Canon Maxify MB5370 review: An inkjet printer tailored to business needs

Maxify = Combining the best of Pixma and Imageclass?

Those following Canon will know that the maker of EOS cameras traditionally has two printer series in its stable: Pixma and Imageclass. The former is inkjet-based, and has been in the company’s lineup for at least 10 years now. While it consists of both personal and business machines, the general focus around Pixma is still very much on quality photo printing. On the other hand, the Imageclass series typically consists of laser printers (both single and multi-function models) geared towards business users looking for the quality associated with the technology, be it fast print speeds, professional-looking documents, or high page yields.

The printer we’ve here today is neither a Pixma nor an Imageclass model. Instead, this MB5370 belongs to Canon’s recently launched Maxify series, and is inkjet-based. In short, you can think of Maxify as an Imageclass-influenced Pixma, designed to serve the needs of businesses better than the latter. And by better, we meant areas like high-volume color printing, fast document print speeds, along with advanced security, network, and cloud connectivity features. Of course, that’s not to say these features aren’t valued by the average consumer; it’s just that they are usually ranked higher by business users, than say, the fast 4R photo print speed we’ve come to expect from the Pixma models.

We’ve touched on the first three models of the new Maxify series in an earlier article, but to recap, the MB5370 is the flagship of the trio and is a multi-function model. It has two 250-sheet paper trays, and a 50-sheet, single-pass, duplexing automatic document feeder (DADF) for faster scanning of two-sided documents. One rung below it sits the MB5070, which really doesn’t differ a lot from the MB5370 other than the fact that it only has one paper tray and its ADF isn’t a duplexing unit, which means it scans one side of a document first and then the next side (essentially a RADF, or a reversing automatic document feeder). If you don’t need the copy and scan functions, there’s the single-function iB4070, which uses the same print engine as its two multi-function siblings, thus offering the same print speeds of 23 images per minute (ipm) in black-and-white, and 15ipm in color.

Design

The Maxify MB5370 looks more like an Imageclass printer than a Pixma printer, with its boxy shape and black matte plastic chassis. There’s this brushed treatment on the front door and the front of the two paper trays, which is pretty clever as it creates the illusion of metal on this otherwise very plastic-looking casing.

In its most compact form, the MB5370 has a footprint (width and depth) of 463 by 394mm, with the depth going up to 607mm if you were to extend the input and output trays to accommodate an A4 or larger paper size. While it has a USB 2.0 port that lets you use it as a personal printer, to serve other people in the workgroup and walk-up jobs, it’s clear that this 13.1kg multi-function device is best placed on an empty desk at a corner of the room, hooked up to the network via its LAN jack or over Wi-Fi.

Speaking of walk-up jobs, the MB5370’s top panel is home to a 3.0-inch color LCD. Because it’s a (resistive) touchscreen, there’s no need for too many controls other than the very essential ones around it, like Power, Home, Return, Start, and Stop. In short, while not backlit, these plastic, tactile buttons are generously sized and easy to press. Protip: If you do a lot of copying, scanning, or faxing, you can save commonly used settings as custom profiles for easy recall.

The business angle

BYOD is a reality, and one thing that’s common between the Pixma and Maxify series is their focus on mobile printing, and support for protocols like Apple AirPrint and Google Cloud Print. The go-to mobile app for printing what’s on your smartphone or tablet or saving a scan to the mobile device is the Pixma/Maxify Printing Solutions app, and it’s available for both Android and iOS. Then there’s Pixma/Maxify Cloud Link, a service that lets you access your files on your social networking sites and cloud storage providers (e.g., Dropbox, Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive) directly from the printer. You can even store your scans to the cloud directly or email them straight to the recipients; and on the MB5370, you can also scan or fax to a network folder for later retrieval.

One feature that we really like is the printer’s ability to multi-task. For example, it’s now possible to initiate the next task while the printer is still printing. For a multi-function device that’s going to be used by a group of people (often at the same time), this makes tremendous sense.

Settings Restrictions and Operation Restrictions are another two business-oriented features on the MB5370. Simply put, Settings Restrictions lets you set an admin password on your network and device settings - you know, so that unauthorized personnel can’t tampered with them. On the other hand, Operation Restrictions limit what the users can or can’t do on the printer. For example, you can specify that document copies are always made in black-and-white mode, or limit printing from or scanning to a USB memory stick.

There are also other features like the ability to monitor usage and program the device to turn itself off or on at preset timings. While they don’t sound particularly exciting to the average consumer, we can see how it can be useful for the cost-conscious business owner.

Performance

To recap, the Maxify MB5370 is a 4-in-1 device that prints, copies, scans, and faxes. It uses the same print engine as the rest of the models in the Maxify series, which explain their identical print speeds (in simplex mode at A4 size) of 23ipm for B&W and 15ipm for color printing. (In draft mode, we’re looking at an even faster 32.5ppm and 24ppm for B&W and color respectively.) In duplex mode, the speed drops to 8ipm for color. You can find Canon’s print speeds measurement report here.

Here at HardwareZone, our test patterns, which consist of Word, Excel, and PDF documents, each 4 pages long, closely mimic the ISO/IEC 24734 standard. As such, even though we use pages per minute (PPM) as our unit of measurement, we believe our results are a fair comparison to Canon’s IPM numbers. We exclude the first printout (because it includes processing time) when we calculate our average print speed - in other words, we’re measuring the print engine in full flow.

Print speed results

Using the MB5370’s default Standard quality mode, here are our print speed results:

Our simplex tests returned print speeds of 24.1ppm for B&W and 15.5ppm for color printing. For duplex, we measured 11.2ppm for B&W and 7.8ppm for color. In short, Canon isn’t lying about the print speeds, which is expected since it follows the ISO/IEC 24734 international standard. Another thing that contributes to the quick rate is the overlapping paper feed mechanism, which would draw the next sheet even when the current sheet is still being printed.

The first page out timings are looking good too: it can be as quick as 8.6 seconds for B&W and 9.5 seconds for color.

It’s worth pointing out here that these average print speeds will vary depending on your system’s configuration, software used, as well as the document’s complexity. To give an example, for our Excel document test, the B&W print speed in simplex mode is 20.8ppm; but for the Word document, it hit as high as 28.8ppm.

Here are the breakdowns of our print speeds based on the various document formats:

Copy speed results

A printer’s print speed only tells half the copy speed story. That’s because for copy tasks, the rate is affected by the scanner’s speed as well. It also depends on whether you’re using the scanner glass or the ADF. Once again, you can find Canon’s MB5370 copy speeds measurement report based on ISO/IEC29183 and 24735 here.

For our simplex copy speed tests, we rely on our 4-page PDF document printed in multiple sets to calculate the estimated throughput. ADF duplex scan and 2-sided printing settings were enabled during duplex copy tests.

Using the MB5370’s default Standard quality mode, here are our copy speed results:

Our simplex tests using the ADF returned copy speeds of 21.5ppm for B&W and 9.1ppm for color copying. These compare favorably to Canon’s claims of 21ipm and 10ipm respectively. For duplex, we got 9.2ppm for B&W and 6ppm for color, versus Canon’s 8ipm and 5ipm speeds.

To give another data point, it took about 28.4 seconds to get the first set (4 pages) of simplex color copy, and 45.8 seconds for the first set (4 pages) of duplex color copy.

With the flatbed scanner, we averaged 9.1 seconds for a 1-page B&W copy, and 13.4 seconds for a 1-page color copy.

In a nutshell, the MB5370 is a pretty fast copier, and that’s in large part due to its fast print engine. And because its twin-CIS (contact image sensor) ADF allows for double-sided scanning in a single pass, it’s also quite quick when copying two-sided documents.

Of course, in addition to physical copies, the scanner also allows you to make digital duplicates. The one on the MB5370 has an optical resolution of 1,200 x 1,200dpi, which is low compared to the Pixma MX927’s 2,400 x 4,800dpi, though it’s on a par with most laser-based multi-function devices. Perhaps Canon feels that Maxify’s target audience don’t enlarge that much, or a higher sampling resolution isn’t needed since the printer prints at a maximum of 600 x 1,200dpi. Whichever is the case, this is evidence of how Maxify differs from the Pixma series: more documents and less photos focused. That said, interpolated resolution goes up to 19,200dpi, which can be useful for niche cases like line art.

For those interested, it took about 32 seconds to scan a 4-page color document to the PC in PDF format at 300dpi. In B&W, it took 25 seconds.

Print and copy quality

We’ve already established that the MB5370 is a fast printer and copier, but is the quality any good?

At an arm’s length, it’s not easy to see the difference between the outputs of the Maxify MB5370 and a laser printer. Upon closer inspection though, it’s clear that a laser printer still produces sharper and more full-bodied text more consistently. The gap between inkjet and laser still exists, but it’s closing; and for the MB5370, we think that most users would be reasonably happy with its print quality. Color text, graphics, and photos fared a tad worse, with print dots often visible and less smooth gradations, possibly due to the lower resolution and larger ink droplet size.

Copy quality is also about average, though it’s again on a par with what we’ve seen from most inkjet and laser multi-function devices equipped with a contact image sensor.

Another piece of good news is that the Maxify printers use a new pigment-based ink that's resistant to marker ink and water spills. We've gone over the text with highlighters and even poured a cup of water over the printouts, and they came away unscathed.

Conclusion

Here's the all-important question: Is it worth getting the Maxify MB5370?

In our opinion, the greatest strength of the MB5370 is its fast print speeds and very decent image quality. And its appeal gets stronger if its business features (e.g., Settings Restrictions, Operation Restrictions, scan/fax to network folder) are exactly what you're looking for. The way we see it, the MB5370 is catered for businesses who print mostly documents; so if your business prints more photos than documents, or you're a SOHO user who frequently prints family vacation photos, the Pixma series (or other brands' photo-focused inkjets) is what you should be looking at.

For comparison, the MB5370's 24ppm B&W print speed is comparable to the Imageclass MF217w, which is a S$329 mono laser printer that prints at 23ppm. While the MF217w is cheaper, it’s lacking several features of the MB5370, like color printing, the single-pass duplex ADF, the ability to print from or scan to USB, and Google Cloud Print support, among others.

Versus the Imageclass MF8580Cdw, a 20ppm color laser multi-function printer that costs S$899, the MB5370 looks like a steal. Sure, the MF8580Cdw is a more robust machine, with a higher recommended print volume (up to 2,000 pages vs. 1,500 pages for the MB5370), support for UFR II LT and PCL 5C/6 print languages (the MB5370 is host-based), and likely to have a sharper text quality, they don’t mask the fact that the MB5370 provides a great feature set and performance for its price.

Versus the inkjet-based Pixma MX927 (15ipm B&W, 10ipm color), which is also a 4-in-1 device and costs S$369, the MB5370 is also faster. Of course, if photo printing is your topmost priority, the Pixma is a better choice due to its high 9,600 x 2,400dpi maximum resolution.

The Canon Maxify MB5370 is now out in stores, and is going for S$459. Supplies-wise, the PGI-2700 black ink cartridge that it uses is going for S$37 and the color ones (cyan, magenta, yellow) are going for S$22 each. They have a page yield of 1,000 and 700 pages respectively. If you print a lot, there are XL cartridges (S$56 for black and S$37 for each color) that print up to 2,500 pages in black-and-white and 1,500 pages in color.

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