Customer Reviews

Brother HL4570CDW Color Laser Printer with Wireless Networking and Duplex

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(18)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

The Brother HL4570cdw is a fantastic printer for everyday and office use. This is my first Brother purchase. I'm using it to print out full colored brochures (graphics, photos, and text). So far it's been more than adequate when using the appropriate paper i.e. glossy paper. When on regular paper, the colors are not as sharp and pictures are not as clear. For photos, the resolution quality is acceptable/good, but there is a noticeable difference in quality from a print shop and a heavy duty office printer (you know the 5 foot jumbo printers).

As for print speeds, from start to finish it prints at an above average pace. The spooling process is quick (less than 2 minutes) for a 80 mb print job. It printed a 60 page, full color (vivid mode), double sided booklet in about 8-10 minutes.

PROS
- Easy printer and wireless Setup (less than 5 minutes).
- Good print speeds (auto-duplex and straight printing).
- Excellent print quality for general graphics and text.
- Good photo quality when using the right paper.
- Acceptable noise level for a printer
- Toner replacements are cheaper than HPs, Lexmark, and Canon.

CONS
- Printer reads toner as empty when full. You must do the toner trick which involves covering the clear holes with black electric tape on the toner cartridges as a temporary solution. For a more permanent solution, you need to reset the computerized toner levels on the printer. You do this by 1) Opening the printer door 2) Holding Back and Cancel at the same time 3) A menu to reset the toners pops up 4) You hit Okay to reset.
- I printed approximately 900 full color pages with the "starter" cartridges it came and some cartridges are already visibly running low. While the prints were on the high color (vivid) settings, it is a shame that this printer appears to be another "toner hog" and did not print to the 3000/1500 page estimates the cartridges claim.
- Photo prints are poor when printing full sized photos on regular paper. For best printing results you need to use specialized glossy paper.
- Must use "multi-purpose" pullout feeder tray for specialized paper or else risk paper jams
- Very slight paper curl
- Noise level maybe too loud for a quiet office space.

I compared the Brother HL-4570cdw's print quality extensively with HPs and Canon color lasers in this price range, and the Brother printed out more impressive looking demo prints than its competitors. The print quality is enough to merit the purchase of this printer and because the toner replacements are relatively cheaper than other companies the Brother HL-4570cdw receives my recommendation.

Overall, I'm happy with this purchase and would recommend it if you get it for the right price. I would not pay more than $400-$425 for this machine which is the price I paid.

I hope the one message I can get out to everyone is that printers are one of the most undependable machines that anyone can look to purchase. I run a home business and I made the mistake of spending well over $1k a few years back for a Konica Minolta 5430DL. It was a beauty of a printer, but shortly after spending nearly $600 in replacement cartridges the printer started falling apart.

What I learned is that even the priciest printers break. This is more of a disposable technology than something you can hand down to your kids. When all the printer companies play the game of selling printers with limited ink cartridges and then charging you more than the printer itself for refills, you know that the only way to come out ahead is to buy the best bang-for-the-buck printer with the expectation that it's only going to last a few short years.

I believe the Brother HL4570 is that kind of printer.

For $400 I knew I was buying something mid-range. It would certainly be a step down from the $1k Konica Minolta but at least the value of the printer is close to the value of replacing cartridges. This means when I finally deplete the cartridges I have the choice of buying more cartridges or another printer -- whichever costs less.

I chose Brother because I wanted a wireless printer that played well with Mac. If read on counteless discussion forums that more than any other brand, the Brother is the easiest to install with a Macintosh computer.

Those discussion forums were correct. The wireless setup with my iMac took less than 10 minutes to complete.

...but I am getting ahead of myself.

Bought this printer when it dropped in price to $399 from $450. Had it shipped Amazon Prime 2-day and Fedex delivered it overnight. It's rather heavy, weighing in at about 65 lbs. The unit is well packaged. Be sure to read the quick-start manual for important unpacking instructions. There are a lot of doors and drawers that you need to access and remove small pieces of packaging.

Once unpacked and plugged in, the first step was to pair the printer to my WiFi. A small LCD display lets you navigate through a setup wizard that automatically detects your WiFi network. The next step is simply inputint the password which is a bit of a cumbersome process as you have to wade through rows of characters till you get to the numbers and letters you need. Frankly, that part of the setup seems very old-school. Brother could have really improved upon this process. Be aware that as you enter each number and letter of your password that character quickly turns to an asterick to hide it. Don't be confused by what the printer is doing.]

Once the password was entered the printer immediately paired to my network. No hiccups whatsoever.

The next step was even simpler. I put the install disc in my iMac, run it, and it automatically installs the drivers and detects my printer. Never have I ever been able to pair a printer to my Mac or PC this easily. It really is true -- this printer is Mac's best friend.

I decided to do a test page which is done simply by pressing the GO button on the printer. It didn't take long for the printer to whiz into motion and produce a page.

Two immediate problems: First, my room stunk of toner. This thing put out a stench that I could not believe. I had read another review from someone complaining about the smell this priter produces. Fortunately, it seems, the stench was only present at the initial print. I am hoping that the printer is just breaking itself in. I will keep you posted on future prints.

The second problem is page curling. Pages come out curled. I am using 30 weight paper which should be less prone to curling. I understand there are adjustments you can make in the computer to lessen the curl. I will certainly look into this and keep you posted.

Print speed and quality is very good. Black text looks very crisp but colors are not true to original. I had read in another review that this Brother printer produces darker versions of the original color. This is true. Oranges were deeper, light blues became dark blues. Potentially, I don't see this as a major problem -- but some who are more finicky about their printer producing true colors will not be happy.

I won't even talk about photos. Haven't tested photo printing because I already know it will look like garbage. You don't use these printers for photos and anyone buying it for that use is foolish.

Is the printer loud? Somewhat, yes. But realize that I am coming from a monstrous Konica Minolta machine that was even louder than this Brother. So, for me, the printer is quieter than the more industrial sized machines I have been used to.

Thus far, I am very impressed with the ease of setup and immediate pairing to my WiFi network and iMac. I mean, I had this running in less than 15 minutes after full unpack.

As for overall quality? It is what I expect from a $400 laser printer. It's speedy with highly acceptable print quality. However, it's not on par with business class machines. It suffers from subdued color reproduction, colors are slightly darker than they should be and pages curl.

The machine awakens from sleep and produces a page in less than 10 seconds. This is great. My Konica Minolta would wake from sleep and go through a minute of two of machine "whirring" until it decided to spit out a page.

For $400 this doesn't seem to be a significant step down from my $1k Konica Minolta business class computer and that's why I am not complaining.

You can read through countless reviews on Amazon hoping to get the right printer. Every single one of them has a handful of bad reviews and complaints about breakage and toner cost. I found the Brother, particularly this model, to be the better rated printer in its price range. Certainly toner replacement will be a little cheaper than going with HP.

UPDATE

The stench I was experiencing with print jobs has lessened, though there is still the slightest odor of print toner whenever I run the printer. I am hoping this subsides with age.

Went into PRINT SETTINGS on my Mac and selected REDUCE PAGE CURLING. It did very little to curb the problem. This printer still produces curled prints and that's the only annoying issue I still have with this printer.

In all, the Brother 4570 is probably the best color laser printer in the $400 range. Certainly a better option than purchasing an HP which comes with limited-filled toner cartridges and (from reviews I have read on Amazon) its own set of headaches.

I purchased this in November 2010 and have had for 5 months. I wanted to give it 3.5 stars, but Amazon doesn't allow half stars. While the purchase price was a VERY good value, the price of the replacement toner and insistence of the system to force you to replace the cartridge even when they clearly still contain ink is very fustrating.

PROS:
1. Reasonably priced for a wirless color laser
2. Excellent color documents
3. Relatively fast
4. Prints double-sided
5. Wi-fi

CONS:
1. VERY expensive refills. I don't print that much and all 4 cartridges have run out in 5 months. The replacement cost for the 4 cartridges is $200. Because it's a relatively new model, it doesn't appear there are options other than to buy genuine Brother Products.
2. The printer just stops working when it deems that the tonner cartridges need to be replaced. The documents I printed the day before looked great and so I can't believe all 3 color cartridges are fully depleated of toner, but Brother insists they must be replaced to get the printer to run again.
3. The pages curl up at the ends.
4. It won't print B&W or grayscale in PowerPoint 2010 even when selecting that option (Brother told me to call Microsoft and have them re-write PowerPoint software to fix this problem, which a complete blow off of a customer).
5. It works great with a PC, but won't print color photos from a Mac (they come out B&W and won't size correctly).
6. A little noisy but not too bad (don't plan to have a phone conversation via a speaker phone or headset if you're sitting within 10 feet of the printer while it's printing)

I purchased the Brother HL4570CDW printer to replace an HP Business Inkjet Networked/Duplex printer that I had owned for 8 years. I did not want an all-in-one printer nor was I interested in printing photos. I merely wanted a work-horse to accommodate all of our b/w and color printing needs. The Brother printer fills the bill. It is so fast, even in duplex mode! The Energy-Saver feature is great. It powers off after 3 minutes of idle.

For $9.69, you can upgrade the memory of the printer with an additional 256 SDRAM. The folks at Brother recommend the Kingston memory module sold on Amazon.com -- Kingston 256MB DDR2 SDRAM Memory Module 256MB (1 x 256MB) DDR2 SDRAM 144pin KTH-LJ2015/256. It is easily installed via access to a side door compartment. After installation, you can navigate to "Print settings" on your printer LCD Panel and print the page, to make sure it shows the increased RAM size.

I love this new printer. The ease of setup was great. I didn't even have to follow the printed directions or CD. I simply went to the Apple web site and downloaded the most recent drivers. Apple OS did the rest of the work. In mere minutes, I had USB/Wireless/Ethernet connections for all of my desktop and laptop machines, including a PC.

A manual is included that does a good job of explaining features, but they are also quite intuitive.

The machine itself is sturdy and well-built but be warned that it occupies a fairly large footprint. For me, this was not a problem because my previous printer was also large and this one actually occupies the same space more efficiently. The printer measures 16"W x 18" L.

Amazon offered the best pricing on the Brother printer plus the bonus of no shipping charges/no tax. The printer requires four separate ink toner cartridges that each cost >$100 but Amazon sells them for $47-$80. Note that there are two versions: regular and extended use. The 310 series is regular - and the 315 series is extended use, which accounts for the difference in pricing. You can find all of the correct refill cartridges for this printer here: Brother TN315BK Black Toner Cartridge for Brother Laser Printer Toner

In summary, this is a good printer for the price and quality. Following are the specifications to my statement.

Brand: Brother is a reputable company with good customer service. We already own another Brother laser printer and have been pleased with it.

Convenience: a wireless printer is convenient when you have computers in different rooms or floors so they all can print wirelessly to the same printer.

Packing: very well packed so it protects it during shipping, a positive point. Although it is probably overpacked, as it took long to take out all the tapes, security ties, etc.

Set up: easy, fast and well explained. You just put the disc in, follow the instructions and it is ready. No problems or hoops to jump. It gives you three options for set up and we used the wired ethernet connection with a Mac. Now we can print from any of our Macs that are on different floors. Note for Macs: discussion forums state Brother is the easiest to install with a Mac.

Size of the unit: medium sized for its type, but heavy, so put it on a sturdy table.

Warm up time: slow for the first time of the day, but prints fast after warm.

Speed: above average in both modes, auto-duplex and straight printing.

Quality of printing: good and sharp as long as you use the appropriate paper for the job, ie. glossy paper for colored brochures. Keep in mind that this printer is not intended to be a photo printer.

Noise: a bit noisy, not too bad though. Just keep it some feet away from your work area, or mainly from your phone conversations.

Volume: it can handle large volume of printing as stated in the product description.

Price of printer: it is reasonable priced for a mid-range laser printer for small workgroups or offices, especially when compared to HPs and Canon color laser printers in this price range, considering also the quality of the prints.

Price of toner: laser toners are always high, but the price for this Brother toner replacement is cheaper than HPs, Lexmark, and Canon.

Yield of toner: it doesn't yield as many pages as the cartridges claim. Also, the printer tells you that the toner is empty when full or still plenty left. And it won't let you continue printing (with my other Brother laser printer you can keep printing long after the printer low nottice appears). Other reviewers advice on doing a couple of toner tricks.

Nice feature: the lcd display tilts up so it is easier to read.

It's a familiar story. You have a nice color laser printer and the toner carts run dry. Or maybe the transfer belt or imaging unit need replacing. And that costs more than a new printer. Except for the cost per print, I liked my Samsung ML-510. The cost to replace the transfer belt and imaging unit were just the straws that broke the camels bankbook.

My monochrome laser printer is a Brother, and it's been a workhorse for me for a good 5 or 6 years, so I looked at Brother color printers carefully. The printer price was attractive, and so was the total cost per print (I print a lot, and the cost of the image unit and transfer belt were still fresh in my mind, so I looked at the total cost for 125,000 prints.)

The printer arrived in a few days, I set it up and it was printing inside of 10 minutes. However, the colors were not very good. Too saturated and too red. I looked around on line and in the manuals and found there was an automatic color calibration system built in. I went through the keyboard menu, found the setting and used it. The prints got a LOT better.

About a week later, I got an email from Brother telling me about a firmware update. I applied it and now the color is even better.

Let's face facts, it's a color laser printer. And their color won't be as good as a good inkjet photo printer. However, if you are printing brochures, or - like me - cookbooks, the color is more than good enough.

Bottom line- the color quality is quite good, the text quality is excellent, the speed is excellent, and while some don't like the cost per print, it's better than what I was experiencing with the Samsung.

After reading many reviews about this printer online I decided to purchase one. I am MORE than satisfied to date with its performance. A number of reviews gave its ability to print pictures a poor rating, but if you adjust the printing preferences within the Brother printing programming from 600dpi to 2400dpi (prior to printing) the images look excellent. The machine provides a very quick print from "sleep" - much faster than the OKI C3200n it replaced - and the toner is more affordable. One big step up, in my opinion, is the duplexing that is built in...huge time saver. Lastly, I set it up wirelessly. The process was simple and straightforward. All five of our home based computers print seamlessly to the machine. I would highly recommend this laser printer for medium duty printing.

I've been looking for lots of different types of color laser printers and based on reviews through other sites and amazon.com i decided to get this printer. It is awesome! I got it for my small business. I have to print around 350 copies per week in color and two-sided. It's fast and good. One of the main factors that made me decide for this printer is that the toner will last for around 2500 copies and with high yield (more expensive toner) it will last for 3500 copies (generic brand) and 6000 copies (brother brand The other printers last between 1200 - 2500 depending on the toner and brand. Now, I have not replaced my toners yet, but i printed already 1700 copies (black and color) I am pretty sure that i should buy toners before i run out. Overall, i would recommend this printer.

]The Brother HL4570CDW replaced an HP LJ2550n that failed suddenly after six years of moderate use. Some reviewers have said that the HL4570 is loud; it is not quiet but it is about the same as other similar laser printers such as the HP LJ2550n.
Text print quality and color is excellent. Warmup is only a few seconds from sleep mode, and speed is very good on both ethernet and USB port printing. Automatic duplex printing is easy to set up and works smoothly. Speed is noticeably better than my old HP. The driver supports Windows from 2000 to Windows 7 64 bit with all printer functions in each Windows version.
Photo printing out of the box is OK but not great. If you are serious about photo printing, you need to look into the printer settings to adjust color saturation levels. Laser printers will not equal the best of the photo inkjet printers.
I have noticed that there is a stronger paper curl with this printer than my old HP but on a visit to Best Buy, I noticed that the new HP printers had the same paper curling tendency.
I strongly recommend adding memory as 128MB is not adequate for a color laser printer. Another reviewer recommended the Kingston KTH-LJ2015/256 memory SIMM that Amazon sells for under $10. It is a perfect fit and gets the printer to the maximum 384MB[[ASIN:B000NH7SZ0 Kingston 256MB DDR2 SDRAM Memory Module 256MB (1 x 256MB) DDR2 SDRAM 144pin KTH-LJ2015/256].
If the high capacity cartridges deliver the rated volume, this unit will have a b/w cost per page of 2 cents which is about the best available for a SOHO printer.
I can't comment on the wifi or printing from USB memory as I don't use these functions.
Overall, I give it an excellent rating and would give it five stars if the out of the box photo printing were better adjusted.

Where do I start, I put out a newsletter and after doing the first month I was out the cost for all new toner cartridges as 500 sheets and that is all they would produce even with removing and redistributing the toner. the heat of the paper curls #20 and when I put that into a folder it jacks up that operation.
HOWEVER the color images on the paper are great, we used to put out a B&W newsletter and not it's color. that's why it gets 3 stars it does a great fast job and the wireless function put it on the cloud and I can print for anywhere I can get on the cloud. It is great for that.