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Brother HL-4040CN review

Verdict

A workhorse designed for larger networks, the Brother offers a good mixture of speed, print quality and features

Review Date: 4 Jan 2010

Reviewed By: Dave Stevenson

Price when reviewed: £216 (£254 inc VAT)

Overall Rating

Features & Design
5 stars out of 6

Value for Money
4 stars out of 6

Performance
6 stars out of 6

Details
Part Code	HL4040CNZU1
Review Date	4 Jan 2010
Price ex VAT	£216
Price inc VAT	£254
Performance
Features & Design
Value for Money
Speed rating	N/A

Basic Specifications
Colour?
Resolution printer final	2400 x 600dpi
Rated/quoted print speed	20PPM
Maximum paper size	A4
Duplex function

Consumables
Drum life	17,000 pages
Transfer-belt life	50,000 pages
Standard mono toner life	2,500 pages
High-yield mono toner life	5,000 pages
Standard colour toner life	1,500
High-yield colour toner life	4,000 pages
Supplied mono toner life	2,500 pages
Supplied colour toner life	1,500

Power and noise
Dimensions	419 x 475 x 317mm (WDH)
Peak power consumption	510W
Idle power consumption	20W

Performance tests
Mono print speed (measured)	22ppm
Colour print speed	22ppm

Media Handling
Input tray capacity	250 sheets
Output tray capacity	150 sheets

Connectivity
USB connection?
Ethernet connection?
Bluetooth connection?
WiFi connection?
PictBridge port?

OS Support
Operating system Windows 7 supported?
Operating system Windows Vista supported?
Operating system Windows XP supported?
Operating system Windows 2000 supported?
Operating system Windows 98SE supported?

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From around the web

I have this printer at home, and have to say it is an ace printer, bit pricey for home use maybe, but the quality and networking built in make it totally perfect for my requirements.

works with all my machines too, mac, linux and windows.

connected to my home network, printing via wifi is easy too, which means it's a doddle to use. the USB printing is okay, doesn't like difficult pdf files, but jpgs and simple pdf's are great.

By garykearley on 13 Jan 2010

Suspect Review

I have had this laser for two years now. After a page count (many form-fed) of 1426 it enforced replacement of all toner cartridges at once despite many being half full. This was made know to the WATCHDOG pages of PC PRO and Tim Danton. However this is what this laser does! Apparently after 1500 pages the toner mechanicals are shot! - Brothers own engineer told me this. So costs are FAR above what is quoted and this wa sknown to PC Pro before the review. Was it in there? NO! Check teh internet to see the facts and that this is true.
I hope this helps turn you away from this laser. In other respects it operates fine but will cost YOU a fortune to run! Don't buy it.

By DumbMarine on 14 Jan 2010

Toner fix

I use this printer for my small business. Impressed with the performance.

Not impressed with printer refusing to print at all if it detects low toner.

I print mainly black and white but some labels, which only use the colour orange. So I was surprised to see that all three colour toners supposedly ran out at the same time !

After replacing them I found out there is a hidden menu to reset the toner page count.

Open the door slightly (to toners)
Press and hold cancel
Press direct print.

A menu comes up which lets you reset the count for all 4 toners, in both high & low yield versions.

I've carried on printing for months by resetting like this. quality stil fine !

Another hidden menu lets you reset the drum, laser etc.

Open door
Press and hold go.
Press up arrow.