Comments on: Review of Canon PIXMA MX870 Office All-In-One Printer

By: jen

jen — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 06:31:00 +0000

did you get an answer on this – same dilemma

By: Bruceabrahams

Bruceabrahams — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 18:33:00 +0000

Ink usage is incredible. I printed a few pages and every few days I can see the color ink bars decrease. Right now, after printing only a few color pages (the rest black and white), I have one bar left on the color inks. Ridiculous. I guess it uses ink even when you are not using it.

Auto fax answer is awful if you are using one line as the fax will interrupt your phone call and send screeching into the caller’s ear.

By: ricardoj

ricardoj — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 05:35:00 +0000

First time to this site… Must say your reviews (at least this one, only one I have seen) definitively stand out from other review sites which seem to have the template, “its good on this, bad on that, manufacturer says this. I recommend…” blah, blah, which isn’t THAT helpful. This review ROCKS!! (excuse my bullshitness, but I’m just happy I finally found the info I was looking for here…)

By: david

david — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 19:23:15 +0000

how does the wifi connect to a macbook pro?

By: Sunny

Sunny — Sat, 14 Aug 2010 09:09:36 +0000

Hi, Thanks a lot for this detailed info…

I have couple of questions :
-> Is it easy and quick enough to send and RECEIVE fax ???
-> Hw much ink it consumes? I have heard a lot about massive ink usage. Is it true ?

By: darby

darby — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 22:31:56 +0000

You can buy and replace the black ink individually

By: Aman

Aman — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 06:43:03 +0000

Hi Guys,
Please advise if this printer will still work if I use Black ink only. I dont need colour printing and dont want to buy a printer in which I have to have coloured ink all the time.
Thanks

By: ItsMichaelNotMike

ItsMichaelNotMike — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 04:18:12 +0000

Great review. I had been using Canon Pixma MP830 before I bought this unit, just today at Staples for $165 tax included.

The Canon Pixma series all-in-ones have been top rated for years (at least since 2005 when I bought my first Pixma). People complaining about aspects of the Pixma are entitled to their opinions, but let me respond:

1. In regards to ink, inks for any printer are super expensive, regardless of printer manufacturer (yes, Kodak has come out with cheap inks, but that’s the exception). For example, buy a set of HP inks for any one of its ink-jet printers, that’s going to cost you $45.

The way to avoid this is to shop for inks on eBay. Don’t buy the refill kits. Those are a mess to work with and self-refilled cartridges never work right. At least I have never been able to get them to work correctly.

Also, since refills require chips, shop for refills that include the microchip. If you opt for the ones without chip you have to carefully remove the old chip off the empty cartridge and tape it to the refill cartridge. That’s a hassle.

Lastly on ink, buy from sellers who sell only inks. They have the expertise to know what is the type of ink your printer requires and will make sure you are happy. They usually sell the refills at the lowest price.

For example, I just bought four 5-cartridge sets with chip for $60 shipped. And the eBay seller guarantees the refills.

2. As to functionality, you have to remember what these are. All-in-ones perform a lot of tasks efficiently, but not the fastest or best quality as might be experienced with dedicated machines. For example, we have office scanners that scan 300 DPI black and white at 30 pages a minute. That performance level should not be compared to these little “putt putt” scanners.

For me, if I can scan at 300 DPI at 5 pages a minute I am fine with that since I would not use the PIXMA in an office setting.

3. I have used HP, Canon, Brother and other all-in-ones. IMHO the reviewers are correct, the PIXMA line is the best of the lot.

By the way Consumer Reports rated PIXMA multi-functions the best.

By: allprintrssuc

allprintrssuc — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 14:24:49 +0000

Don’t get a home printer if you can’t afford the wasted ink. Fact is, ALL home printers blow ink and are slower than $15,000 corporate printers. So drop your unrealistic expectations before getting home printers. Better yet, be cheap and use the ones at your employers and milk their ink and supplies.

By: CANONISED

CANONISED — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 13:45:39 +0000

I own a canon MP800R and vowed never to buy Canon again – sure the print quality is higher than others, but the amazinging irritating features in most canons is still present. Canons blow a ton of ink each time you turn them on. They stuff about for ages on power up, cleaning heads and consuming your valuable ink – a built-in canon profit margin to say the least.
Canons are also slooow at scanning anything above 150dpi to the point of being useless. Also, duplex printing is mind-numbingly slow on this MX870, and the scanner cover cannot handle thick items like books very well.

I’ll be going elsewhere.

By: James

James — Sun, 23 May 2010 03:49:33 +0000

Thanks for the photos, was looking for confirmation it had a flatbed scanner under the ADF. Any news on the scanning ‘cutting’ crop issue the reviewer mentions?

By: André Zijlstra

André Zijlstra — Fri, 21 May 2010 14:28:49 +0000

I bought this printer a few weeks ago and I love the machine. I like the feature to scan to USB. The MX870 handles it all very well, and the instructions are easy to follow. Scanning to PC or email still is a mystery to me. When I choose this option no PC comes up in the list allthough I can print or scan wirelessly. Suggestions are welcome!

Greetz,
André

By: Richard

Richard — Fri, 07 May 2010 11:15:03 +0000

You guy’s Rock! Awesome and complete review, made it an easy choice for me when looking to replace my antiquated flat bed and ink jet combination. Your review was much better than those I found on CNET. From now on I will check yours first! Thanks again!!

By: sparky

sparky — Thu, 06 May 2010 03:07:08 +0000

Very detailed and helpful review. Just one question but since I’ve not bought an all in one before, am I able to RECEIVE faxes as well as send? And I’m wondering if with an AP will I be able to print from an iPad?
Many thanks.

By: Matt

Matt — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 02:19:24 +0000

Very nice review, very detailed and answered many of my questions. Would like to know, when you scan a document, can it be scanned directly to something like a network hard drive, is the scan feature limited to just scanning to a computer?