Brother MFC-5890CN review

As features go, being able to print A3 pages as well as A4 is a useful one.

The Brother MFC-5890CN manages to do so unobtrusively, too, as it isn't gigantic. And if your requirement for larger prints is only occasional, its 150-sheet paper tray telescopes in when loaded with A4 and doesn't project at all from the front.

This is actually a hybrid A3 and A4 machine, as it's only the print engine that can handle the wider paper. The flatbed scanner is an A4 device, as is the automatic document feeder (ADF) that sits on top of it, so you don't have the facility for copying or scanning A3 material. If you need A3 compatibility in a Brother all-in-one device, you should go for the MFC-6490CW, which costs £250.

Its controls are well laid out, with dedicated fax shortcuts at the left-hand side, a number pad for individual calls, an LCD display, mode keys, navigation and, finally, on the right, function keys to start and stop copy and scan jobs. The LCD display, as is common on Brother MFDs, is double the normal width, which is handy when browsing through photos from memory cards, as you can have menu options on display at the same time.

In our tests, print speeds were nothing like Brother's specs, with our 10-page text print coming in at 3.87ppm and a five-copy black text and colour graphics document clocking 2.52ppm. These figures aren't bad for an MFD, but the 15 x 10cm photo print took three minutes 12 seconds, which is slow when compared with similar priced machines.

Print quality was reasonable, but didn't have the clarity of some of its rivals. Black text looked a bit fuzzy, although colour graphics were bright. Our single-page colour copy produced lighter tones than the original, but was still usable, while our colour photo printed rather dark, with much shadow detail disappearing altogether. Print costs come out at 1.9p for an ISO black page and 5.3p for colour, both of which are good figures.