IT Pro Verdict

The MFC-L2750DW offers small businesses a wealth of multi-function features at a very tempting price. It’s fast and easy to use, print quality for general office use is acceptable and you won’t find more cloud and mobile features anywhere else.

Pros

+
Great access controls; Good value; Buckets of connectivity options

Cons

-
Background banding on photos; Cost per-page is a little expensive

In its largest assault on the SOHO and small business printing markets, Brother has launched ten affordable mono laser and multi-function (MFP) printers. The MFC-L2750DW sits at the top of its new MFP range and boasts 4-in-1 print, scan, copy and fax functions, integral duplexing, 34ppm print speeds, connection options galore and a sub-200 price tag.

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Along with USB 2, 10/100 Ethernet or 11n wireless, the MFC-L2750DW offers AirPrint and WiFi Direct plus NFC for tap-to-print mobile operations. Cloud features include built-in functions for scanning to and printing from services such as Dropbox, Google Drive, Evernote and OneDrive.

Brother's installation routine discovered the printer on our network and preconfigured the generous software bundle on our Windows 10 desktops. This includes a System Tray status monitor, TWAIN driver, ControlCenter4 (CC4) scan and print utility, Nuance's PaperPort SE 14 OCR conversion and document management software and a new Windows iPrint&Scan app.

Brother's Web Connect portal makes light work of registering the printer with selected providers; we supplied our Dropbox account details, entered the unique 11-digit code at the printer's 6.8cms colour touchscreen and PIN-protected access. After choosing the 'Web' option at the touchscreen, we could browse our Dropbox account, print files directly from it and send scans to the cloud.

Scanning to email doesn't get any easier either. Selecting the Easy Scan to Email app at the printer allowed us to register and PIN-protect multiple email addresses for sending documents to and there's no need to provide SMTP server details.

The printer has apps for sending scans directly to Word, Excel or PowerPoint formats and saving them to a cloud account or email address. The Scan to Mobile app scans a document, sends it to Brother's web site with PIN protection and displays a QR code on the touchscreen for you to scan in from your mobile and retrieve the document.

We used Brother's iPrint&Scan app on our iPad to print files and pull in scans. The new Windows app also provides these features but the iOS app goes further as it includes a firmware update tool and options to print from iCloud, Google Drive, Evernote, OneDrive and Dropbox.

Tough access security includes Brother's Secure Function Lock 3 which applies local user lists and function profiles to decide what print, scan, copy, fax and Web Connect services each one can access. LDAP and Active Directory authentication are supported, while the printer driver can be used to assign a PIN to a job so it can only be released by entering it at the printer.

The printer performed well - our 34-page Word document was swiftly despatched at both 600dpi and 1,200dpi resolutions in 60 seconds with a time to first page of around 12 seconds. The integral duplex unit halves speed, with the same document printed on both sides in 120 seconds.

Our challenging 24-page DTP document was also delivered at 34ppm at 600dpi but occasional pauses at 1,200dpi dropped overall speed down to 19ppm. The colour flatbed scanner is the duplex variety and using its 50-page ADF saw a 10-page single-side document reproduced in 34 seconds while a duplex-to-duplex copy took 93 seconds.

Print quality for text is great with super-sharp fonts right down to 6pts on both 80gsm and 100gsm paper weights. Reports with graphs and charts are equally clean but although graphics and photos are detailed, their overall impact is marred by an unpleasant banding in backgrounds.

The only consumables are the toner cartridge and 12,000-page drum unit. After exhausting the 700-page starter cartridge, we recommend using the high-yield version as this delivers a page for 2.8p although even this is at the expensive end of this market sector.

The MFC-L2750DW offers small businesses a wealth of multi-function features at a very tempting price. It's fast and easy to use, print quality for general office use is acceptable and you won't find more cloud and mobile features anywhere else.

Verdict

1,200dpi A4 mono laser MFP

1200dpi colour flatbed scanner

34ppm

600MHz CPU

256MB RAM

6.8cm colour touchscreen

10/100 Ethernet

11n wireless

USB 2

NFC

33.6Kbp fax/modem

2 x RJ-11

Duplex

250-page feeder

50-page ADF

Rec. monthly duty cycle -- 2,000 pages

410 x 399 x 319mm (WDH)

12kg

1yr limited warranty

Options: 2yr warranty extension, £30 ex VAT

RUNNING COSTS

Dave is an IT consultant and freelance journalist specialising in hands-on reviews of computer networking products covering all market sectors from small businesses to enterprises. Founder of Binary Testing Ltd – the UK’s premier independent network testing laboratory - Dave has over 45 years of experience in the IT industry.

Dave has produced many thousands of in-depth business networking product reviews from his lab which have been reproduced globally. Writing for ITPro and its sister title, PC Pro, he covers all areas of business IT infrastructure, including servers, storage, network security, data protection, cloud, infrastructure and services.