Brother DCP 165C – Nothing More Than Disappointment

We loved:

Brother DCP 165C with its low cost to print and two year warranty might turn some heads in the market.

We hated:

Brother DCP 165C’s discomfited build quality, deprived output quality, outdated design, sluggish print times and no inclusion of USB cord are something’s that we hated.

Introduction:

Brother DCP-165C is the reason why people started believing in bad printers. In our labs during our testing on Brother DCP-165C, we faced so many hiccups that we were left shaking our heads in despise. It was everything you can imagine and be it the hardware malfunctioning or the poor output quality, the things to upset was really in abundance in Brother DCP-165C. Though, the budget buyer might cheer a little after seeing the price tag of $80, but will regret it later as they saw the print quality of their printed documents.

But the most interesting thing is that even to produce poor quality output, the printer takes all the time in the world and you will have to wait a little before you get disappointed with it. We urge that you stay away from DCP-165C and even if you want a really low priced printer, you should check the Canon Pixma MX330 instead.

Build and Design:

If you know anything about the printers or even if you have seen any of the modern printers in the market you can easily tell that the Brother DCP-165C is light years behind the printers that we have in market, be it the print quality or the aesthetic design. Right from our very first glimpse at the DCP-165C we had a low score for design for it in mind and there is no reason why we shouldn’t, even when you look at it you also will agree with us. Though, its long footprints at 15.4 x 14.4 x 5.9 inches (W x D x H) saves a bit of space, but the rectangular space definitely hasn’t got any sort of appeal for the modern consumers. Especially when you see some of the designing marvels in the form of printers like HP Photosmart Premium Fax All-in-One.

The façade of the printer comprises of the front lip of the control panel which definitely will give you the feel of dot-matrix printers used way back in late ’80s. The control panel has got rubber buttons packed around a pitiable one-line LCD which doesn’t even have backlit for night viewing. The screen of the printer is fixed at an angle which actually is impossible to view or read unless you aren’t hanging over the device. Even the characters carved are so petite that we have to actually have to peer to read some of them during our tests.

Located at the right of the screen, there is a series of buttons for scan, photo capture, power, ink levels, two buttons for color and black “Start” and stop/exit button. The photo capture buttons actually opens the folder to display the images stored on the memory card from the built-in reader, right in between the control panel and input/output tray. The reader also has got slots for PictBridge USB for connecting the digital camera, SD, Memory Stick, XD cards and CompactFlash.

Specifications:

Manufacturer: Brother International
Weight: 15.4 lbs
Dimensions (W x D x H): 15.4 x 14.4 x 5.9 in
Inkjet Technology: Brother Innobella ink
Ink Cartridge Configuration: 4 cartridges (1 for each: magenta, cyan, black and yellow)

Printing Technology: Ink-jet – Color

Microsoft Certifications: Certified for Windows Vista
Max Copying Speed: up to 18 pages/min (color)/ up to 20 pages/min (mono)

Supported Media Type: Photo paper, Plain paper and Transparencies
PC Connection: Yes
PC Connection: USB, USB host

Operating System Support: Windows XP Home Edition , Windows 2000 Professional ,  Windows XP Professional x64 Edition Windows Vista , Windows XP Professional , Apple Mac OS X 10.2.4 or later
Ink Palette Supported (Colors): Magenta, Cyan, black and yellow
Software Included: Presto! PageManager for Mac, ScanSoft PaperPort SE 11.0

Performance:

Brother DCP-165C performed exceptional in our speed tests, but not in positive way. It was the slowest of all the printers from the same price range, and this was not the case in one or two document printing, this was its performance in general, and any document we printed took maximum time possible for its printing.
In our photo printing test, it was even slower than its older “Brother,” the Brother MFC-685cw which was released in 2007. It took lethargic 0.62 pages per minute to 1.3 photos per minute of MFC 685cw. The results for rest of the tests were also equally pathetic and the DCP 165C continued floundering in the last place in any test it was subjected to.

Apart from speed the print quality was another disappointment for us and just as all the other Brother printers the DCP-165C also wasn’t able to provide us a consistent print quality. In all our print tests including, graphics, photos and test the print was nebulous and sometimes even hard to read, even after plenty of troubleshooting and print head adjustments there wasn’t any improvement in its quality.

The quality got worse for the colored graphics and print output were having spotty color blends that looked as if the nozzle wasn’t properly aligned with the paper. We even tried printing graphics in printers “True2life” and “vivid color” color settings, but neither of them was able to bring any improvement and the quality went down consistently.

Support and Service:

Brother backs DCP-165C with its with two-year limited warranty which comprise access to its phone support line from 6 a.m. to 5 p.m. PT. Generally printers comes with one year warranty and hence it was nice to see the extra year of support and we think even the buyers will appreciate the additional one year of warranty. Apart from the hotline support, there also is the online “Ask Us” program from Brother, which offers instant e-mail replies for any sort of troubleshooting, and there is even more support available through FAQs, manuals, software downloads and service center locations.

Expert Comments:

We’ve tested a wide assortment of printers, some with mind boggling performance and some with pathetic performance, but none of the printers we’ve tested till now, succeeded in frustrating us. But it was accomplished by Brother DCP-165C multifunction. Be it the counterintuitive setup, awful print quality, crawling output speeds and bland design whatever you say, they all are reasons not to by Brother DCP 165C. So put a little load on your pocket, spend $30 extra and you will be able to get yourself a Canon Pixma MX330 all-in-one printer which is a much better printer than this.