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Canon Pixma MP540 All In One
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When closed the Canon Pixma MP540 measures 44x35.5x15cm, the depth increases to 59.5cm when both the front receiving tray and the rear photo paper tray are opened the height goes up to 30cm.
To the right of the landscape scanner cover is a separate portrait action lid that lifts just beyond 90 degrees to show a 4x3cm TFT screen and on the base it reveals 14 buttons, when using it from the PC the only one likely to be needed is the on/off.
Just below this panel on the front of the unit is a door that reveals three photo card slots. The back left is where the power lead is inserted and the back right where the USB lead goes in.
This is a five ink offering red, blue, yellow and black and a separate larger black. Software installation took 7 minutes and 860MB of hard disc space. For a novice user there is a front end that guides for the more experienced you can go straight to the application you require. By default it creates 6 icons on your desktop.
There are four print modes, High, Standard, Fast and Custom the first three all give nice black crisp letters, the Custom mode set to speed is the fastest and gives somewhat grey output the normal 200 word test document printed at 14PPM and the more normal 1500 word document spread over four pages printed at 11PPM.
As far as photo printing goes to me anyway there is only one mode ‘best’ when printing on photo paper and while – within reason – speed is not important the only criteria for me is quality. This here is fine and to print an A4 borderless image or four images on an A4 sheet takes a quite acceptable 3 minutes 45 seconds.
With the card slots you and print direct from the unit, however the paper size choices are more restricted, 6x4 7x5 and 10x8 are possible, surely A4 should be included. A claim is made of 41second printing that I assume relates to 6x4 images my best was around double that.
As a copy unit (with the PC not connected) you can copy an A4 black and white page in 18 seconds and a colour one in 27 seconds. The options available are displayed and this includes reduction and enlargement all set from the TFT screen.
Scanning of course requires the PC to be connected and should you use the icon in My Computer you get the option of using Windows built in scanning solution or the Canon one. I choose the Canon one to be told it was not installed. The Windows option works but if you click on the Canon icon on the desktop so does this so the problem could be a glitch or maybe just a problem with my install. An A4 scan of a full text page took 20 seconds.
This is a reasonably priced unit and while there are faster out there it works without paper jams. The older Canon method of storing paper vertically at the rear means that photo paper does not need to turn. Paper placed in the rear (near vertical) tray is face forward while plain paper placed in the under tray is face down.
The two black inks might seem unusual but they are different the text one is pigment based for clear sharp copies while the smaller black is to give better tones when mixed the 1pl ink droplets give clear sharp images. 2400x4800DPI is possible from the scanner.
The software is good and easy to use making what you want to do easy to do.
Doing my Internet searches found the Canon Pixma MP540 All In One unit at a best price of £75.88 including free delivery from the first link below.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B001EO6Z5U?ie=UTF8&tag=gadge0a-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634
Doing my Internet searches found the Canon Pixma MP540 All In One unit available for €81,75 including free delivery from the first link below.
http://www.amazon.fr/gp/product/B001EVK41E?ie=UTF8&tag=gadge04-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1642
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