against getting one.

 

[Osage]

to twistingo,

I would definitely not recommend the Canon MP150 with its small chipped cartridges. In terms of a chipped Canon, you have to go all the way up to a
MP500 or greater to find some decent printing economy in a all in one Canon---in MHO.

Otherwise I agree with your take on the brothers inkjets. I wish I knew where to tell you to find decent unbiased reviews on brother inkjets.

But with some luck, someone who has had one for some time will weigh in to give you their actual experience. And if you do buy one, please post back to post your experiences over time.

 

[twistingo]

I ended up getting the Brother MFC-215C. It was on sale at the local superstore so l thought why not? It had the features l was looking for and the price was right.

It 's a compact unit, fits on my desk nicely. I had seen a review that indicated you needed to supply your own usb cable but maybe that applies only to the US as one came supplied, as well as a couple of different power cords.

Set up wasn't difficult. The mannual is detailed (an extended pdf version is also provided) but there is a quick set-up version which is easy to follow. Installing the ink cartridges was a breeze as was installing the drivers and software. I later went to the website and found an update which l installed.

I've upgraded from an ancient Epson so probably anything modern would seem good to me but these are my first impressions.

Printing:
For basic, not too small text fonts, the 'fast' print setting produced quite acceptable copies, but the 'fast normal' setting has become my default, decent quality with economical ink usage.
Color printing l haven't used much but so far so good. I don't print photos so l don't have the right paper to do any worthwhile testing.

Copying:
Nice and clear for a budget printer.

Scanning:
Very happy with the scanning performance. For home use most people would find the scanning quality more than acceptable. Easy to use software makes the scanner simple to use but with plenty of permutations if you want to play around with the settings. The OCR software works surprisingly well. Does everything l want, keeping in mind the size.

Faxing:
Haven't used the fax yet apart from setting it up. Seems to have all the features l require however for networking and heavy business use you probably would be getting a higher spec model anyway.

Overall a nice unit, plenty of features at a good price.

 

[Osage]

To twistingo,

I take it you are not planning to use third party cartridges or to do your own refilling. But so far it sounds like your experiences have been very positive. Especially since you had zero software install problems.---and lots of Lexmark and HP users do have frequent fits at that stage.

But it would be nice to see you come back and post your long terms experiences. And it would thrill me to see you keep some detailed records of per page costs. I certainly hope that brother keeps up its commitment to non-chipped cartridges.

So a big thank you from me for posting on brother printers--which seems to offer quite a lot of bang for the buck. And this forum also needs more Brother posters in MHO. But I should also note that BomberBill and Ineedcache have also contruited.

But I would also like to note--at least from my perspective---that both the copy and fax function of an all in one are only occcassional useful--but when you need them--they are extremely useful and well worth having. And from a networking and medium to large office perspective vs. a home user viewpoint, the home user seldom needs state of the arts hardware. The other opinion I have is that the scan and fax functions are partly dependent on having the hardware---but well written software is the key in making them easy to use.
On my MP730, I certainly wish Canon had done a better job software wise.

So keep us posted twistingo.