Canon MultiPASS F50 Flatbed Multifunction

by Canon

Product Details

Product Manual [8.44mb PDF]

• Shipping Weight: 38 pounds
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S. and to APO/FPO addresses. For APO/FPO shipments, please check with the manufacturer regarding warranty and support issues.
• ASIN: B00005OSVF
• Item model number: F50
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (25 customer reviews)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes
• Date first available at Amazon.com: October 23, 2001

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

Designed with the small office in mind, Canon's F50 Multipass combines several necessary functions inside one sleek box that fits snugly into an 18-by-24-inch space. Featuring a fax machine, copier, scanner and printer, this speedy and accurate machine is an economical personal assistant for the home office.

Faxes are transmitted as quickly 3 seconds per page; color sheets may take as long as 60 seconds. With programmable dialing options for 12 one-touch numbers and a 30-page automatic document feeder, it practically operates by itself. The transmission memory can contain up to 270 pages, and users have easy access to a number of utility reports.

The printer and copier are compatible with envelopes, transparencies, photo paper, stickers, and transfers as well as plain paper in letter or legal sizes. For monochrome sheets, the F50 churns out up to 17 pages per minute at 600 x 600 dpi; in color, it can process up to 12 pages per minute at an outstanding 2,400 x 1,200 dpi. The paper tray can handle up to 100 sheets of plain paper. Up to 99 copies can be created from one original, with available magnification options ranging from 25 to 400 percent.

The flatbed scanner offers 9,600 x 9,600 dpi and 36-bit color depth; hobbyists can easily process their vacation photos while professionals can quickly organize important documents.

The F50 is fully compatible with PC and Macintosh systems, and includes a scan processing software package. Canon provides a one-year limited warranty on parts and service, along with an InstantExchange program. --Jill Lightner

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

50 of 50 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great unit, but docs need work, January 7, 2002

By 

"toborthe8thman" (Boston, MA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Canon MultiPASS F50 Flatbed Multifunction (Office Product)

An excellent printer, lots of great features for the money, although a few minor quirks. I was considering some other flatbed all-in-one's from HP, Brother, Lexmark, etc, and am using this to replace separate older HP all-in-one and Canon scanner units. Some reasons I chose this unit include combination of ability to copy 8x14 legal (auto-doc feeder only), individual color cartridges (cheaper and environmentally more friendly), high speed color fax w/270pg memory, 2400x1200 color print resolution (useful for digital photos), 30pg auto-doc feeder, direct hi-res color copies (1200x1200), 25-400% copy enlarge/reduce, and print speed.

Setup was easy - quite a few steps to unwrap packing tapes and other setup, but fairly dummy-proof both hardware and software. Performance is excellent in many ways for basic printing, copying, scanning and fax. In the 1200dpi direct color copying mode, even does a respectable job copying direct to glossy photo paper. Doc feeder is smooth, no jams so far. Note that 8x14 legal scans work fine, but are through the doc feeder only, which runs them through a small separate 1"-wide scan area - the plate glass accepts up to letter and A4 sizes (the doc is wrong on this suggesting 8x14 glass copies, but a note on the canon web site corrects this). The unit is a good healthy size, but not overly huge. It vibrates back and forth a bit during inkjet printing sweeps, but a good solid base will help. There is also a plastic cover over the paper tray, a nice touch to keep dirt/dust off the paper supply.

On the down side, the docs are well written for basic functions, but very poor for most advanced features. Many technical terms are not defined (eg: most fax tx/rcv settings) or not documented beyond just mentioning them by name. There is no single section or roadmap for all of the on-printer menus and most menu settings are not in the index either, so you have to jump around the pages by eye. The color/quality/paper settings in the print setup, while flexible, have little documentation in terms of what they really do (eg: difference between photo/glossyphoto/photofilm paper type settings). I'm still working on trying to compensate a bit for correct skin tones from my Fuji digital camera, which tends to favor red more than I'd like - although shots from another digital camera came out fine. Another nit: the max scan resolution I've seen is 600x600, so I'm not sure where the claimed 600x1200 settings come from. Finally, 17c/12b ppm copying and printing speeds are not what I'm seeing for highest resolution settings, these numbers must be for either lowest resolution, or multiple page copy speeds.

All that aside, I'm very happy with the unit, it copies and prints great high-resolution pictures in reasonable speeds, and is nicely priced.

26 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Pleasantly surprised, January 31, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Canon MultiPASS F50 Flatbed Multifunction (Office Product)

I purchased this MFD for a number of reasons. I wanted to replace our old home office copier and fax. They were starting to show their age, lacked more advanced features, were energy inefficient, and were taking up way too much counter space. When the office scanner finally died, I decided to take the plunge with one of these multi-functional dohickies.
I read all the reviews I could find, checked all the specs and, despite the couple of dissappointed reviews posted here, decided to try the Canon because it seemed to fit the requirement list--in particular the need for both flatbed and sheet fed capabilities.
I wasn't as concerned about being able to fax directly from the computer or being able to use the thing as a printer--that was just gravy that I didn't really expect to work that well.
When the Canon arrived, I was aprehensive. How many days would it take me to get the thing set up? Would I really have to send it back because it was defective.
I unpacked the machine, read the quick start guide and started unpacking and setting it up. I was sending and receiving faxes as well as making copies about 30 minutes after I opened the
box!
I did read the manual in order to set up the fax machine id--the header at the top of the fax that identifies the sender and the fax number from which the fax was sent. The rest of the features were intuitive enough for me to figure out how to do without checking the manual, i.e. the faxing and copying.
The color copy with default settings created a very crisp, accurate print. As I former print production manager, I know whereof I speak.
After this initial success, I decided to cross my fingures and attemp to load the Canon software on my workstation running Windows 98 (upgrade is pending). Again, I followed the quick start instructions.
No crashes, no glitches. Everything installed without so much as an error message. Faxing from my computer is painless and scanning into Photoshop very easy! I even loaded the OCR software. I've had problems with this software conflicting with my system in the past and I have had to uninstall it, but the version provided on the disk doesn't cause that problem. Again, no problems--OCR works like a charm!
Maybe because I've been used to older technology, the Canon's features, in particular it's scanning, feels very quick. So far, I have no complaints whatsoever and would highly recommend the F50 to anyone.

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Does not work on a Windows network, March 18, 2002

By 

Howard Dunlavy (Saint Paul, MN USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Canon MultiPASS F50 Flatbed Multifunction (Office Product)

I am still finding this hard to believe, but this machine does not work on a Windows network. I had the printer hooked up to a Windows XP desktop, with network connections to another Windows XP notebook, and a Windows 98 desktop. Both of the attached computers setup the printer fine, but any job sent to it would only print after I re-booted the computer hooked directly to the printer.

I then confirmed with Canon support via both e-mail and telephone that the printer is not supported on a Windows network. This makes it worthless to me, as I need a printer that all 3 computers could use.

It is frustrating to find a printer such as this that is highly rated (Consumer Reports, CNET), but nowhere did I see it mentioned that it had this problem. Given the number of homes that have more than one computer now, I would think the reviews would be sure to mention such a short-coming.