Canon PIXMA MX700 All-In-One InkJet Printer

Already in spirits from my new computer purchase not so long ago, and wishing for a better way to make hard copies of those things I had only in digital form, I went out and got myself a brand new printer. Needing all the trappings of an office, namely printing, scanning, faxing, and copying, and yet not entirely willing to pay an expense account-sized premium for the bunch, I got the Canon Pixma MX700. This is not the fastest printer nor is it the most feature laden, but this is a solid printer at a reasonable price and more than adequate for any casual home user.

The exterior of the printer is a dark grey and nicely matches my own, and no doubt, many others, computer. The printer is fairly standard in size at approximately 22 inches x 19 inches x 18 inches. It fits nicely and unobtrusively on my moderately sized home office desk (it does require some expansion room if both the front and rear paper feeders are in use). The most striking visual part of the printer is the small LCD screen mounted on the front. It measures 1.8" and is both large and bright enough to make its use simple and convenient. The idea is that not only can menus be accessed to control the functions of the printer, but photos can be reviewed from inserted memory cards before they are printed (the screen even allows for some photo manipulation).

Although I rarely send or receive a fax, I wanted a printer with that ability for those rare occasions that I need it and would rather not have to run to Kinko's or the library. As such, the fax machine has been very helpful and has met all my needs despite its rather basic feature list. The keypad on the front of the printer allows you to enter the destination fax machine easily and a dedicated fax button allows you to send that fax. This machine is missing some of the more advanced functions I have seen such as delayed transmission of the fax, but I imagine that most home users will not need functions like that. One of the nice things the fax does have is a built in memory. This allows for the receipt of a fax even when the printer has run out of paper or ink. The fax will be stored until the paper or ink situation is rectified and the message is then printed.

The scanner function of the MX700 has some features that I have yet to see and really improve its functionality - namely the document feeder and the options of scan output. The first nice touch is the document feeder on top of the scanner allows you to scan multiple pages without standing at the unit and manually changing each one. The other nice feature of the scanner is that it gives you options when scanning a document - you may save the document to your computer, attach it to an email, open it within an editing application, or save it as a PDF. This last option allows you to save your documents in high quality so that you might view them almost as well as the original. The scans have all come out looking excellent and lack the grainy quality of my scanners of yesteryear. When scanning a document and saving it to the computer, the unit gives you the option of picture format in which to save depending on your document needs. I have scanned more of my printed pictures in the JPEG file format and on comparison I actually have trouble differentiating the two. According to the included instructions, if the MX700 is on a network, the scans can actually be saved to any computer on the network. Since my unit is not networked I cannot attest to the ease or arranging that transfer, but since everything else with this printer has worked so well and been so easy, I will give the folks at Canon the benefit of the doubt. As far as the speed of the scanner, I was fairly impressed to see that the unit can go through about 5 pages per minute. Since I rarely scan a document longer than 5 pages or more than 5 pictures at once, I am almost always finished with my scanning in less than one minute. This, of course, allows for plenty of time to play with margins as well as blurring the faces in pictures to make the funniest moments of family gatherings all the more so.

The copier function is similar to that of the scanner and fax in that it does not have all the advanced functions of the more expensive machines, but it does have some nice features that make it very usable. These functions include, as with any decent copier, both enlargement and reduction of the copied image as well as borderless printing, but also includes, as might be seen on a more expensive model, the abilities to make a single copy from 2 or 4 documents as well as resuscitation of an aged photograph. I was happy to see that the copying is far improved over my last printer. My old HP printer rumbled along to complete approximately two copies per minute. This machine is able to complete the same number of copies in about half the time. In my rough test of the machines ability, I found that it could copy around 4 pages per minute. As with the scanning function, this should be plenty fast for any home user.

This printer has most of the common features as far as photo printing is concerned. There are a number of ports on the front to allow for direct printing from storage devices and, as mentioned above, the onboard LCD screen allows for browsing and selection of photos on the cards. As also mentioned above, some limited editing may be done on the LCD screen. These include red eye reduction, face optimizer, brightness, contrast, and some color changing effects like sepia and black-and-white. I have not yet had much experience with most of these options but I have used the red eye reduction as well as the color changing features. The red eye reducer works fairly well and has limited some of the more noticeable eye problems in my pictures. Unlike some of the older systems, this one does not leave the pictured with two white holes where they should have eyes. It uses a softer effect to mitigate the effect of the red eye. The color changing effect can be very fun and I have used it on many of my scanned pictures. I mainly use the black and white change and really appreciate the effect it can have on the drama in some pictures. I have also used it to the same effect on some of my family photos to rather nice results. Because the process is essentially a removal of color, there is no noticeable change in the quality of the image and therefore no loss in the appeal of the change. The photo printing is the slowest of the MX700s abilities and I measured that function at approximately 1 page per minute.

The quality of photos, regardless of the speed with which they are produced, is remarkable. The photo quality is so good, that when I scanned and reprinted onto photo paper one of my photos, not a single person I showed them to could tell which was the original and which the reproduction. Even knowing by looking at the paper used, I had trouble telling which photo was which. The color, clarity, and overall quality of the original are maintained as precisely as if it was reproduced professionally.

The paper may be loaded into the printer from two different feeding trays - one in the front and one in the back. This allows for over 200 pages to be available to the printer at should ensure that the printer never runs out in the middle of a large document printing. The instructions do warn that while paper loaded from the back comes out without being bent, the paper loaded from the front must go around a roller and is consequently bent. As such, photo paper and other thick document media should not be loaded from the front of the printer.

One of the most important parts of a printer is not its initial cost, but the cost to keep it going. The ink is the most important factor in the equation and is thankfully not too painful with this printer. There are four different ink cartridges that must be filled and I found all of them online for about $15. In the three months I have had this printer I have yet to run out of ink (with moderate use). Because of that I cannot comment on how many pages one might expect to get from a cartridge. I did check online and according to Canon, the MX700 costs about $0.03 to print a black-only page about $0.06 to print a color page. This is far better than with older printers that sometimes cost in excess of $0.30 to print a single color page.

The biggest problem I have with this printer is its lack of a single function: duplex printing. I have often employed this function in the past in an effort to spare the environment some o f its trees. I only forgive the folks at Canon for two reasons: I know that this function is usually a modular function seen on expensive office printers and also because include a handy guide that tells you how to take your one sided printing result and place it back into the printer in such a manner that the other side is properly printed.

Over all, this is a great printer for the home user. It does not have all the functions of the more expensive printers but it certainly has some of them. While the Canon cannot do everything, what it can, it does very well. The printer makes quick and high quality scans, photos, and copies and will do what is necessary as a fax machine. The average home user will be more than satisfied with everything this machine can do and more than happy with what it costs to get the job done.