Affordable Brother All-in-One Does Nearly Everything

By Jim Bray
April 4, 2009

It won't shine your shoes or make tea, but Brother's new MFC-990CW printer will handle just about any printing/scanning/faxing task you may throw at it.

This $230 unit is also small enough to fit on a desktop – as long as it's a fairly wide one – taking up less than half the space of the last Brother multi-function printer I reviewed. To be fair, that's a bit of apples and oranges comparison, since the model I reviewed previously was a laser printer whereas the 990CW is inkjet, but if a small size is important to you it can make a difference.

On the other hand, since you can configure it to use Wi-Fi instead of having to plug it into your computer, where you end up sticking it is really up to you. Of course, the Wi-Fi networking also means you can share the printer with others on your net as well. I hate sharing with others (just ask my wife) and so was tempted to use the standard USB interface, but the USB input is mounted strangely inside the unit and is a bit of a pain to access.

Besides, you just can't beat the convenience of wireless, if only to free up a USB cable. I still parked the unit beside my desk – but it was so I didn't have to walk any farther than necessary, "Sedentary" being my middle name, rather than to ensure I didn't run out of wire.

Brother says the MFC-990CW is capable of print quality up to 6000 x 1200 dpi, which is pretty darn good whether you're printing business documents or photos. In my tests I tried to count the pixels, but went cross-eyed after getting to about 300 x 300; suffice it to say the print quality is "fine".

The manufacturer also claims a print speed of up to 33 pages per minute for black and 27 for color. Your mileage may, and probably will, vary. I didn't time the printing, but it didn't seem excessively quick to me.

But talk about features. Not only does this thing print and scan and fax (does anyone really fax any more?), it also comes with a 5.8 gigahertz cordless telephone handset, digital answering machine and full-duplex speakerphone, all of which Brother says are designed to work in perfect tandem with its fax functionality.

It's also Bluetooth enabled, so you can interface your wireless device with it and squirt over digital photos or other stuff you may want to print out. If that doesn't work for you, it also has card readers and a USB slot built in. There's also OCR software to turn your scanned pages back into editable text.

Other features include a handy 4.2 inch touch screen color LCD display (this is where, for example, you pair with a Bluetooth device and configure the network) and "PhotoCapture Center" lets you do on-screen photo editing. You can also fax, copy or scan "Unattended", and the unit comes with a fifteen ssheet automatic document feeder.

It all seems to work as advertised, though I had some problems early on. When I first hooked up the unit it worked fine, the term "hooking up" being a bit of an atavism, of course, in a wireless environment – though I suppose the power cord still counts. Installation of the software suite was easy and straightforward, as was installation of the four inkjet cartridges, and all was well for a while.

Then Murphy's Law reared its ugly head and the unit stopped responding to my computer's commands. The controls on the front panel still worked, but when I'd send a document to print from my PC, it would sit there forever. I tried it wired, wireless, and I uninstalled and reinstalled the software repeatedly, and nothing helped. If I weren't so simple, it would have given me a complex.

Fortunately, Brother offers toll-free technical support "for the lifetime of the machine" and after I'd whined to them about how unfair life is, their people gave me call. A pleasant and competent person (and isn't that rare these days?) walked me through a process by which we fooled the machine into thinking it was hooked into a wired network and, despite the fact that it isn't nice to fool people, it has worked perfectly from then until now - wirelessly.

The phone handset has an earphone/headset jack for extra convenience; I've experienced no interference using the phone and its audio quality is fine. Better still, I love having a cordless phone so close at hand. You may have a cordless phone in your home office already, but the way my house is set up I've had to carry one in from the next room – a horrible imposition for someone as lazy as I.

In some ways, the machine is overkill. I don't need a digital answering machine, for example, because my phone service includes voice mail. But you may, and better too much flexibility than too little, right?

All is never perfect, of course. The output tray's a bit awkward to slide your hand into when you need to remove the paper and if you don't extend the little "stopper" thingy on its edge your paper spews out all over the floor (which at least means you don't have to slide your hand in!). I also wish the paper tray would hold more. But this is extremely nit picky and, after all, this unit isn't designed for the downtown office towers but rather is more for the small or home business.

Brother says the unit is rated to do 2,500 printed pages per month but they don't recommend more than 1000. That's far more than I print in a month, but it all depends on how much hard copy you need to output.

Another thing to remember is that inkjet printers are thirsty. Brother's website offers replacement cartridges for this unit it says are good for 325 pages for the Cyan, Magenta and Yellow and 450 for black. They charge about $10.50 for color and $24.50 for black. That'll add up quickly if you do a lot of printing. It's the nature of the inkjet beast, though, and not necessarily a "Brother" thing.

Perhaps you'll have an inkjet refiller in a mall near you…

In all, the extreme flexibility of the MFC-990CW is coupled with good performance and a reasonable cost of entry. So if you don't mind the ongoing costs that are the nature of the inkjet beast, this all-in-one could be a good choice.

Copyright 2009 Jim Bray
TechnoFile.com