It's tempting to look at a multifunction printer that offers fax and ethernet facilities and conclude that it's a business printer. The Canon Pixma MX895, though, more than almost any other MFP we've seen, caters for everyone. Everyone except the very small, that is, as this printer is something of a giant. Its chunky pyramid design does little to camouflage its bulk, although it does have a nice line in hiding many of its less-sightly features behind compartment doors. See also: Group test: what's the best multifunction printer?
While the likes of HP go to town on touchscreen interfaces, the Canon Pixma MX895 sticks to complementing its 3in graphical display with a mass of buttons – up to 16, in fact. However, this turns out to be a boon in a machine that has so many features – particularly the button-intensive fax. The cunning interface lights and dims buttons as and when they become necessary. If you're faxing, you'll want the whole lot. If you're browsing through your photos, though, you'll be faced with far fewer options. It's a good move that pays dividends on a feature-rich piece like the MX895, and makes it a cinch to use with or without a PC connected. See also: Canon Pixma MG2250 review - for a cheaper alternative from Canon. Read more inkjet printer reviews.
And so on to those features. We could mention the glut of connectivity options – Wi-Fi and Ethernet networking (with Bluetooth as an option) jockey for position alongside PictBridge and a fully featured memory card drive that caters for Secure Digital, Memory Stick, CompactFlash, xD-Picture Cards etc. The Canon Pixma MX895 can snatch files from Canon's online Cloud services, and mobile devices can make contact too. And then there's the 35-sheet ADF that works beautifully for copying and faxing.
Canon Pixma MX895: features
But, more than the features, we should mention how well they all work. The general speed is perhaps less than stellar, and its Fast and Normal speeds of 11.9 and 8.9ppm are no match for those of the HP Photosmart 7520, for instance. Neither are the graphics sensationally fast, although in the middle mode it does produce a competitive figure of 3.1ppm. What does impress, though, is the quality, which is top-notch. Colours are gorgeous and characters are sharp and focused. And with the addition of dedicated photo paper, the results are gorgeous, deftly constructing its images with the deepest shades and the greatest attention to detail.
Running costs for the Canon Pixma MX895 aren't at the cheaper end of the scale, working out at 2.9p for a page of black print, and a hefty 12.5p for a full-colour page.
The scanning component of the Canon Pixma MX895 also works very well, generating zippy times, but still adding plenty of colour and incisive detail to its scans. An adjustable lid would help though. On the upside, the copying facilities are never less than faithful to the source material.
Canon Pixma MX895 running costs:
- B = £10 C = £8.33x3
- B = 339 C = 200
- B = 2.9p C = 12.5p
Canon Pixma MX895 print speeds:
- Mono print speed: 11.9ppm
- Colour print speed: 7.3ppm
- Colour 4x6 photo speed (max quality): 79 secs
- Scan speed (A4 image at 300 dpi): 12 secs
