Question All in one laser printer suggestions

[beatle]

I've been using a Brother HL-2240 for the past 8 years. I only have 1443 pages on it, swapping to a high yield cartridge 7 years ago when I got close to 500 pages. Never an issue with the thing, but I'd like to have the ability to scan/copy and maybe fax (I have an Obi200). Other key features:

- Reliable
- Scan/copy ability
- Wifi enabled
- Print from phone/tablet
- Scan to NAS (or Google Drive)

Fax would also be nice, but I could probably live without it.

The MFCL2710DW looks like a good bang for the buck. Is the 2750 really worth the extra bucks or is there another I should consider?

 

[bbhaag]

Back in February of 2018 I purchased the MFCL2710DW for my small business. It has been an ok printer for us over the past year and a half.
Some of the complaints I have is the Brother toner doesn't last very long even the "high yield" cartridge seems to run out rather quickly. You can buy generic cartridges that are better but because Brother has a propriety chip that they use you will have to take the chip off the old cart and put it in the new one. Not a big deal but still a hassle.
Also for the longest time, maybe for six or so months we were having trouble with printing over wi-fi. I'm not sure if it was a Brother problem or a Windows problem but it was really annoying. Sometimes it would work fine and other times it would refuse to print which is not ideal in a business setting. On the plus side that issue does seem to be resolved because sometime around February of 2019 it started functioning properly.
Can't comment on the print from phone option as we don't use that but the scan to NAS and scanner in general works very well. The quality is good and it does it scans relatively quickly. I like the option it has to keep scanning several pages so it creates one large file versus scanning several pages that each is its own file. It makes it easier to email orders to vendors.

We don't do a lot faxing anymore but on the few occasions we do it works well.

Anyway, sorry for the long post but just wanted to give you my impressions of the model you are considering. Overall we are happy with it I just wish the Brother carts lasted longer and I'm also thankful the print over wi-fi issue was resolved.

 

[beatle]

Thanks, good feedback. How many pages do you get out of a cartridge? The high yield in my current printer has about 60% left after printing about 1000 pages. That's good enough for me since I print so little.

 

[bbhaag]

It's hard to say because I don't really track it that closely. If I had to ballpark it I would say around 3800-4800 pages a year but we were replacing the Brother high yield cart 3 or four times a year. If it is supposed to print 3000 pages that just doesn't add up. Now we use the V4INK which we can buy at a much cheaper price and they last just long if not longer than the official Brother carts.
Since you don't print nearly as much the high yield cart would last you a very long time.

 

[beatle]

Good tip on V4ink. I could expense my old brother high yield cartridge back in 2012, but this toner would come out of my own pocket, so I was considering a generic. Apparently most of the carts from Amazon are fakes anyway, and the real McCoy is north of $70.

 

[beatle]

My 2710 arrived yesterday. A couple issues though:

No duplex scanning. This is kind of a drag. I did not really know it did not support duplex scanning. I had to scan in a doc today that several back sides. Scanned all the pages into PNG and then renamed them for the correct order, then printed to PDF. It was only 4 pages so not too big a deal, but I thought the "D" indicated duplex in the name. Guess I should have read the specs closer. You need the 2750 for this.

It does not seem like I can scan to a network location either according to the manual. The "network profile" can only be set up on the 2750. I can pull a scan from my desktop and then drop it on my NAS if I want, but I can't walk up to the printer and have it scan things in and drop it on my NAS. That is also a big drag. Should have picked this thing up locally instead of Amazon as I'm sure shipping will be very expensive to send it back.

 

[beatle]

Well I'll be. I can do a free return by dropping off at a Kohls. That's odd, but I'll take it. Just ordered the 2750. Stings to spend an extra $80 for that convenience, but hopefully this is a buy once cry once purchase.

 

[someone16]

Good tip on V4ink. I could expense my old brother high yield cartridge back in 2012, but this toner would come out of my own pocket, so I was considering a generic. Apparently most of the carts from Amazon are fakes anyway, and the real McCoy is north of $70.

Since you don't print that much I would stick to original toners. The quality on the generic ones are kind of hit and miss. Don't have a very big sample size, but my office uses generic ones and I get duds like 15-20% of the time. It sucks to swap in a new cartridge only to have it print streaks.

 

[beatle]

My 2750 arrived last week. I like it so far - scans directly to my server and the LCD is a nice touch over the two line display. When the time comes, I will experiment with resetting the toner cartridge until it is truly empty:

I agree that the real McCoy may be worth investing in for my usage.