Customer Reviews

Brother MFC-8820D Laser Printer, Copier, Scanner, Fax

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

 

 

For our small office of 6 people, we have been looking for an office machine that is easy to operate, reliable, and cost-effective. The four contenders are HP 3330 MFP, Canon D680 imageClass, Brother MFC 9700, Brother MFC 8820D. They are all 4-in-1/5-in-1 machines(Fax, Laser printer, Scanner, Copier, Data/Fax modem) priced below US$800. Brother MFC 9700 is cheaper but comes with a 14.4k modem and only 8MB memory and a smaller flatbed; as the result it faxes and prints slower than MFC 8820D. The remaining three candidates all have excellent "pedigrees" and are well designed and built. However Brother MFC 8820D won at the end for the following outstanding reasons:

1. The 'D' in 8820D stands for duplex copying and printing: It works seamlessly and effortless. There is no need for removing the paper tray manually (really tedious). Duplex "fax receive" saves 30% to 50% of paper by having fax printed on both sides. Now one can have some break from the cost of receiving junk faxes.

2. 32MB memory: This is more than enough for holding a lot of copies and faxes. Very good for large unattended jobs. The best part about this is again about cost. No immediate need to spend more money for upgrading the memory as is required for Canon D680 (measly 2 MB).

3. PC fax software for computer data/fax needs.

4. Expandability for network interface.

5. Digital paper count to indicate the no. of copies made and faxes received: good for cost management and safe guard against potential abuse of the machine by employees for personal uses.

6. Excellent ADF (automatic document feeder): we have not had any paper jam so far.

7. Very easy to program and operate: simple to use for beginners and sophisticated features for users who demand more advanced functions.

8. Last but not the least is the cheaper cost for its toner on a per page basis.

There are only two minor drawbacks for us:

1. MFC 8820D's ADF/scanner does not scan a page from edge to edge. However this is true of all machines in this price range. Canon D680 omits the least at both margins. HP 3330 is the worst.

2. Large footprint. We had to relocate it to a different room in the office where there is enough space instead of putting it at a more convenient place where there is easier access. Nevertheless it's not too bad considering that it replaces 4 separate machines all at once. Besides it forces us to walk down the hallway and get some exercies!! ;--]

For our small office of 6 people, we have been looking for an office machine that is easy to operate, reliable, and cost-effective. The four contenders are HP 3330 MFP, Canon D680 imageClass, Brother MFC 9700, Brother MFC 8820D. They are all 4-in-1/5-in-1 machines(Fax, Laser printer, Scanner, Copier, Data/Fax modem) priced below US$800. Brother MFC 9700 is cheaper but comes with a 14.4k modem and only 8MB memory and a smaller flatbed; as the result it faxes and prints slower than MFC 8820D. The remaining three candidates all have excellent "pedigrees" and are well designed and built. However Brother MFC 8820D won at the end for the following outstanding reasons:

1. The 'D' in 8820D stands for Automatic duplex copying and printing: It prints on both sides of papers seamlessly and effortlessly. It is not necessary to remove the paper tray manually (a really tedious process in other machines). Duplex "fax receive" saves 30% to 50% in papers by printing faxes on both sides automatically. Now one can have some break from the cost of receiving junk faxes. This feature can be disabled if one-sides printing is desired.

2. 32MB memory: This is more than enough for holding a lot of copies and faxes. Very good for large unattended jobs. The best part about this is again about cost. No immediate need to spend more money for upgrading the memory as is required for Canon D680 (measly 2 MB).

3. PC fax software for computer data/fax needs.

4. Expandability for network interface.

5. Digital paper count to indicate the no. of copies made and faxes received: good for cost management and safe guard against potential abuse of the machine by employees for personal uses.

6. Excellent ADF (automatic document feeder): we have not had any paper jam so far.

7. Very easy to program and operate: simple to use for beginners and sophisticated features for users who demand more advanced functions.

8. Last but not the least is the cheaper cost for its toner on a per page basis.

There are only two minor drawbacks for us:

1. MFC 8820D's ADF/scanner does not scan a page from edge to edge. However this is true of all machines in this price range. Canon D680 omits the least at both margins. HP 3330 is the worst.

2. Large footprint. We had to relocate it to a different room in the office where there is enough space instead of putting it at a more convenient place where there is easier access. Nevertheless it's not too bad considering that it replaces 4 separate machines all at once. Besides it forces us to walk down the hallway and get some exercies!! ;--]

... and I've seen lots. After getting burned (very badly) by a Sharp AL-1641CS, the Brother 8820D was a wonderful experience.
<ul>
<li>The five-line dot matrix LCD screen is essential -- a device without it is going to be very, very hard to use.
<li> The toner cartridge has a refill port on it (although Brother tells you not to use it)
<li> The interesting "top heavy" design looks a bit strange, but comes in very handy when you realize that you can put the small footprint all the way at the edge of a table/desk.
<li> The printer and ADF mechanisms appear to be quite heavy duty -- probably only one step below the HP 8100 (which IMHO, is the pinnacle of modern super-rugged office machinery)
<li> Color fidelity on the scanner is very good; better than most multifunction devices.
<li> The ADF is unbelievably fast when you scan at 100dpi grayscale -- I'm guessing here, but it must be in excess of 60 pages per minute. Paper literally flies through it. Color scans are much slower, but still quite reasonable.
<li> BROTHER SUPPORTS MACS
<li> BROTHER SUPPORTS LINUX
<li> Unlike one of the other reviewers, I've found that the device scans to within 3mm of all margins -- I just did a test run and it was within 1mm of most of the margins. I'm sort of amazed that it can get this close. I think part of this is that it doesn't use the same part of the flatbed glass for ADF scanning that it uses for flatbed scanning -- there's a special separate strip of glass that curves downward to help the paper feed more evenly.
<li> Very sharp, high quality output.
<li> This printer has a real CPU in it with a generous amount of memory. Nothing is more frustrating than shelling out for a device only to realize that its ability to act as a printer was a complete afterthought, and that it chokes whenever you try to print anything too complex (cough, cough, Sharp, cough).
</ul>

Negatives:
<ul>
<li> Paper curls a bit after printing, although every compact laser printer has this problem (due to high-temperature fusers). The paper generally flattens out after 5-10 minutes.
<li> The mac scanner driver causes Image Capture to crash if you try to use the ADF. This is pretty annoying. Other than this, the drivers are excellent -- unobtrusive, simple, and reliable. The bundled software is a steaming pile, but that's true of nearly every hardware product.
<li> It only holds half a ream of paper (250 sheets), so you're always left with these torn-open half-empty reams lying around. Unfortunately the second input tray (so you can put two half-reams in) is unjustifiably expensive.
<li> No postscript support.
</ul>


In short, if you need duplex printing, don't waste your time with any other multifunction -- this is the one you want. If you can live without duplex, the range of options you have is much larger, although I still don't know of a device that beats this one.

I bought this Brother MFC-8820D multi-function (MF) machine from Dell for $511.95. It seems to run great.

The real story is in the hideous tech support from Brother. The printer did not ship with a the OCR software CD for Win2K. There was only a Mac CD. I called Brother and they told me that I would have to buy the OCR software from ScanSoft, even though it was supposed to be included in with the MFC-8820D unit. I told them that that was crazy and I asked them to send me the CD. Then the printer support person told me to send the MFC-8820D back to Dell and ask them them to ship a new unit. It can't be very efficient to ship printers around the country when you really just need a CD! I guess Brother doesn't mind spending Dell's money.

I called Dell. At first they didn't give me a final answer about resolving the problem. Then to my surprise, Dell told me today that they shipped me a new printer. I can't believe that in order to get a replacement CD that Dell should have to ship a new system. Laurel to Dell, a Big Dart to Brother and extra work for me to send back the first printer.

I spent several full days researching what laser printer to buy. Printers, multifunctions, copier/printers, etc., I looked at them all. This is the best deal on the market. The printing, scanning, faxing and copying are all easy and flawless. The software is even adequate (not great, but fully-functional and easy to use). Although the printer does use a lot of electricity when it kicks on, it isn't that noticable other than a very, very slight and momentary dimming of the lights.

I looked at the HP and the Canon and this is better. The toner is cheaper, there are more features and it is of better quality. It even feels more solid than the other brands of laser multifunctions. I've had the product for about a week and I'm thrilled with it. It is MUCH better than my Canon inkjet MultiPass F80 and little HP laser printer.

I didn't think I would write one of these reviews about a printer, but this one is that good.

This device is perfect for our needs for copying and printing. The laser quality is terrific and it prints much faster than similar ink jet models. The printer connected to the home network right away and both our Windows and OS X computers were able to print. The browser-based printer configuration over the network is really nice. The paper feed on the top never jams or rotates the page. This multifunction device is a great value.

I wish that I could comment on the scanner abilities except that neighter the Windows or OS X TWAIN drivers work. I've submitted a request for help twice over the past two weeks from Brother's online support page and have not received a response. It sounds like other people have very limited success with Brother's phone support. I have doubts that this company is willing to resolve issues that people have with their products. Be prepared to return the device if all functions don't completely work right out of the box.

I bought this unit last January. It was easy enough to hook up on my old Toshiba 4010CDT P2 266mgh laptop. Basically, the unit is fantastic EXCEPT for the scanner which still doesn't work properly. I must say that Brother support is not fantastic. I had several sorties with no postive outcome. I even offered to take both units to them even though I have bought an on site warranty. The support guy thinks my Windows 98 o/s is corrupted and suggested I format C and rebuild. This I do not believe as I have a friend who has exactly the same laptop as me and he had his rebuilt just a couple of weeks before. I borrowed his laptop and the scanning software perfomed very poorly. It was extraordinarily slow and cumbersome. My old HP5200 was fantastic as a scanner so I new what to expect. The real test will be when I buy a new laptop soon. If the scanner doesn't work I will take them to task.

I agree with the above reviews that this printer stands above the competition. In some cases that is not too hard. Has HP ever done a printer driver in the last 40 years that works? Even the old HPGL (Hewlett Packard graphics language) pen plotters had bugs that programmers had to copy to make compatible drivers. Lexmark, the ex -IBM printer outfit? Total junk, the noisiest jammingest piece of junk I have had was a Lexmark laser. Never again, ever. I have a Canon scanner I like, and an old Epson 1520 C-sized printer that works other than not feeding a page right-- but that might just be age. The Brother MFC-8820D offers that greatest of all features, duplex printing. Once you have a true duplex printer you will never go back. The 8820D is also a laser, so the printing won't run if it gets wet. Cartridges are cheap and seem to last. Best of all I found a network card for it for 20 bucks on an auction site so now it is a network printer (but darn, it won't scan over the network).

Now the bad-- I used to have to scan data-books as part of my engineering job. The scanner top is made to rise up so you can scan thick items, but the whole hinge system broke. You can see these two giant springs meant to hold up the cover and the thin cross-section of cheap crappy plastic that Brother engineers expected to withstand the spring force, and you know these kids never worked on their own cars as teenagers. The document feeder still works, it just flops around and won't say open.

The second problem I have is the scans are cut a bit short. There is a white band at the bottom where the scanner seems to be sending data, but the bottom 1/8th inch of the page is missing. I can use the goofy scanner utility in the Brother program group to set 14-inch scanning and the page is still short. This may be some goofiness with the document feeder sensing the end of the page and cutting of the data and padding out white after.

Now, as too the complaint from the other commenter that says that the scans are too narrow. Brother's software programmers can be as incompetent as programmers everywhere, or maybe its Brother marketing. They default the scan to A4 size, which is 8.3 inches wide. Set the scan to come from the document feeder and you can pick the page size. At least you can do this if you scan with the fabulous free image viewer IrfanView. Just do a File>>Acquire/Batch_scanning and use the Twain dialogue. I will admit that the right edge of the scan does look like its missing an 1/8 inch or so, so if that is what the other commenter is referring to, yeah, I agree.

Also don't even try to use the goofball Paperport software. It defaults to proprietary .max files. You can click settings to make jpegs, but why bother when you can use the very superior IrfanView to scan a whole stack of pages, and give them incrementing names and all the other cool things that IrfanView lets you do?

I am disappointing by the broken hinges and the truncated scans, but I still believe in Brother. Indeed, I just ordered a Brother MFCJ6510DW from Amazon so I can scan the 11x17 graph paper I love to draw on, as well as have a 11x17 color printer. Its an inkjet, but its also cheap. Canon and Epson makes big format printers but they are meant for photo use, not business use.

This device makes the case for 3 in 1 devices in general. It's great to be able to print, copy and scan from one device. However, it's a little slow, and the mechanism which locks and unlocks the scanning array is sticky and doesn't always work. That said, I've had the unit for five years, and it's still working. So, an excellent piece of equipment. Will I buy another Brother unit when the time comes? 75% chance. It's done well and I'd be happy with another version of the same, but I wonder if another brand or model might be better.

Item was purchased as is w/ no guarantee at a terrific price. Most of the time you do get what you paid for. Item arrived with broken lid and was inoperable. Some you win, some you lose.