Customer Reviews

Brother MFC-420CN Color Inkjet Network Multifunction

5 star:		(37)
4 star:		(23)
3 star:		(11)
2 star:		(18)
1 star:		(32)

 

 

Update: Now I've had the Brother for over a year and a half, and I see that others have had bad luck with theirs. I will temper my original joy with the comment that my first unit did go bad (just wouldn't print), but Brother replaced it with a new one during the warranty period. They are so inexpensive that I bought another one to see me through the two weeks of repair/replacement time. That was less than great, but now I have a backup, for still less than $300.

I've never experienced much in the way of paper jams, so I would guess that at this price point, Brother just isn't providing consistent build quality. That's too bad, because the prospect of a bad unit is a real disincentive. I'm still satisfied overall, but recognize that not everyone is having the same experience. And of course the downtime resulting in purchase of a second unit was a drag. I would consider a different printer, but Epson and HP have both been such poor experiences for me (with far inferior support), that I will still probably prioritize a new Brother model when I need to upgrade. No sign of that happening any time soon though.

August 30, 2006
---------------

Ok, I have only had this all-in-one for a little over a week. But after years of being a slave to the HP ink needle, I am so happy with it I want to dance.

I have never really seriously considered Brother in the past, and now I feel like I have been living in the wrong world. Like if someone told you "My new car does 0-60 in 5 seconds, gets 70 mpg, and cost $1500. What, you didn't know about those?"

For less than $150, I now have a very compact printer with 10baseT ethernet (goodbye nightmarishly technical HP JetDirect 300x external network box), separate ink tanks for all colors, more advanced features than my 3 year old HP that cost around $1000 with the JetDirect, sharper printing, and best of all, real, honest-to-goodness Mac OS X support. Their software and documentation shows an absolute commitment to doing Mac right. (It took a year and a half for HP to get the Mac drivers for my OfficeJet to be minimally functional, and never did manage to handle things like scanning from the unit to a computer on the network.) Brother has earned a long-term customer here, and I am telling everyone I know.

Like any AIO, the quality of printing and scanning is probably not up to what you can get in stand alone units. But for general small office/home office use, it is more than fine. If you want the highest photo quality, get a specialized photo printer with a 6-color head. But actually, the photo quality on this unit is still far better than you could get at any price only a few short years ago. It's just that we have gotten spoiled at the truly amazing quality of photo inkjets in the last couple of years.

I will probably get one of the Olympus dye-subs for photos eventually, but in the meanwhile, prints from this on photo paper are plenty good enough for posting on my refrigerator door. And the resolution and appearance of business graphics, while again possibly not up to what current stand-alones will do, are the best of any printer I have ever owned, and leagues ahead of the older HP OfficeJet I just gave away.

And the best part is, it could fall apart in 6 months, and still not cost much more to replace than I have been spending on HP ink cartridges. My OfficeJet sucked down ink like a storm drain, and the cartridges were EXPENSIVE. It became clear in short order that their business model was built around bleeding you dry on consumable costs. Those guys have quite a racket, but I'm happy to say I am out from under it.

Thanks Brother, I will sing your praises to the skies.

I must say overall I am very pleased with this printer:
Pros:
- Networkable right out of the box. I connected it to my wireless router and was immediately able to print from my laptop using its wireless connection. Not just that, I can also scan to my laptop and fax from my laptop wirelessly!
- PC Fax function is excellently implemented: very user friendly
- Excellent B&W and color copy functionality using the document feeder
- Much more compact than most multi-function machines
- Uses four separate ink cartridges (3 color + Black) to reduce wastage
- Decent quality of printed photos though not really a photo-printer
- Has built-in slots for memory stick, SD, CF, etc.
- Allows easy cleaning and alignment via the menu
- Very cheap for the functionality: about a hundred bucks after rebates

Cons:
- Stops ALL functioning even if a single ink cartridge is empty. Say the Cyan cartridge is empty - not only can't you print in color, you can't print in black & white either. What's more you can't scan or fax either!! This is just bad design!
- Sometimes claims the ink cartridge is empty even when there is a little bit sloshing around at the bottom.
- Brother Tech support is TERRIBLE!!

By the way I found out details of the maintenance mode for this device after hunting around. This is quite useful, so here it is for anyone that needs it. Anyone getting errors that they can't get out of (such as shows no ink though ink is there) should try to reinitialize parameters using commands 91 or 01 of the maintenance mode.

Brother Maintenance Mode Commands:
- Quickly press Menu/Set * 2 8 6 4 to enter maintenance mode.
- Display should read maintenance.
- Press one or more of the maintenance mode commands below. After each command display should read re-init for a few moments then redisplay maintenance.
- Press 99 to exit the maintenance mode.

Maintenance mode commands:
01 Full RAM clear (see 91 below for retaining user programming)
02 scanner initialize (feed a white sheet, then a black sheet)
05 white level
09 print test
10 modify soft switches
11 print configuration list
16 panel test
19 CML test
20 signal test
21 tonal test
23 filter RX
54 scan edge
55 scanner area
66 test print memo
75 display drum life (if enabled on laser models)
76 reset drum life counter (laser models)
91 parameter initialize (user programming remains intact)
95 protection
99 Exit maintenance mode

I have owned this for 4 months and have been pleased thus far, until today. I only use it as a fax and copier. I have a seperate printer at my office so it is not even hoked up to my computer. Today I received the warning that my color cartridges are out of ink, so it totally shuts down. I cannot even send a fax. The problem is that I have never used color. I always copy in black and white, same with the fax. Apparently it cleans itself periodically like a cat and that uses a small amount of ink. It is rated for 400 pages of color, so 100 pages of ink a month just for cleaning seems excessive to me. It is frustrating to spend c.$40 for color even though I never plan on using it. Perhaps those were the sample cartridges that came with it and they did not have the same capacity as standard ones. Other than that, as a fax machine and flatbed copier, it works great. Good value and small size.

I bought this printer when it first came out. I thought "Ooooo, all in one PLUS an ethernet connection.. YES!!" Being the early adopter with not many reviews to read, I rushed to a retailer and swooped it off the shelf. For a period of 6 months, this was a PLAYER! I had good prints, scans, and copies (never tried the fax machine). Then after the 6 months, the printer developed a bad personality. Some of the "quirks":

1) The printer now tells me on each print-out that it's out of ink (often, several flavors). I just out the cartridge to reveal a more-than-half-full tank of magenta. Admittedly, these are pretty small tanks, but it's not empty! I attempted to clear the cartridges nozzle with a cartridge cleaning solution. That worked... for about a day. Then, BEEP BEEP BEEP ***GIVE ME INK!***

And it gets better. If you actually runs out of ink in one of the cartridges... *drumroll* the printer refuses to print, scan, or copy. *cymbal crash* GENIUS! Either this is a ploy to force ink purchases or the engineers suffered from a bad case of stupid.

2) I never did clean the print heads, because the printer was sure to clean itself every day (YUM, YUM, INK!!!) Over time, I had to adjust the print settings to "fine" (instead of normal) to get a decently-clean printout. Otherwise, my printouts were Dali paintings.

3) Admittedly, the printer takes up very little space. This is partially because the #$%*&$*# paper tray can only hold 50 sheets of paper. So, I've heard my fair share of BEEP BEEP BEEP ***GIVE ME PAPER***

And this was just at first. Now as the personality of the printer has become stronger, the printer and I often have the following dialog. Fellow 420CN owners can probably relate.

Me: I'll just print out this article.
420CN: OK... Wait dude, you're out of Magenta.
Me: (taking out cartridge) Uh, no dude. We're good on Magenta.
420CN: BEEP BEEP BEEP!!!
Me: Ok ok ok (cleans the magenta cartridge and reinserts it).
420CN: And Yellow!!!
Me: You've got to be kidding me... (cleans yellow and reinserts)
420CN: Ok, hang on. I'm bathing in Magenta and Yellow. tra-la-laaaa!!
Me: *sigh*
420CN: BEEP BEEP BEEP
Me: WHAT!!!!!!!
420CN: I can't print. Check the troubleshooting manual.
Me: For what?
420CN: BEEP BEEP BEEP
Me: (opens scanner cover, closes it)
420CN: Please wait...................
420CN: Ok, here comes some data. (sound of one page printing)
420CN: BEEP BEEP BEEP!!!!!!
Me: FOR THE LOVE OF.....
420CN: Data remaining.... (long pause)
Me: (attempts to turn off printer)
420CN: Printer will power off until pending tasks are finished...
Me: (unplugs and plugs in printer)
420CN: *YAWN* Waking up. Please wait, drinking ink... *GLUG GLUG GLUG*
Me: WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME!!!!!!!!
420CN: BUY MORE INK!!!!!!!

In conclusion, nothing would please me more than backing a truck over this stinking, steaming pile of flawed electronics. I would advise anyone to avoid buying this printer. If you already have one, I feel your pain. I am now shopping for a replacement. After finding one, I will recreate the printer smashing scene from Office Space. :-)

Pros: Compact size, Network interface, xD, et al printing, Large ink cartridges, fax compatable with ans machine

Cons: Slow printing, copying, typical cryptic fax tree menu

I looked carefully for this new offering of Brother because of Network connectivity and the small size. It takes half the space of my previous All-in-One Xerox Workcenter, and the fax does not scream at every caller on my line--it just waits for an incoming fax tone before responding ("manual" mode), then it comes to life--even if you pick up the receiver (upstairs), and it even ignores my answering machine. Very Slick! It connects to my computer via USB2 AND network cable, and it can allow faxes to go to the computer instead of printing. For $150, this is a bargain. So far I have no paper jams or problems. Note the limitation of 10 pages in the copy/fax paper feeder, but there is a 100 page paper tray. For home use, this answers my needs completely!

I had a little trouble registering at the site (Sunday Night)--it locked up without entering me--but I'll try later.

The Brother MFC 420CN is a replacement to the Xerox All-In-One we used to have, and compared to what we used to have, we are now spoiled. The MFC has a lower profile than most other MFC in its class, but it is no lightweight when it comes to features. Since we have two laptops and one desktop in our home, we needed a printer and scanner we could share so networking was obviously one of the first features we needed to have. The network setup was easy and straight forward for Windows XP, but it was a little confusing to find a Linux driver. [...]
Printing is quiet, fast and clean. I tested a 10 page text document on my Brother MFC 420CN and it took about 20 seconds for the first page to come out, but then it took about 10 seconds per page to print, and about two minutes for the rest of the pages to print. I compared the time it took to print the same document over our home network to a Samsung ML 1430 laser printer and it takes about 30 seconds for it to warm up, and it took about the same amount of time to print all 10 pages.

Scanning via USB and the network is also very easy and efficient on the faster machine. It took a little reading of the manual to figure out the scanner options, but once setup it was easy to use. It averaged about 8-10 seconds to scan an average B&W page and the document feeder is very handy for multipage scans.

One of our laptops is a 166 Mhz processor so it took a little over two minutes to print one color page at normal density, but only about 40 seconds to print the same page at the lightest density. If you are using the Brother MFC 620CN on an older PC, I recommend using the lightest settings for draft prints.

As a fax machine, it works as I expected in stand alone mode. One very nice feature is the ability to program all the fax settings including the FaxID, phone numbers and groups you assign in your phonebook. Once you have created the list on your computer, you download it into the printer's memory.

All in all, I highly recommend this printer for its combination of fine features, intelligent user interface, and ease of use.

(...).

[...]

Although I'm fairly smart, I admit I'm not very computer literate - at least when it comes to the mechanical/installation part. So, I was a bit concerned - would I be able to hook the thing up by myself? But, the documentation is excellent, and installation was a breeze. (Yes, I'm a woman - and we really DO read the instruction manuals!)

After installing the print cartridges, I had to run the head cleaning/test print three times to get satisfactory output. The first test print showed black and cyan okay, with two short bars missing from both yellow and magenta.

I ran the cleaning cycle/test print a second time, which cleared up the problem with yellow, but not magenta. On the third run, all printed perfectly.

To test the print quality, I grabbed a picture I had colored when playing with my daughter. It is quite detailed, and colored with Prisamacolor artist's pencils - I thought it would be a good test picture because I had used a lot of different colors, and incorporated shading and blending techniques into the work.

The first test I set the machine to "Best" quality. The resulting copy was indistinguishable from the original - the colors reproduced exactly. The next test I ran on "Normal" quality, and once again, I couldn't detect any differences -either between it and the original *or* the previous copy. The third test, set on "Fast", was also equally as good and impossible to distinguish from the original, or from the other two copies. I'm impressed!

Thus far, I have not hooked up the machine to my computer (my computer is pretty old, and I need to buy a special cable with a parallel port plug on one end, and a USB cable plug on the other), but I don't anticipate any problems with either the installation of the drivers or in using the "print", "fax", or "scan" functions.

One important note - if you have but one phone line, and that line is equipped with voice mail, you will need to either switch back to an answering machine OR sign up for "personalized ring" service from your phone company to utilize the "fax" function, if you do not wish to install a dedicated fax line. The "personalized ring" service is pretty cheap, though - only (...) - and provides you with a separate phone number which shares the same line with your primary phone number.

All in all, I think the Brother MFC-420CN is an excellent value for the money, and I would recommend it without reservations for home use.

Update:

I (finally) got the correct cable to connect the MFC-420CN to my PC, and the installation of both the hardware and software were simple and easy.

A week and a half ago, I was printing some Valentine's Day cards, and decided to print some matching envelopes, too. The envelope design completely covered the front of the envelope with a background color, and there was a bar of graphics on the far left end.

Despite following all the instructions in the manual for envelope printing, each envelope emerged from the printer with small smudges of black ink on either end (I have not, however, had the problem of smudging when printing on any other type/size of inkjet print media).

I called Brother customer service (toll free!) and was pleasantly surprised to discover Brother DOES NOT outsource its calls overseas, as so many companies do these days. The customer service rep was knowledgable about the product, and working together we tried several adjustments - to no avail. The rep finally decided the printer itself was faulty, and offered to replace it entirely - via FedEx.

How refreshing to deal with a company that provides exemplary customer service, and seeks to resolve issues quickly. I will *definitely* purchase Brother products again in the future!

This printer is AWESOME!!! After canning 2 HP DeskJets, I thought I'd never buy another inkjet printer. But this is a bargain and a fantastic printer. The scanner and the software are very easy to use, and the print quality is excellent. My favorite feature is that the printer distinguishes between voice calls and faxes. I have only one telephone line, but if a fax is sent, the printer automatically picks it up. If it is a voice call, the fax does not engage and my answering machine picks it up. It is a bargain for the cost.

On the needs-improvement side, The document feeder is clumsy, and when I attempt to scan in a stack of papers they invariably end up all over the room. This printer does not print photoquality pictures, although the quality is not bad.

Also, the printer does not alert you when ink is about to run out. It just stops, leaving you running to Office Depot or Staples to finish printing your job. So make sure you keep extra ink in the house.

I have never written a review for a product before, but this printer deserves the highest praise.

I bought this item for my dad, who has a wireless network and wanted an easy to use all-in-one. The Brother 420 is the perfect solution. It is VERY easy to setup and the included documentation is very thorough. I was a bit skeptical when the salesman told me how easily this printer would work over a wireless network at home. Networking was very easy, and I've set it up without problems on a D-Link wireless G router and a Netgear rouder (b). This was much easier that I thought, especially since the software did EVERYTHING automatically. Wireless printing is now a breeze.

The built in fax, copier and scanner work great as well and the copier/fax are stand-alone so you don't need the computer to perform these functions.

Also, this printer has individual ink cartridges which can save a lot of money. Speaking of money, can you believe that this GREAT item only costs $130 at Staples after a $20 coupon? Other wireless printers are about $400 and a wireless print server is anywhere from $60 to $100. This is a great deal and the printer runs flawlessly!

LIke I said, this is my first review for a TOP RATE PRODUCT!

I was thrilled to find a 4 in 1 for under $150. The selling point for me was that my Staples store was using it at their computer counter and the clerk said there hadn't been any problems.

I'm not a computer person and still had little difficulty installing the machine. At first, it worked fine. I was surprised when I kept running out of color ink because it wasn't used very often and I had it set on draft black only. I accused my kids of printing color pictures (which they denied). As other reviews mentioned, this will not print in the black mode if any color cartrage is empty. At night I heard strange noises coming from the room where this was kept. One night I was in the room and realized it was the cleaning cycle. I also realized that the cleaning cycle ATE ink. Now, after about a year, the machine has died. I don't know what to do. I would like to buy another brand but after reading the reviews of other brands, I realize they are just as bad, and some are worse! Maybe I just need to accept the fact that if I want a decent quality (when it works) 4 in 1 in my home, I will have to replace it every 18 months, or buy a more reliable machine that will not only cost more money, but whose ink costs will be much more. I never tried it with generic ink. I bought some, but the machine died before I got the chance to use it. In summary, I can only say:

Roses are red,
and violets are blue.

It seems like all printer manufacturers,
are going to stick it to you.