Fit to print

INBOX:Brother's new inkjet range provides A3 printing for home use at a reasonable price, writes MIKE BUTCHER

DOES ANYONE print anything out any more? With mobile phones able to carry any manner of documents, laptops galore, presentations instead of handouts, why print?

But of course we’ll always need to print out. That’s not good news if you’re a tree. Plus, the limitations of the A4 sheet are wearing a little thin.

So printing on A3, even if colour can be something of a revelation, especially in, say, a home office. But usually colour A3 printing has been reserved for larger companies, larger machines. Not now.

There are inkjet printers coming on to the market that can do the job almost as well, bringing the price down for small businesses. A3 can be a handy format. You can proof larger documents, print posters, and fold spreads in half to make A4 newsletters.

And Brother now has the MFC-5890CN, coming in at just under €170. Brother has introduced two new A3 inkjet all-in-ones to its range. The MFC-6490CW will print A3, scan and copy. Its MFC-5890CN sibling just does A3 print but only scans A4, making it about €80 cheaper.

The result is a printer that does not take up too much room on the desktop and is the size of an older A4 photocopier. However, its black and silver appearance doesn’t exactly blend into the background. There’s a 50-sheet automatic document feeder on top and paper loads from a 150-sheet feed tray at the front.

The paper tray and its cover are telescopic so don’t protrude other than when printing A3 sheets.

The control panel has function keys for fast-dialling fax numbers and a number pad. A double-width LCD display means you can preview photos from a memory card while seeing a menu of options. Memory card slots can take CompactFlash, memory stick, SD/MMC, xD cards and there’s also a USB drive slot.

Luckily, unlike many printers, the four ink cartridges are very easy to access, install and replace.

USB and ethernet go inside, but phone, fax and power plugs in externally.

Brother has also paid attention to keeping the ink consumption affordable. The print quality of the MFC-5890CN is adequate – this is an inkjet after all, though it has a high resolution of 1200 x 6000dpi. The scan resolution is also high enough for scanning photo prints.

All in all, if you need the capacity to print A3 pages on a machine which sits happily on your desk, you could do worse.