Large format printing and scanning at an affordable price...

Author's Rating:

Pros: 11"x17" Printing & Scanning
Individual ink carts (for each color)
Wireless and Wired Networking

Cons: Wireless networking may not be compatible with your network
It is BIG

The Bottom Line: 
Other than the difficult Wireless networking (see review) it lives up to all our expectations.

Author's Review
We bought our Brother MFC-6490CW all-in-one printer/scanner/fax when they were first released last year.  It has been used regularly as both a printer and scanner for most of the last year and we are pretty happy with our purchase.

That is our basic feeling but here are the details...

SIZE
The first thing that strikes you is how BIG the box is, when UPS/FedEx/Etc brings it to your door.  This is not a meek little inkjet that sits inconspicuously in the corner is is virtually unnoticed until it wakes up and spits out a printed page.  This all-in-one requires some space planning before you buy one.  For those of you looking at acquiring this model (or the new sibling, MFC-6490CDW ), note that it roughly measures 22" W x 20" D x 13" H (without the paper trays extended to Ledger size).  Double check your space so you don't get a rude surprise. Luckily it fit perfectly on our printer stand and just fills in the space at the end of the desk perfectly (yea!).

Looks
The printer is relatively attractive (as printers go) but will certainly not be considered a piece of art.  It is predominantly Black but also has a light grey accent around the front.

Controls
The controls are fairly well though/laid out, making them easy to use.  From our experience, relatively non-technical / inexperienced users should have no trouble deciphering how to use the functions of the control panel. 

One complaint I have about the controls is that it takes 4 key-presses to get to the detailed screen about how much ink is in the carts.  Even though there is an "Ink" button on the keyboard, it only puts you into a menu that takes 3 more key-presses to see what you are looking for.  They should have made that "Ink" key take you directly to the "how much ink is left in the carts" screen.

There is a tilt-able LCD monitor (3 1/8" x 1 1/8") that both shows you what you are setting with the controls and also displays photos via PictBridge to help you print pictures directly from a camera or other compatible device.

Other Features
Scanning and Printing at up to 11"x17" is what we bought this device for and it works great.  There are not many options for large format scanner/printers and this one is very attractively priced and also includes many other nice features:

·         OS compatibility
-   Windows
-   Mac

·         Printer connectivity
-   Wired Network (10/100Mbs)
-   Wireless Networking (802.11b/g)
-   USB 2.0 (of course)

·         Ink Cartridges
-   Individual Ink Carts (for each color)
-   High capacity ink carts available
-   Generic (non-Brother) ink carts available

·         Device management
-   Brother management software application
-   Web based management
-   Control panel

·         Fax
-   High speed - Super G3 fax (33.6Kb/s)
-   B&W and Color
-   Page memory = 480 pages (for when you run out of paper)

·         Printer
-   High capacity paper tray (400 sheets)
-   B&W (35ppm)
-   Color (28ppm)
-   Borderless printing

·         Copying
-   B&W (23ppm)
-   Color (20ppm)
-   Stand alone (no PC required)
-   Up to 11"x17"

·         Scanner
-   B&W
-   Color
-   Up to 11"x17"
-   Scan to:  E-mail, Image, E-mail Server, FTP, OCR, Media Cards, File and USB Flash Memory Drive

Power Consumption
In today's world where power consumption has become so important to many people, you will be glad to know that full power consumption is only 29 watts and a super low 6 watts when sitting (awake) ready for use and only 4 watts when sleeping.

Some Downsides
Downsides are all about size and a strangely incompatible Wireless networking implementation. 

More about that Wireless issue
The wireless networking is our biggest complaint about this printer.  Being an IT manager, I fully expected to breeze through the wireless setup and have this baby humming along on our network.  Wow, was I wrong.  Our network is secured (hidden SSID, WPA2, not MAC restricted, all on 3com commercial APs) but nothing is out of the ordinary for any reasonably well secured private network.  I spent hours trying to get the MFC-6490CW to authenticate with our network... to no avail.  Ultimately I cried "uncle" and plugged it's wired Fast Ethernet port into my Gigabit switch.  Considering it is within reach of that switch it does make some sense to use it, however, it was really frustrating to fail so completely at making the wireless work.  After working on this, I have read numerous reviews of this printer that criticize the wireless implementation.

Your results will varry and for those of you who have wireless networks that this thing likes, "bravo",  I salute you!

Summary
Overall we are very satisfied with our purchase.  It would garner the top rating if the wireless network was implemented better (-1 star for that).

It does everything as well as I expected. 
+ Scanning is good and you can fit really big things on that 11"x17" flatbed.
+ Printing seems to be reasonably miserly on ink and Generic Ink is available online for a very reasonable price (I get mine at ABC ink).
+ The copying function is easy to use and reasonably fast considering this is an inkjet printer.
+ It is quiet and produces so little heat, I can't tell it makes any at all.

Lastly I love the fact that it is super miserly on energy.  29 watts max!  In today's world, I wish more of the manufacturers paid a little more attention to this.

If you are looking for a large format scanner / printer, it is hard to imagine how you go go wrong with the Brother MFC-6490CW.