Scanner Reviews

More economical than an inkjet, but do a price comparison of other machines, factoring in the separate costs of both the toner and drum. Brother's own specs. are deceiving, leading one to believe that a 20,000 page count for the drum means that one actually can print approx. 20,000 pages, when in fact that estimate is based on triple spacing -- when was the last time you did triple space printing? I also had the expectation that the toner would last for somewhat longer than it does - Brother should consider manufacturing high yield toners. Over the long run, if one is doing relatively large output printing, it is more cost efficient to purchase an HP.

Approx. halfway into the life of the toner, the "toner low indication" light appears, so there is obviously a problem with the toner sensor.

Sometimes the machine does not pick up faxes (I use the distinctive ring feature), although clearly people are trying to fax a document to me. I am not sure if this is a failing of the distinctive ring feature or the machine generally.

The automatic feeder function is generally unreliable if you try to fax or copy more than one page at a time; for instance, I have tried faxing/copying upwards of 10 pages at a time, and sometimes it will only fax/copy 5-6 of the 10 pages.

Sometimes the print command is unresponsive, and it will involve either re-sending the print command, or shutting off the MFC altogether. Considering the time required for warm-up, this can be annoying.

I could never get the scanner software to work, even after calling in techs to ensure proper installation, so have not used this function.

If the machine is within 5 feet of your work station, you will have difficulty hearing anyone on a phone.

Sometimes it would be useful to have legal (flatbed) photocopying capability.

Also, there must be a defective hinge, because the cover has always felt ready to fall off.

When taking the machine in for repairs, most repair shops will provide you with a courtesy fax machine, without distinctive ring, while the MFC is undergoing the typical 5-days in the repair shop. The problem with that however is you may not have a separate phone line for the courtesy fax. In other words, this defeats the purpose in having the distinctive ring feature in the first place, because you are either going to have to install another phone line or have to rent an MFC - the costs of which will overcome the initial purchase price of the Brother MFC. Unless, of course, you can close your office for a week and don't care if you miss any faxes.

My warranty has yet to expire, but I've already purchased an HP MFC to replace this product. The Brother MFC6800 probably suffices for most home and very small office purposes (overall, the printer works very well and produces quality output), but if you have high demands, don't want to in the long run spend a lot of money on toner, and don't want to stand over the machine feeding paper into the sheet feeder one by one, then keep looking for something more suitable for your needs. (I can't endorse the HP MFC just yet as I have not put it to the test, but I've done the cost comparison and it will be less costly for supplies.)

I was going to buy this just for the stand alone fax but after I installed and set up the whole package, I've turned it into my default printer. I've had multi function machines before but this is far and away the best. Maybe it's because it's a laser, but it prints and copies fast. The fax setup was a breeze as was installation. Output is very good. In short, a winner. True, it doesn't have color, but I have little need for that. I will admit I haven't tried the scanner yet, but the excellent fax, copy function and printer function make it worth the money.

I replaced my long-running Brother MFC-P2000 with this unit because of the excellent experience I had with the original Brother product. This one is even better! I needed to add fax capability and wanted a flatbed scanner - this model does it all! Trust me, if you need color, buy a less expensive ink jet for those times in addition to this one. The laser quality of this machine is perfect for any home office work you need to do. It is fast, SUPER QUIET, and produces excellent fax, copy, scan, and most importantly print output. The key layout and menu structure are simple and great. I recommend this product without reservation.

At a low price the scanner is a reasonable buy. Buying this scanner used may be a good option. Users may give up trying to install it, leaving the scanner in "as new" condition.

The "Check for OneTouch Updates" options starts to download then at the 30 seconds to go mark says it's unable to connect with server. When retry is chosen the time goes to 17,000 ± seconds. The update does not load ever after leaving the that time go by.

There were a few problems with the installation, but that's not unusual with many products. The one-touch features are a waste of programing.

I purchased the 8100 about 18 months ago. My OS was windows 98 and I had no problems installing the scanner software drivers. The scanner worked like a charm. The Paper port software allowed me to link to graphics, fax, and word packages. I updated my OS to windows 2000 and downloaded the scanner update off of the Visioneer site. Once again, the scanner works great. I read the reviews from others who purchased this scanner and was amazed that they were not happy with their purchase. Let me tell you a secret to getting this scanner to work. You must load the software "BEFORE" you plug the scanner into your USB ports. If you use Windows 2000, download the scanner update, run it, reset the computer, plug in the scanner and turn it on. Windows will see you have added the scanner and the drivers you downloaded from Visioneer will load. That is all it is to it. For the price, you cannot get a better deal on a scanner. I'm telling you, it works great.

I have had this scanner for almost 2 years and it's a workhorse. Under W2K, it installed swiftly and it's easy to run. I plug it when I need it, is recognized right away and I'm ready to scan. Photos, receipts, documents - this does a wonderful job on everything.

The machine is OK, the support... there is none. The software is a hack job, again no support. I loaded it on Win 98 & it created all kinds of conflicts with other software (Publisher from Microsoft in particular).

These machines are known for placing random ink marks on your paper after a jamb. If you have paper jamb inside the machine (as opposed to in the feeder), you will inevitably have random black marks on every page thereafter. It has been a continuing problem and since Brother doesn't have a fix for it, they tell you to replace, you guessed it, the $160 drum unit! That's over half the price of what they sold the machine to us for. Think twice before buying. As stated before, the scanning and copying on this unit leave a lot to be desired.

Considering that the street price on this machine is under $...(plus a... rebate) you are getting a lot of bang for the buck. What I was looking for a was a reasonably priced multifunction laser printer that would be used primarily for printing text, occasional faxes, and document imaging. I found what I was looking for in the Brother MFC-4800.

Looking at it function-by-function, the laser printing quality is excellent (and fast) when it comes to text, but achieves only average quality when printing graphics. For my fax needs the MFC-4800 fits the bill and even provides features that I'll never use (broadcasting, and fax forwarding, come to mind) .

The quality of the scans is acceptable for my uses (archiving phone, cable, and credit card statements, etc.) However, the document feeder does seem to be overly sensitive to slight misalignments, thus creating a scan that is at a slight angle. Copy quality is significantly worse than average, but acceptable for making copies for archival or backup purposes. If you need to make copies where appearance matters, e.g., of handouts for a presentation, definitely consider going to a copy shop, or even a convenience store.

As far as installation goes, I'm using Windows XP Pro SP-1 and installation was uneventful. XP drivers and software were included on the installation CD-ROM that was included in the package. Buyers of units that have been on store shelves for a long time may need to download the XP drivers from Brother's web site. The included OCR software works with XP. In a review on another site, and even on Brother's web site, I read that the OCR software was non-functional under XP, but I am able to scan a document and edit the resulting text with no problems.

Even if all you need is an inexpensive laser printer, the MFC-4800 should be considered especially since it is in the price range of most other single function printer only units. If you decide on buying it, you will probably find its additional functions to be icing on the cake.

I purchased this product to work on a project requiring scanning. After using the product exactly once, I didn't have a need for it for a while. Six months later or so, the scanner no longer worked. Since it was out of warranty, HP only offered service over the phone for a fee with no guarantee that I would get results. This product only offers a 3 month warranty. Is this standing behind your product? HP has lost my business, and I recommend that you consider another manufacturer.

I am not at all a computer genius, but I have used scanners before, and this is one of the worst. It's ultra slow, scan quality is awful, and you can't just scan an item and be done with it- if you scan a photo and then want to crop the image, it rescans the photo, then when you try to send it to a program or save it to disc, it scans it again. I find this extremely annoying, especially when I am scanning large items that I have to hold in place. I'm sure computer geniuses will laugh at this review, but all I can say is, I am quite unhappy with this scanner.

I was pleased with this scanner until I scanned my third or fourth document. (Unfortunately, this occurred after the 90-day warranty expired.) While scanning the document, I heard a rattling noise, and the scanner stopped scanning. I looked under my document and through the scanner glass I saw a small white plastic cap rolling around loose. The belt that pulls the scanner back & forth had come off its upper axle because this cap, which should stay on the end of the upper axle, had popped off. (Note to HP: The cap ought to be threaded, like a screw, or glued on, so that it does not pop off.) I tried to email hp.com to ask for help in opening the scanner and fixing this on my own, but my computer keeps getting an error message from their website emailer.

HP has made a quality scanner at a bargain price.

They've tried to make slide and negative scanning easy, and failed, but perhaps because it CAN'T be as easy as pressing one button on a scanner. You have to pay attention to details to get good results from slides and negatives, with either a $100 scanner or a $5,000 scanner, and I've used plenty of both.

The software leaves a lot to be desired in terms of responsiveness, but if you READ THE MANUAL... (strange concept, eh?) you'll discover that there is a control application called the "Director" which makes scanning faster and easier to control, than fumbling with the default user interface and its auto-preview delay.

I too had problems with the auto-cropping of whitespace and negative scanning, until I took 5 minutes to go to HP's website, read the TMA scanning document in the FAQ for this product, and do what it says to do (in essence: use the Director application instead of the scanner buttons). Which results in: perfect scans.

My only complaint re: negative scanning: the mount is difficult to handle, and shoving a long strip of negs through it results in light leakage of the TMA lamp, and dark scans. So, you HAVE to cut your negs if you have strips of more than 4 per.

Two stars for making a good scanner at a cheap price.

One star for putting up with ignorant consumers who don't read manuals, and for actually putting useful information up on their website. HP may no longer provide good human support, but the online support is decent.

Oh, and the software takes up NOWHERE NEAR 4GB, as one reviewer claimed. It is, however, atrociously slow (to be fair, I have yet to encounter ANY truly "fast" scanning software, on any platform).

An awesome scanner for the money. Paid $39 at Circuit City (Sorry Amazon). Works like a dream. Of course you could get a higher end scanner but it would be a higher end price to boot. Does everything that the model replacing it does for about $50 less.

I paid $40.00 for this scanner at Circuit City. I got it home and about 5min after I took it out of the box I was scanning and printing some very old photos (yes I did install all the software). I have used other scanners (school, work, kinkos) and this has got to be the simplest to use. Fool proof. Just press a little button, if you want to email your scan just press the button with the envelope picture, just a simple scan just press the scanner button. Like I said Fool Proof. I have no idea what others are saying about white space being cropped out and the guy that says you need 4gb to install the software is a total lie. I guess he must have something against the HP brand. I will admit that the lamp takes some time to warm up (30 sec.) but that is really no problem. I will admit that the scans that it makes are not as good quality as some high end scanners but it is really great. I have scanned some old photos that are like 3x4 and have printed them up to 8x10 with great quality. I give it 5 stars because of the price I paid, the ease of use and the quality I get from it with my experience.

Do not even think of buying this scanner if you are running XP or Win2k. It will not work on either operating system. There are no drivers available from Canon to upgrade from Win98 to 2K or XP.
I wont buy another Canon product because of this.

OK for black & white scans, but color scans are RED all over. Even the underside of the scanner cover, which is white, scans as red. Canon doesn't have a toll-free number for tech support and doesn't respond to emails. So don't buy this one unless you really like red.

All in all, I'm happy with how this scanner works. Unfortunately, the set up in Windows 98 was not as easy as I expected. My first scan came out with an extremely red tint. I called Canon about this problem and the first person I spoke with barely stayed on the phone for two minutes and his solution did not work, forcing me to call again. The second person suggested calling the software manufacturer (Adobe), which I did to no avail, they wouldn't help unless I paid $2 per minute. So, I called Canon again and spoke with someone who knew what they were talking about, and the problem was solved in about five minutes. So, if you purchase this product don't be surprised if it takes more time than you anticipated. It still is a good price and worth a little aggravation. The scans come out great, and I find the scanning takes relatively little time. Highly recommended.

It scans pictures with pretty good quality for the price, I have no problem with that. In addition, you can use both printer and scanner with only one parallel port on the computer. It's a little tricky to get this to work right, you have to boot up in the right order (printer first, then scanner, then computer) but overall still pretty nice to use both devices with one port.

The downside to this scanner is the software. Basically, it's all garbage. The only piece I use is the TWAIN acquire software attached to my Paint Shop Pro and Adobe Photoshop to bring scanned pictures in. In addition, I have a terrible time reinstalling the drivers for this scanner whenever I unplug it from my parallel port. My CD-ROM chokes whenever I place the Microtek scanning CD in my CD-ROM. I had to download the latest drivers from the Microtek website instead.

My recommendation is: invest the extra money to get a newer, more current scanner with at least a DECENT software package. But buy the scanner for the scanning, not the software that comes with it.

I concur with the prior reviews. The Scanmaker X-6 was a nice functional product for it's time, but I really had trouble getting it to install and run in Windows 98. After a couple of frustrating sessions, I got it to work (the included software Dynacion Swiss Army Knife did the trick) and it has worked well for several years. The already mentioned quirk of not recognizing the scanner unless it is turned on at computer system boot up was the biggest annoyance.

I just upgraded to Windows XP and the scanner was obviously not compatible. Went to Microtek's site and downloaded the updated software drivers. First install attempt ... the install program crashed. Waited a couple of days. Second attempt... install program ran, but then on reboot got a can't find some kind of .dll file message. Uninstalled the scanner and reinstalled. Third time.. ran install (setup.exe program in Disk 1 of download) again and it worked perfectly. Set up and ran on reboot.

Scan quality is still good... not as good as new scanner and is relatively slow (Extended parallel port EPP Interface), but also $100-$200 cheaper than buying a new scanner.

Good product, finicky "not so hot" to "crummy" install software. Nonexistent support from company other than downloads. I'm not an expert software, computer guy, just persistent and did get it to work. I'm using it with XP ... also works well with XP control panel scanner icon and software... but will probably upgrade to better scanner in next few months (Apr 2004 post)

I've had this scanner for about 3 years now. It has worked perfectly in Windows 98/ME/2000/XP. I mainly use this scanner for photographs. The scan quality is excellent, as evidenced by correct tonal reproduction. You can even scan 3D objects by placing them on the scan bed, effectively getting a digital camera quality image. The only downside is speed. This scanner features a parallel port connection, which severely cripples its performance potential. Basically, if you need an all-around quality scanner to be used for occasional scans, look into it.

What a waste of money. Purely a disaster. Lucky to get 2 scans without errors. Total frustration. messages:Scanner busy, scanner warming up; scanner not ready; scanner not available.
This makes the old Microtek look like a dream machine.
I have another Epson at home and the Smart Panel software is not so smart- there too- errors, lockups. I hope nobody else buys this garbage. Poor support terrible software.

I almost did not buy the 1260 Photo Scanner based upon a couple of other reviews. After using it for a few days, I sure am happy I did.
1. Since I run Windows XP with the Service Pack, I was very concerned after reading the problems a couple of other buyers experienced. I can now say this is not an issue with the Epson. When you open the box, there are instructions on how to download a 'patch' from Microsoft to ensure that the scanner runs perfectly.

2. I was also concerned with another reviewers comments about having to set up a 'phantom' printer. I use a HP Laserjet printer and I printed to that device without any problems.

3. Finally, one of the other concerns was 'ease of use.' Again, not a problem from my perspective. The scanner was set up and running perfectly within ten minutes (from box to perfect picture).

The quality of the photos and documents is very good from my perspective. I tested the scanner using the printer, sending a picture to an email, saving a scanned picture to a file, and including a scanned picture in a Word document. All functions worked flawlessly. What more could I ask? Well, maybe one thing. The scanner could be a little faster. It is not actually slow - just not real fast. Conclusion: All things considered, I do not think you can go wrong with this scanner.

This is my first scanner but it has been a pleasure. It has never caused any trouble and has always done what I asked. Sometimes I struggle to get the 35mm adapter to work (the optional attachment) but other than that, this scanner has proved to be a very good purchase.

I bought this scanner because of its low profile and "scan" button, and because my Microtek E3 was a great product. Unfortunately, hookup was a problem. Microtek seems to have written their code to require the very latest USB drivers from Intel, so unless you find the right support note on the Microtek web site (and the link to Intel's page) you will be very frustrated hooking this USB device up to your system. Even after a four-hour installation process, I still cannot get the button on the front of the scanner to function properly. The ScanWizard TWAIN driver is excellent, but don't bother installing the rest of the software. The OCR package is particularly poor. The only redeeming thing about this product is its price and it's low profile

After being quite content with my now-outdated Microtek E3 SCSI scanner, I decided to go Microtek again with the new slimscan USB. Although I would say that scans are slower than the older SCSI model, the overall quality is much better, and the interface is improved. As mentioned in other reviews, the OCR provided with the package is somewhat weak, but functional. I would recommend purchasing OmniPage Pro by Caere for higher-quality OCR recognition, although this may run you around a hundred dollars, last time I checked. The model is quite thin, although I too have had troubles making the button in the front, which is supposed to launch applications in Windows, functional. All in all a solid purchase at a solid value.

-Pete

I comparison shopped in stores and on the net quite a bit,checking out several product reviews. Basically, I wanted to add aflatbed scanner to my setup (which includes an all in one printer with sheet feed scanner) to save photos and to scan from books, etc. that can't go through a sheetfeed. I didn't want to spend alot of money, I needed somthing small to fit in my computer cabinet, and I didn't want a slow piece of junk. I bought a Microtek SlimScan C6 (USB) via Amazon.com. I had no problems with installation and was using my scanner in about 20 minutes. Software includes Adobe and Photo Impact for editing photos and Photo Impact Album for keeping track of them. I have 18 years computer experience but don't work in the computer field. Enjoyed the Amazon experience (my first) too.

Used scanner w/W98 with so-so results. Upgraded to W-XP.
Scanner doesn't work w/XP. Sent in $15 to umax for CD that
was supposed to allow 2000P to work W/XP. Re-installed soft-
ware from CD umax furnished, no go. Tried to e-mail umax for
some help, but ran into a long jump-thru-the-hoops process that
did nothing but frustrate. So, I now own a 2000P door stop.
If anyone is thinking about buying umax, I would think long &
hard about their products.

I used this scanner with great results for a year or so... was very happy with it. Then I started getting yellow bands on my scans (as have MANY OTHER PEOPLE -- most haven't been able to get rid of them). I haven't attempted to see if I can get rid of them because I upgraded to windows XP and UMax doesn't provide an XP compatible driver.... wonderful scanner... for a year.... if you have Windows 98...

I found the quality and speed to be just fine especially scanning pics for my web page. The software offers all of the options with regard to resolution, size and the various choices you may want to make for a scan if you are a more experienced user. It's a parallel port scanner so it won't work with XP but it runs great on win98. It might be good to use on a second system with Win98 or maybe for the kids on their system. It's not the best but I believe it's a decent scanner that can be found for an inexpensive price now.