Brother MFC-665CW Photo Color All-in-One Printer with Wireless Networking

I purchased this model because of the "all-in-one" features. It can accomplish a variety of tasks, and for the most part, done it's job well.

HOWEVER... it's primary function is as a printer, and unbeknown to me at the time of purchase, Brother printers have a dirty secret, no one will tell you about.

Imagine, it's well past midnight, and you are rushing to complete that project or report before leaving for work, or school, first thing in the morning. It's time to finally print the job, and then get some sleep. We're not talking a multi-color task here; basic black and white, essentially all text.

The printer stops, and tells you the cyan cartridge is empty. Yeah, yeah, fine, will get a new one later this week, but for now, I just need to print this report, and then go to bed.

It doesn't matter that you selected "Grayscale" under the Properties menu, meaning, you only want black ink. This machine will NOT print UNLESS it is loaded with ALL the color cartridges, even if you just want grayscale! There is no "work-around", you are screwed, unless you always keep an extra supply of cartridges on hand (the full set isn't cheap).

Also, I never, ever had paper jams with my old HP as I have with this beast.

Bottom line, unless you are willing to fork out extra cash to always have ALL FOUR replacement cartridges standing-by, invest your money in another brand of printer. Supposedly, Epson also has the infuriating restriction, but confirm that for yourself, should you be considering that brand.

This is my first "all-in-one" machine so I can't compare it to other models, I'm generally happy with this machine with its ablity to do anything under the sun with an amazing price.

However after a while I noticed there are two annoying limitations:
1. the print speed is extremely slow.
2. it drinks ink like spring water! I got the "ink lever is low" after about one month of usage with about 30 pages being printed overall. What a surprise!

Another feature I wish is to have a cordless headset, I read there is acutally a step up model with that feature, but it didn't receive good reviews.

Even with these limitations I still recommend this machine due to its very resonable price and versatility.

I did a lot of research before I purchased this Brother MFC-665CW. Other than the standard Fax, Copy, Scan functions of an all-in-one, my primary criteria was that it have a 802.11b/g wireless interface and a small footprint. Without the phone handset, which doesn't have to be installed when unpacking, this unit is only 15.5" wide. Depth is 14.6" and height is a tiny 7.1".

The software installation and Wi-Fi configuration was very easy. The Control Center software is user friendly and using it with the unit is simple. Scanning documents to the PC over Wi-Fi is seamless. I was very impressed with how well the automatic document feeder works for a small unit. Another positive is that it has independant ink tanks so you only replace each color as needed.

Definitely a great all-in-one that I am very happy with. Highly recommended.

Bought it Sept. 07, not from amazon, and don't understand the negative feedback.

Reviewers Mark Twain and Super Dolfan state cost of ownership is too high.. i can replace all 4 carts-3 color, 1 black for $50 total and have printed 100's of pages, only replaced the black once. don't do a lot of color printing. Cleaning cycle is not done once a week, more like twice a year.. never had to clean or clear the heads yet.

As far as ownership costs go, take a look at HP or Epson and your costs are much higher.

Carolyn Stevenson said the unit jams and doesn't feed properly.. this is user error. your overloading the tray and don't know what your doing. My printer jammed once, cleared it in a few seconds and that was it.

It's obvious the 8 people who gave it one star should use a mac.

The unit took 10 mins to set up with usb cable, never had a problem with printing color/black, copies or faxes. The wireless is slower obviously.

No printer is perfect, they all have there problems, in the year i had mine, i had less trouble with this, than any hp, epson or canon in the past and i used them all and paid less than $130 for it.

If your looking for a solid all in one printer with fax/copy and wireless features.. this one can't be beat.

This machine is on of the most expensive printers/all-in-ones ive owned. If you are planning to really use your printer (more than a few pages a month) please take this into consideration: This Brother machine will completely disable itself if it has a low ink warning on ANY of the 4 inks. The ink levels are based on # of pages not actual ink used. I am very conservative and set this printer to low quality black and whit mode to save money. in 4 months I have had to change all the color and black inks twice- almost $200! Keep in mind i have not used a single drop of color ink. By comparison the same amount of printing would have cost me $11 on my Canon.