Brother MFC-9440CN
Manufacturer: Brother International Part number: MFC9440CN
- More product information:
- Editors' review
- User reviews
- Specifications
- Accessories
- Manufacturer info
- Bottom Line:
- Our quibbles with the Brother MFC-9440CN pale in comparison to the many things we like about it, chiefly its sublime combination of fast speeds with high-quality output. It's currently our favorite recommendation for a small office environment.
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CNET editors' review
Brother MFC-9440CN price range: $1,286.86
- Reviewed by: Felisa Yang
- Edited by: Matthew Elliott
- Reviewed on: 08/23/2007
- Released on: 08/15/2007
The good: Consistently fast task speeds; great print/scan quality; expandable paper handling and memory; onboard PictBridge port; ADF; network-ready; Brother ControlCenter is flexible and customizable; security feature is great for a multiuser environment.
The bad: No junk fax blocker; no auto duplexer; walk-up scanning options are a bit limited; color printing could use a tiny bit of improvement.
The bottom line: Our quibbles with the Brother MFC-9440CN pale in comparison to the many things we like about it, chiefly its sublime combination of fast speeds with high-quality output. It's currently our favorite recommendation for a small office environment.
The Brother MFC-9440CN is an excellent color laser multifunction printer for small offices and work groups. Its fast speeds, great print/scan quality, and large feature set are commendable. It's not without its shortcomings, but they are minor. Compared with similarly priced multifunctions we've reviewed, such as the Lexmark X502n and the Xerox Phaser 6115MFP, we prefer the Brother MFC-9440CN for standard office use because it carries out all of its functions well. If your priority is super-high-quality prints, you may consider the HP Color Laserjet CM1017, but its slow print speeds won't stand up to everyday office use. For everyone else looking for a multifunction that offers the features and performance that meet the wide-ranging needs of a busy office, we recommend the Brother MFC-9440CN.
Design
The Brother MFC-9440CN is a large printer designed for small offices and work groups, so make sure you have sufficient desk or table space for it. It stands 17 inches wide, 19.2 inches deep, and 19 inches tall, and it weighs a hefty 72.6 pounds. Hand wells embedded in either side help you get a grip on the printer, but it's large enough to require two people to move it.
The A4-size scanner lid is surmounted by a 35-page automatic document feeder. If using the flatbed scanner, the maximum size your original can be is A4, but the ADF unit allows you to scan legal-size documents. A PictBridge-enabled USB button sits on the front panel and supports both PictBridge cameras and USB flash drives.
The control panel houses a lot of buttons, but it's well organized. Task buttons let you switch among fax, scan, and copy functions. Eight one-touch dial buttons let you quickly access as many as 16 saved fax numbers, and the alphanumeric keypad lets you input unsaved numbers. Several buttons let you make quick changes within certain tasks. For example, the copy-specific buttons allow you to reduce or enlarge the copy, while the fax-specific buttons let you change the fax resolution, redial, or hang up. A backlit, two-line text LCD, the standard menu navigation buttons, and start buttons for color and black printing round out the control panel.
The paper handling system on the MFC-9440CN is flexible, an important feature for a multiuser environment. The standard paper tray holds up to 250 sheets of plain paper and can be configured for a variety of page sizes, as large as legal; an optional 500-sheet tray is also available from Brother. A panel on the front of the printer opens to reveal a 50-sheet multipurpose tray, perfect for making one-off prints without having to swap out the contents of the main tray. The output well has a capacity of 150 prints.
The MFC-9440CN uses a linear arrangement of toner cartridges. To access them, open the front panel of the printer and pull the toner tray out. The printer ships with standard size cartridges: the black is good for about 2,500 prints ($60), while each of the three color cartridges is good for about 1,500 pages ($70). All of the toner cartridges are also available in high-yield versions. The black cartridge produces about 5,000 pages ($93), while each color cartridge produces about 4,000 pages ($130). Using the high-yield versions for best value, we estimate that black-only printing costs about 1.9 cents per page, while full-color pages cost about 11.8 cents apiece. Both costs are within the normal range for a multifunction laser printer in this price range. The recommended monthly duty cycle for this unit is 35,000 pages, so it's best suited for a small office environment with moderate-to-heavy print needs.
Features
The Brother MFC-9440CN comes network-ready, with an Ethernet port in the rear. It can also be connected to a single PC via a USB cable and is compatible with both Windows and Mac operating systems. It lacks an auto duplexer, though the driver can assist you with manual duplex jobs. It ships with 64MB of memory, upgradeable to 576MB.
The copy features on this model are standard. You can make as many as 99 copies at once and reduce or enlarge via preset values or custom values (25 percent to 400 percent, in 1 percent increments). If you're using the ADF to copy a multipage document, you can opt to have the machine collate the copies. The printer will make 2-on-1 or 4-on-1 copies, in portrait or landscape mode, but doesn't support poster prints. You can adjust attributes such as quality, brightness, and contrast.
The manufacturer's settings for the standalone scan function are limited, but you can expand them using the bundled Brother ControlCenter software. If you're initiating a scan using the printer's control panel, your options are limited to e-mail, image, OCR, and file. Scanning to a file automatically saves the scan as a JPEG file in a new folder in My Documents. If you want to change the resulting file type or the destination folder, you can do so in the ControlCenter. Conveniently, the ControlCenter lets you configure the software button and the control panel button differently, so if you mainly want your scans to be saved as PDFs, you can configure the on-printer button to do so and still have the software scan button configured for something else. Other file options include bitmap and TIFF. One thing you cannot do when starting a scan via the printer is scan into an application--you have to go through the ControlCenter software. The stock choices are Paint, Internet Explorer 6, and PaperPort, but you can add applications to the list. The Control Center even lets you create four custom scan profiles. You can designate the target location, the target application, the scan quality, and the file type for each profile.
The onboard PictBridge-enabled USB port lets you perform walk-up print tasks. If you're printing images, you can't preview them, and you'll need to know the image's filename in order to choose it. Supported file types include PDF, JPEG, Exif+JPEG, TIFF, and PostScript 3.
As mentioned before, the printer offers eight one-touch keys, each of which can be programmed with two fax numbers, for a total of 16 one-touch fax numbers. Additionally, the machine can store as many as 300 speed-dial numbers (which require a three-digit code). If you send broadcast faxes often, you can program groups, as well (broadcast faxes can only be black and white). If you're away from your machine, you can have remote fax options turned on. These include fax forwarding, paging (the machine pages you to inform you of a received fax), and fax storage (the fax is stored in memory until you print). The one feature the MFC-9440CN lacks is junk fax blocking, a handy feature often found on office-oriented multifunctions.
One last feature we liked on this model is the security feature. The Settings Lock lets you program a PIN number and safeguard from having others changing your machine settings, such as date/time, quick-dial settings, and LCD contrast. The Memory Security keeps others from gaining unauthorized access to the machine. When the Memory Security is on, you cannot print received faxes, send faxes, copy, print from a PC, scan, or receive PC faxes. This feature is useful if you suspect someone in your office is abusing their privileges with the multifunction unit, and you want to keep costs down.
Performance
The Brother MFC-9440CN isn't the fastest laser multifunction we've tested in CNET Labs, but across the board, it's the most consistently fast across all tasks, if that makes sense. Let us explain. It produced black text at a rate of 16 pages per minute (ppm), behind the Lexmark X502n's 19.71ppm, but when printing grayscale graphics, it bested the Lexmark with a score of 15.21ppm. The Brother machine was the fastest with color printing, by far, when compared with similarly priced units, more than doubling some of the scores. It produced color text at a rate of 13.8ppm and color graphics at a rate of 15.53ppm.
At both grayscale and color scanning, the Brother again fell behind the Lexmark, but not by far. The Brother produced grayscale scans at a rate of 5.87ppm and color scans at a rate of 5.23ppm. The Lexmark was a half to a full page faster with scans. Finally, the MFC-9440CN came out on top with copying using the ADF: a fast 15.06ppm, nearly half a page faster than the Lexmark.
(in pages per minute)
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
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Grayscale scan | |
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Color text | |
Black graphics | |
Black text |
(in pages per minute)
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Copy | |
Color scan |
Happily, the MFC-9440CN doesn't sacrifice quality for speed. The black text prints were basically perfect, which is what we expect of a $700 laser multifunction. The text is sharp and clean, and easily legible down to 2.5 points. The grayscale graphics print was good but for some graininess in photo elements and a bit of lost detail as a result of the light end of the grayscale being slightly blown out. Color text showed good color blending and well-rendered characters, but some of the text looked as if it was shrouded in a bit of haze. The color graphics print showed sharp details and nice saturation, but the colors were overly ruddy.
The grayscale scan showed great, sharp detail. The only issue was some compression at the dark end of the grayscale, resulting in lost details in shadow areas. We're hard-pressed to find problems with the color scan: it's near perfect.
Overall, we found the Brother MFC-9440CN's print speeds and quality to be great, more than good enough for standard office use, and perhaps even good enough to produce some light, in-house marketing collateral.
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
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Black graphics | |
Black text |
(Longer bars indicate better performance)
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Color scan | |
Grayscale scan | |
Color graphics | |
Color text |
Service and support
Brother backs the MFC-9440CN with a one-year limited warranty. Toll-free phone support is available weekdays from 9 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. ET. You can also send an e-mail or a fax to tech support. Brother's Web site has an FAQ database, downloads, and manuals.
User reviews
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Nice machine!
by patcic on September 25, 2007
Pros: Very easy setup, fast printing
Cons: Color photos decent, not great.
Summary: This is my first ever Cnet review.
Finally junked my HP d135 and glad I did.
What a breeze to setup this machine on my 3 user LAN at home ...Summary: This is my first ever Cnet review.
Finally junked my HP d135 and glad I did.
What a breeze to setup this machine on my 3 user LAN at home via ethernet. No IP's to config, no hassles with the printer software finding the printer. I just put in the installation CD and it installed perfectly on all my pc's. I had the whole thing out of the box and running in less than 30 min. Fast printing, even for a one page color with no prior warm up. BW is very fast too. Printed a landscape picture of mountains and green forests and the print out was decent, not great. This is not important to me, if I want great photos I order them over the internet at .08 cents a print.
Software is excellant, very easy to use. Configurable scan button is nice. I set it up to scan directly to Outlook and a new message window pops up on my pc with the scan included as an attachment.
Machine build is solid, not flimsy. Packaging was excellant.
Purchased from Staples at $600 and then Brother has a $70 rebate you send to them directly. I found the coupon at Office Depot's website but it's a Brother coupon so it doesn't matter where you bought the machine.
This is day 2 and so far so good!Updated
Works perfectly! I would take back my comments on picture quality. Turns out it prints pictures fine, my orginal photo I tested was not of the best quality.
My wife and I both like it a lot!Updated
Works perfectly! I would take back my comments on picture quality. Turns out it prints pictures fine, my orginal photo I tested was not of the best quality.
My wife and I both like it a lot!22 out of 22 users found this user opinion helpful.
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A fantastic machine
by drh1sbh on January 5, 2008
Pros: Easy network setup, solid depth of color, fast printing, easy user interface
Cons: typical laser printer, a bit noisy when printing
Summary: Well, I have to say that I've given HP their shot; having owned a HP 7410 and the 7700 series all in ones, this machine is by far superior. ...
Summary: Well, I have to say that I've given HP their shot; having owned a HP 7410 and the 7700 series all in ones, this machine is by far superior.
I will confess to being an HP fan for years but both my last officejets let me down after only a year of service.
I wasn't sure about moving to a color laser printer but when I tested this machine for copy and print quality against the HP 7780 it was a hands down winner.
I've read the two negitive reviews on this machine and: ignore them. clearly these two users couldn't click "next" on a set up screen. This is one great machine. I had my eyes set on a Cannon but they don't make a machine with all the features I need. The Brother pulls it all together in a "bulky" but elegant package that works flawlessly10 out of 10 users found this user opinion helpful.
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Not good with MAC's
by Kona Boat on January 21, 2008
Pros: This is a great printer if your on a PC
Cons: For some reason MAC updates are far and few
Summary: I purchased this copier for my home/business. I've been a Brother MFC customer for the past five years. This year, I decided to upgrade and go with the ...
Summary: I purchased this copier for my home/business. I've been a Brother MFC customer for the past five years. This year, I decided to upgrade and go with the color laser printer. I've switched my main computer over to an iMac.
My only complaint I really have with this printer is the fact that it will not print envelopes. Seems like such a small trivial issue, but I print many envelopes throughout the month.
I called Brother Support, and they acknowledge the issue and indicated that they "will have an update soon" with regards to this glitch. That was two months ago and they still have not updated any issue with regards to MAC.
Other than this small concern, it's a great printer. I just wish Brother would figure out that MAC computers are going to play a bigger roll with their customers down the road, and I wish they would get moving on the few software glitches they have.8 out of 9 users found this user opinion helpful.
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Very good thusfar after trading in Samsung CLX
by Nate_Texas on January 3, 2008
Pros: Reliability and speed of copies/faxes/scanning
Cons: Poor envelope printing
Summary: After I previously purchased a Samsung CLX printer and returned it after poor performance, I upgraded to this model. Thusfar, I have been pleased with its performance. The copying/scanning/...
Summary: After I previously purchased a Samsung CLX printer and returned it after poor performance, I upgraded to this model. Thusfar, I have been pleased with its performance. The copying/scanning/faxing is very quick and produces great results. The color printing is great as well. I have not yet tried to print photos, but everything else prints just fine. I also compared this model with others for sale in many office supply stores and found the replacement toner to be more reasonable than say the Canon or Samsung models. The only problem I have thusfar is that when I print envelopes they seem to come out a bit pressed and crumpled, but other than that I would recommend you spend the extra money and purchase this for your small home or business office. It also works well on a network and setup was very easy.
6 out of 6 users found this user opinion helpful.
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defective & no customer support
by M.Seidner on December 10, 2007
Pros: functional
Cons: massive & heavy, unreliable
Summary: After reading positive reviews, I bought it with high expectations. After setting it all up, it wouldn't print at all. Five days and seven calls to Brother's customer ...
Summary: After reading positive reviews, I bought it with high expectations. After setting it all up, it wouldn't print at all. Five days and seven calls to Brother's customer support later, nothing had gotten resolved and I had been given the "run around" with everyone I spoke with. Customer support couldn't figure out what was wrong with it (even though I gave them the error code from the display), and were going to send out replacement parts. At this point I had lost all confidence in the machine, and was completely frustrated & annoyed by the lack of customer support. I happily returned the printer and purchased a different brand.
In Summary, the printer is comparable to many others in the same price range, but the total lack of reliability and customer service make it not worthwhile. Also, weighing at about twice the weight of similar products, the Brother MFC 9440CN is combersome as well. I would NOT recommend it!!6 out of 11 users found this user opinion helpful.
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Piece of Overweight Junk
by asocrates on November 5, 2007
Pros: Copier, Fax work fine
Cons: Color Laser Printer Quality Terrible!
Summary: The Editors Choice award & high rating convinced me to go for this overweight behemoth even though I have never owned a "Brother" before. In the past I've used ...
Summary: The Editors Choice award & high rating convinced me to go for this overweight behemoth even though I have never owned a "Brother" before. In the past I've used a Canon, Epson, Dell & HP & I have good color quality on all. However the color quality on this machine is a complete whitewash, even at a max 2400 DPI and vivid color setttings. I tried their nightmare of a website to download the firmware as per their faq's and I get nowhere. I e-mailed them & received a 7-PAGE TO DO list which I am trying to decipher!!Ready to send it back packing!!
10 out of 21 users found this user opinion helpful.
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Awesome priner for small business
by Leland_Hill on January 9, 2008
Pros: Very fast printing
Cons: A little slow with initial start-up
Summary: Overall I'm really pleased with this printer. Color is great and it prints very fast. All-in-one capabilities are very good. Scanning and copying is easy. Faxing works well too.
Summary: Overall I'm really pleased with this printer. Color is great and it prints very fast. All-in-one capabilities are very good. Scanning and copying is easy. Faxing works well too.
3 out of 4 users found this user opinion helpful.
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Printer good/Company BAD
by Lonny-Jarrett on September 3, 2009
Pros: THe printer works great when it works.
Cons: The software is way underpowered compared even to my 8 year old inkjjet. Very few options. COmpany a nightmare to deal with to the point of being unresponsive.
Summary: Love the product/hate the company. THe company is a nightmare to deal with and totally unresponsive. It's easy to wait 1 hour on hold without reaching a tech. ...
Summary: Love the product/hate the company. THe company is a nightmare to deal with and totally unresponsive. It's easy to wait 1 hour on hold without reaching a tech. Call Customer relations? THey'll say they will call back in an hour but don't. There is no excuse for such a large company to show so little support. Want to buy something? Ge through quickly. Already a customer? Good luck!
1 out of 1 users found this user opinion helpful.
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Decent Unit Flawed by Poor Color/Expensive Consumables
by sandorhoc on April 2, 2009
Pros: There is a fairly full set of features for a multi function unit in this price range. Meets all the requirements for my small business. Print quality is good and decent PC interface for most functions
Cons: Color quality is very poor. First page is a little slow coming out but after that it's ok. Consumables are rediculously priced. Life of consumables leaves something to be desired.
Summary: Not sorry I bought it but due to the cons listed above I will replace the unit or use only for B/W printing, copy and fax untill the belt ...
Summary: Not sorry I bought it but due to the cons listed above I will replace the unit or use only for B/W printing, copy and fax untill the belt needs replacement at which point I will replace the Printer. Can't see how anyone can write a four or five star review unless they work for Brother or it's ad agency.
1 out of 1 users found this user opinion helpful.
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A workhorse of a printer!
by gdallasc on February 28, 2009
Pros: Consistent and reliable printing
Fast scanning when used with a pc
Easy set up on a networkCons: Slow copy function
Noise level
Very heavySummary: I purchased this printer for my 2 man office based on CNET's review. I'm very pleased with that decision. There are a few minor cons, but overall this ...
Summary: I purchased this printer for my 2 man office based on CNET's review. I'm very pleased with that decision. There are a few minor cons, but overall this multi-function unit is a workhorse. For a year now it's not presented any problem, it just keeps on working. I highly recommend!
1 out of 1 users found this user opinion helpful.
Specifications
- Manufacturer: Brother International
- Part number: MFC9440CN
- Description: The MFC-9440CN is a network-ready color laser Multi-Function Center that offers a wide range of standard features ideal for any office or business. Produce vibrant, rich color documents and copies in-house without having to outsource printing them.
General
- Fax Type Plain paper
- Printing Technology Laser - Color
- Monthly Duty Cycle (max) 35000 impressions
- Display 2 lines x 16 characters
- Width 17 in
- Depth 19.2 in
- Height 19 in
- Weight 72.6 lbs
Memory
- Standard Memory 64 MB
- Max Supported Memory 576 MB
Copying
- Max Copying Speed up to 17 ppm (mono) / up to 17 ppm (color)
- Max Copying Resolution up to 1200 x 600 dpi (mono) / up to 1200 x 600 dpi (color)
- Max Document Enlargement 400 %
- Max Document Reduction 25 %
- Maximum Copies 99
- Copying Features 4 on 1,
2 on 1 Printing
- Max Printing Resolution up to 2400 x 600 dpi (mono) / up to 2400 x 600 dpi (color)
- Max Printing Speed up to 21 ppm (mono) / up to 21 ppm (color)
- Printer Drivers / Emulations PCL 6,
BR-Script 3 Scanning
- Optical Resolution 1200 x 2400 dpi
- Interpolated Resolution 19200 x 19200 dpi
- Gray Scale Depth 8 bit
- Color Depth 24 bit
- Color Depth (Internal) 48 bit
Fax Machine
- Compatibility Super G3
- Max Transmission Speed 33.6 Kbps
- Data Compression System JPEG,
MH,
MR,
MMR,
JBIG - Total Memory Capacity 1000 pages
- Reception Memory Capacity 500 pages
- Transmission Memory Capacity 500 pages
- PC Faxing Yes
Fax Machine Features
- Error Correction Mode (ECM) Yes
- Broadcast Transmission 366 stations
- Features Automatic redialing
Document & Media Handling
- Max Original Size Legal (8.5 in x 14 in)
- Original Type Sheets
- Document Feeder Capacity 35 sheets
- Max Copy Size Legal (8.5 in x 14 in)
- Standard Media Capacity 300 sheets
- Max Media Capacity 550 sheets
- Bypass Feeder Capacity 50 sheets
- Output Trays Capacity 150 sheets
- Document & Media Handling Details Input tray - 250 sheets,
ADF - 35 sheets,
Output tray - 150 sheets,
Bypass tray - 50 sheets - Speed Details Copying : up to 17 ppm - B/W,
Copying : up to 17 ppm - Color,
Printing : up to 21 ppm - B/W,
Printing : up to 21 ppm - Color PC Connectivity
- PC Connection Availability Yes
- PC Connection Ethernet 10 Base-T/100 Base-TX,
Hi-Speed USB - Network Protocols TCP/IP
- Operating System Support MS Windows XP Professional x64 Edition,
MS Windows Server 2003 x64 Edition,
Apple Mac OS X 10.2.4 or later,
MS Windows Vista,
MS Windows 2000 Professional,
MS Windows XP Professional,
MS Windows XP Home Edition,
MS Windows Server 2003 - Software Included Presto! PageManager for Mac,
ScanSoft PaperPort SE Power
- Power AC 120 V ( 50/60 Hz )
- Power Consumption Operational 495 Watt
- Power Consumption Standby 95 Watt
- Power Consumption Sleep 28 Watt
Miscellaneous
- Direct Printing Specifications PictBridge
- First Copy Out Time B/W 21 sec
- First Copy Out Time Color 23 sec
- Consumables Included 1 x Cartridge ( Black ) - up to 2500 pages,
1 x Cartridge ( Cyan ) - up to 1500 pages,
1 x Cartridge ( Magenta ) - up to 1500 pages,
1 x Cartridge ( Yellow ) - up to 1500 pages - Microsoft Certifications Compatible with Windows 7
Manufacturer Warranty
- Manufacturer Warranty 1 year warranty
- Service & Support Details Limited warranty - 1 year - On-site
Environmental Parameters
- Sound Emission 30 dBA (idle) / 54.5 dBA (operating)
- Min Operating Temperature 50 °F
- Max Operating Temperature 90.5 °F
- Humidity Range Operating 20 - 80%
Accessories
Manufacturer info
- Manufacturer profile
- Browse Brother International products on Shopper.com
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- Manufacturer:Brother International
- Address:
100 Somerset Corporate Blvd., Bridgewater, NJ 08807 - Phone: 1-908-704-1700
- Fax: 1-908-704-8235
