Usually I'd have bought this MFC from Amazon. However due to a sale it was less expensive to purchase at my local box store. My cost was under $70 for the unit, and it was well worth it.
This is a network MFC, and can connect as wired or wireless to a home or small business network. There is bundled software for Mac and PC operating systems. I have been able to install and get full functionality with Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP PC's and MAC laptops. If you don't wish to run this as a network MFC, it will also work well as a USB MFC attached directly to a PC.
Bundled with this unit is a free copy and license for Paperport 11. Paperport helps to organize scanned documents. It isn't fantastic software, but it is nice to have bundled with this printer. Also included is the Brother control center, which is software unique to Brother that helps control the MFC functions (such as scan a picture, or use OCR to process a document). For Mac's Presto PageManage is available with this printer. I haven't use this product, and don't know how it compares to Paperport.
Printer status and problems can be reported to any PC configured to accept status information via the Brother status monitor. If paper is out, or ink is low, a warning can either be popped up, or shown as an icon on the system tray (at least in Windows, how exactly this would work with Mac OS I do not know). If your printer is in another room, being able to see it's status from a distant PC is helpful.
On standby the MFC-J615W uses only 3.5 watts, other similar devices seem to use more power. Low power use is a good reason to consider this MFC unit.
It ships well packed, and is easy to open and set up. The ink is in sealed packages that tear open without the need for any scissor or knife. Most of the unpack and set up centers around removing tape and plastic that is just about everywhere. There are a few hard plastic pieces that must be removed to clear the inkjet cartridge insert area and to release the bottom paper drawer to open. The default for the paper drawer is to have very small paper (4" picture size paper), it needed to be adjusted (which is easy) to hold 8.5 x 11" copy paper. It prints on copy paper without issue.
The paper tray is a bit flimsy, it is made of thin plastic. The paper output handling is not great, which is why one star was removed. There is a slide out catch which is a thin 2" wide piece of plastic in the center of the output page, it doesn't work 100% of the time, and is extremely flimsy. Occasionally paper will fly out the front of the printer. The catch can't handle more than about 10 or so pieces of paper, if printing a lot, someone must go to the printer to grab pages out, or paper will be on the floor. If set up on a table or other area, make certain there is no airflow and provide ample room for the paper to fall to the front of the printer and remain in some order. This is useful only for very small, proximal workgroups or in homes, mostly due to the limited output paper handling.
Prints are not as vivid on standard copy paper as I'd have hoped. Colors look a bit washed. Recently I tried non-Brother picture paper and the colors came out looking great. To get vivid colors out of this printer requires high quality paper, without it, the colors are a bit bland. However for the price, and as a basic utility printer, this is very acceptable. I almost exclusively use inexpensive copy paper as the colors and quality of the print from this printer on regular 20 lb copy paper is more than acceptable to me.
There are vivid option and fine options which can be selected as defaults or per print, these greatly improve the overall quality of prints on any paper, but also increase the time to print each page. Color does look better on inkjet specific paper than on standard copy paper. Reasonably small point type can be read (7-8 point) without having to use the high resolution feature on regular copy paper or high quality inkjet paper. Pages print reasonably fast at the default setting, but no where near the rated speed from the description, more like 2-3 pages per minute.
There is a low resolution option and ink save option, I haven't used these. The low resolution option may get something close to the rated speed, but would probably only be good enough for drafts. In my home we don't print a lot of reports a day, and there isn't much need to get super fast prints. Also the large input tray only holds 100 pages of 20 lb copy paper, there is a smaller picture paper tray that seems to hold 10-12 blank pictures. 3rd party ink is readily available and inexpensive, there doesn't seem to be a need to try and conserve ink. My cost per page is about a cent or less for ink.
Set up for network printing and scanning is easy, the ethernet connection can be wired or wireless, as there is a built in fax machine with a touch tone keyboard, entering in a wireless password was easy (just type the number 2 multiple times to scroll through a, b, c, A, B, C, 2, and so on for each digit / number you need). WEP, WPA, AES, TPIK are all supported. Wireless range seemed reasonable but not stellar.
Network scans permit files to be sent to a PC with appropriate Brother software installed. You can select which PC to send a scan to at the MFC, or you can load the ADF (automatic document feeder) or flatbed and got to a PC then directly request a scan from the PC to pull a document in. Either way it was easy to scan. The ADF is also flimsy, and doesn't seem to hold the rated 15 pages, more like 8-10. So far paper handling of the ADF has been reasonable, there have been no jams, but occasionally a sheet will go a bit too far to one side and need to be rescanned.
A nice surprise with this MFC, and if I understand correctly with just about all newer MFC's is there is no longer a bulb warm up delay. My old scanner waited a minute or two when inserting something to scan for the bulb to warm up. The newer scanners with LED bulbs no longer need to delay before scanning, this allows a fax or scan of an item just about instantly. There is no longer any need to wait for a bulb to warm up.
Faxes can be sent to a PC on your LAN, without being printed. This permits you to save paper, and review a fax before printing. Over the years I've had several fax MFC's, and this is by far the best with my VOIP service. I have yet to have a fax at normal resolution fail using my VOIP provider (Ooma).
There is a nice LCD display on the front, which is backlit and in color, it is easy to read and can tilt. It offers status and set up information and makes using this MFC in stand alone mode very easy. It also helped when setting up wireless.
I have installed the free Brother iprint / iscan app on my Android phone (this app exists for Android and iPhones in their respective marketplaces), it permits these phones to print wirelessly to the J615W printer and also to scan documents to this printer. Unfortunately it only seems to work with pictures from the camera, it would be nice to print downloaded .doc, .pdf and even full web pages. Prints are reasonably fast, but seem to be fixed to the size of the photo. You can set the size of the image by the selected page size. The Brother phone application will enlarge the print to fit. 8.5 x 11 prints are borderless from the phone. There is a problem with very high resolution images, I got an internal error pop up when printing from my Android using the highest resolution. A crop or another picture at the standard (not the highest) resolution solved the problem. It seems like a bug or problem with the Android app. Still it's nice to be able to get direct prints from my phone.
Ink cartridges from 3rd parties are inexpensive, and the cost per page is very low. There are refillable 3rd party cartridges readily available. Brother brand cartridges seem to be a pain to refill, but there are numerous inexpensive 3rd party cartridges, some refillable, the cartridge size you will want is LC61. After 2 months of ownership, I have printed 137 pages of which 130 were color. On average my ink cartridges are more than 50% full. I'd estimate at least 200 pages per cartridge based on my personal use. I bought full cartridges from a store at Amazon (the printer ships with sample cartridges). The cost was $12.50 with free shipping for 3 of each cartridge. I estimate my cost for ink per page will be about 2 cents or less with the J615W. There are refillable cartridges which I may investigate later, for now the printer does a sufficient job and 2 cents per page is reasonable to me based on sparse printing.
If you want a modern, networked, capable inkjet MFC, this is a very good bargain in my opinion. The J615W is low profile, consumes very little electrical power, is reasonably fast, prints nice pictures, is inexpensive to purchase, is inexpensive to operate, hasn't jammed for me in 4 weeks of ownership, and works well with an Android or iPhone.
Note, this is mostly for a home with a small network and a few computers / laptops, or a small businesses, the paper capacity is limited, there is no letter feeder, paper handling is limited, but up to legal paper can be printed and scanned. Envelopes can be printed, but the entire tray has to be removed and replaced with envelopes. An envelope slot would have been appreciated.
The Brother control and status monitor software is very good, and lets me know when paper is out, remote configuration also works well, each button on the printer can be assigned to a program on my PC, for example when sending a picture instead of sending a .png or .jpg, I elected to send a .pdf so multiple pictures could be scanned at once and put in a single file on my PC. I am able to select which folder to put files from the printer. Brother also lets me remotely see the status of each ink cartridge and alerts me if ink is low. Multiple Brother printers / MFC's can be monitored from the advanced Brother control center at the same time. I currently have 3 Brother printers on my network, and get alerts if any have a problem, and I'm able to remotely monitor / configure each. For a home or for a small group, this is a tremendous value and is very versatile. Brother MFCJ615w Wireless Color Photo Printer with Scanner, Copier & Fax - Multifunction Printer - Wireless Printer - Inkjet - Printer'
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