Customer Reviews

IntelliFAX Flatbed Color Inkje

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

A reliable, multi-featured, plain paper, flatbed fax/copier/scanner. The best feature is that the paper intake lies flat and prevents paper jams that always occur in vertical feed machines. This machine has 4 ink cartridges, acts a complete telephone answering system including speaker phone. Stands alone or connects to your computer via USB "A-B" cable and, the documentation says, it will send/receive faxes from your desktop. I have not done this, yet. But it works well as a primary or alternate printer. Additional drivers are required to be downloaded but, installation worked smoothly and by the book. Cool feature is that this machine responds to it's own "distinctive ring tone" or "ring master" tone and will not answer regular telephone calls if you so desire. Although you can still answer and talk from this handset if you want. You'll have hours of fun learning all the things this baby can do. Very nice for the price. I liked mine so much, I bought one for my Dad.

After 15 years of use (sort of old fashioned, I use things until they are really useless or completely broken and cannot be repaired) of another Brother machine (the intellifax 820), I thought it was time for a nice upgrade.

I chose this machine over a Canon for instance because of the price, but also because I wanted to use it as a telephone and an answering machine. I couldn't be happier after 3 months of use. It is extremely complete and versatile (phone + answering machine + fax + copier), unbeatable for the price. The machine, once in place, is also compact, unlike (yes, you guessed) most of the Canon models, which take so much space.

Down the toilet goes thermal paper, of course. But that is not all. As compared to my old 820, this one has a speakerphone that works both ways. By that, you can not only hear what is happening on the line, but also talk without picking up the receiver (couldn't do it with the 820). It also has a caller id function, so you see (if part of your package with the phone company) if those nasty telemarketers are bugging you. Plus, it has a message center memory. With all the hurricanes and power outages for whatever reason, this is very practical; all your messages will be kept in memory for 24 hours when the electricity goes out !

This machine also makes nice copies, as long as you stay in black&white (definition and consistency are not good in colour). Copies can either be made once at a time, or by putting them all on the flatbed and boum, there they go in line. Just like at the copy shop, where they have those expensive machines that are often out of order. I haven't tried sending colour faxes, but if I do, I'll come back and edit this comment. No problems sending multiple pages faxes though, thanks again to the flatbed system. Pages go out in a zoom, but the rest depends on the quality of the phone line, and obviously on the quality of the machine at the other end.

A couple of drawbacks on the machine : the buttons are a bit small, and you have to be sure you are pressing the right number; also, the direct memory numbers are less than on my old 820 (you only get 6, where I had 20 on the 820) even though on aggregate you have more on this machine (you have to go into another feature); finally, I am under the impression the cartridges are going to be costly, even though I don't use or make colour copies or faxes. You see, the system does a sort of automatic cleaning every once in a while, and you can hear it starting to get in motion, even if it is very brief.

Overall, if the three things I have just told you do not bother you, go for this machine, it is ideal for small businesses or someone who wants a multifunction machine at home, without taking up up vital space on your desk and you do not have to go out to the copy shop anymore. You can even connect this machine to your computer center (something I still have to do, just like the previous reviewer). And Brother is the specialized brand in these products, so you can hardly go wrong.

This machine has made me start a personal boycott against Brother. In 5 months, it has been replaced twice (aka 3 broken machines) with each machine getting phone tech support. It has cost the small office I work for about $400 in man-hours, I should have just bought a new fax for that price.

The problem?: answering machine cuts people off. When I call tech support, I can now recite their troubleshooting manual for them. If the only problem were a broken machine, I wouldn't be so upset. But their service center is horrible. Obviously, their fix ain't workin' for me, but they recite it like drones. And forget reaching anyone with any authority. And in my head, I actually say a prayer of thanks if the person I reach doesn't have a foreign accent!

Attempts at expressing my frustration with going through 3 machines may as well be shouted at a brick wall, they calmly repeat "please press menu set, 2, 7, 2" "But I just did that with Nan 5 minutes ago" "Please press menu set..." "...2,7,2 yes, 180 seconds, stop exit, now what?"

So after wasting almost 3 times as much money as the machine cost on man-hours, Brother's next solution is an hour drive to a service center (leaving a home business without a fax!) or we can pay the extra charge for on-call service (which amounts to around $130-wow, that's what this piece of junk cost in the first place!). But they'll pay for a technician to look at it after that. Gee, thanks, Brother.

I think I'll pass. Maybe Sanyo makes a fax/ answering machine that can do its job...

I purchased this machine in February 2006 as a replacement unit. From the beginning, I never got the colors to print correctly. (I did try following the instructions of the manual, and of the customer service reps, changing ink cartridges, some that I bought, others that were sent by Brother's customer service reps, plugging and unplugging, changing the paper, etc. Too many hours, no satisfactory results). To solve the problem, I bought an Epson color printer/copier.
I thought that at least I could use the other features i.e. phone and answering machine.
The answering machine cuts off the messages and I have never been able to retrieve the messages remote.
The little that gets stored is impossible to understand because at playback the sound is so poor that many words are lost (it's the same effect as if you'd be using a cell phone and there is a bad signal, although it's not a bad signal, is a bad recording/playback component).
The speaker phone is also bad, I tried to use it to speak with the customer service rep and it was impossible to make sense of what he was saying because words got lost...
The replacement unit they sent got the colors correct, but the answering machine does not work and the speaker phone also drops the words although not as bad as the first machine.
Stay away from this product.
Since their customer service reps do not help, you have to make a decision quickly: to keep the old broken machine, or to keep the newer broken machine, because if you delay your decision past 3 days, they will charge you for the replacement unit. Even if you send the machine back after the 3 days they still charge with a $30 fee.
Buy the way, what you get as a replacement unit is a remanufactured machine (another machine with half fixed problems). They will not provide you with a product registration card for the "new" machine.

This unit works good but is hard to set up for the technologically disadvantaged.

Don't buy this machine. The ink jet printer is not a good quality. I don't know why Amazon still sell this. I'm just looking for another printer, just for one year.

So frustrating that this unit will not fax out without all of the color cartridges in perfect working order. I never use the color ink, yet have to replace them in order to send a fax. I swore the last time I bought a brother that I would not do it again. Unfortunately, it was my only choice at a local store. Only thing nice is that the cartridges are still readily available.

This machine is a total piece of crap! I will never buy another Brother product. I just tried to fax one sheet of paper to a vendor and I've already spent an hour on it. First I tried to fax and the machine came back with a communications error and I couldn't proceed with anything. So I unplugged it to reset it. Then when it comes on it spends 10 minutes cleaning itself which it does by wasting a ton of ink. Then because it wasted so much ink, now my black ink is out...AND IT WON'T FAX!!???!! NOW I REPLACE THE BLACK INK AND I'M GETTING MESSAGES ABOUT OTHER INK CARTRIDGES!!!! SO I REPLACE ANOTHER ONE!!!! THEN I FINALLY GET THE INK MESSAGES OFF AND WHEN I TRY TO FAX IT SUCKS THE PAPER HALFWAY IN AND THEN GARBLES IT UP AND IT JAMS!!!!!!! SO I TRY TO FAX AGAIN...THIS TIME I THINK IT FAXED, BUT HAVE TO WAIT ANOTHER 5 MINUTES FOR IT TO CLEAN ITSELF AGAIN AND USE MORE INK BEFORE I CAN FIND THE STATUS. WHEN THE STATUS FINALLY COMES OUT IT TELLS ME I HAVE A POOR LINE CONDITION, BUT ITS THE SAME LINE I USE FOR MY PHONE AND THAT'S FINE. SO NOW I SWITCH CORDS AND TRY TO FAX AGAIN, BUT THE PAPER INPUT IS DESIGNED POORLY AND THE PAPER DOESN'T GET PICKED UP BUT EVIDENTLY THIS MACHINE DOESN'T CARE SO IT EVIDENTLY FAXES NOTHING...SO I TRY AGAIN...THIS TIME IT SEEMS TO HAVE FAXED, BUT I GET NO STATUS...SO I TRY AGAIN...NOW IT'S NOT GIVING ME A STATUS AGAIN...WHEN DID THIS SETTING SPONTANEOUSLY CHANGE?? NOW I HAVE TO PRINT OUT A FAX JOURNAL...OMG IT ACTUALLY WENT THROUGH...AN HOUR AND $30 IN INK LATER. I WANT TO THROW THIS THING THROUGH BROTHER'S WINDOW. IT WASTES WAY TOO MUCH INK CLEANING, DOESN'T PICK UP PAPER PROPERLY AND JUST GENERALLY SUCKS.

I bought this Brother because I had about $200 worth of printer carridges left over from a previous Brother printer (MFC210C) that had ceased to work. I really did not want to buy another Brother but felt that the price I paid for this newer one was low enough to justify purchasing it in order to use up all the printer cartridges I had. So far so good. It prints. It faxes. It seems better made and more durable than my previous Brother all-in-one. I use it with an older Mac G4 OS 9.1. The older printer used to freeze up the system. This one so far has not. The older printer was really quirky and I vowed never to get another Brother product. But this newer one seems to be okay. I dont use the phone or the answering system so can't comment on that. I print a lot of promotional fliers and dont need great graphic reproduction quality. I also print a lot of documents that are just black text on white paper. I dont have super special printer needs. I just like to start a print job and walk away from it and have it finish without annoying messages and freaky things happen. I gave it a 3 star rating, perhaps unfairly because so far nothing has gone wrong, but being the sceptic that I am and after the exasperating experiences of the previous Brother printer, I guess Im reserving judgement until I have had this newer one for a while.

After four months of use,it suddenly went crazy.When I installed a new ink cartridge after it ran out of ink,it keeps stating "NO CARTRIDGE" and stopped functioning.I had my friends checked it, and still not working--keeps flashing the stupid "NO CARTRIDGE".What a waste of money.I will never buy anything from BROTHER.And by the way, the message center of the machine is also crappy.