Gadget User Blog

Canon have created a rather nice unit here. A networked multifunction printer. It prints documents fast. It scans well but the real deal breaker in our opinion is the duplex print, copy and scan function. This means that it will scan and copy double sided originals, as well as print double-sided. Now I don’t know about you but this function is perfect for an office in desperate need of controlling the volumes of paper that pile up.

This unit was included in my office to help digitise file keeping. So all those paper bills, contracts and other records can now be easily scanned and filed in an electronic filing system. Still need to do some work on what the best electronic document management software is for a small business, but for the moment the included software from Canon will do the job.

Well, actually the Presto Pagemanager 7 software is a crock. It conflicts with something on the PC and so doesn’t even open. The CD Label Printer software did the same thing but the removal of some PDF Printer freeware fixed that problem.

Now, there seems to be many reviews that bitch about this unit, but for me, its use will primarily be for business rather than photo printing and so far so good. It prints crisp documents and the photo copy function is reasonable enough. I don’t expect this machine to perform like a high end photocopying unit or even a high speed scanner. But what it does do is put a range of rather convenient functions into one relatively cheap unit. Expect to pay between $300-400 for the MX850.

I must say I found the networking function pretty easy to set up, and more importantly very stable. Uses as a network printer I can finally print without having to have the main desktop turned on. It finds my laptop on the wireless network easily and so I can scan documents directly to the laptop.

I haven’t tried out all of the functions but I will add to this review as I go. But my first impression of this unit is that it’s a serviceable printer that is reasonably easy to set up and work with. It has some good power management so shouldn’t be too much of a power drain in the standby mode.

But by far the most useful feature for me is the duplex copy/scan function. This is going to save a lot of time for me and it was really the only unit in it’s price range that offered this function in an inkjet multifunction (and in a laser multifunction in the price range).

All in all I am impressed with the unit so far. I would recommend it if you are looking for a decent scanning solution.

Click star to rate this article: (3 votes, average: 4.67 out of 5)

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