Good fax machines?

[M.]

My wife needs to buy one for a business she runs from home. Any recommendations?

There's a Panasonic plain-paper fax that includes a digital answering machine and a cordless phone for about $179. Any reason I should ignore this for the pricier HP's that don't include the phone/answerer features?

[Thought]

I don't know anything about fax machines, but...

Does she need to receive faxes on paper? You can get a free account at eFax.com and have all of your faxes arrive via email.

[M.]

She mainly wants something that she can use to very quickly and easily send faxes and to make quick copies. Receiving faxes is secondary. She's not terribly fond of the idea of using a scanner for faxes, which is why I'm considering a dedicated fax machine.

I highly recommend one of the Brother MFC fax machines. I've had my Brother MFC-4550 since 1997, and I still think its a good machine.

MFC stands for multi-function: in addition to faxing its also a printer, scanner, and copier.

p.s. but it sounds like the panasonic machine you've found is suitable for your needs.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: ODB@WuTang.com on 2002-01-30 16:42 ]</font>

[M.]

How do the copies look from such a machine? Are they adequate? My wife will be using it for forms with hand-written comments, and I want to make sure all of it will show up with decent legibility.

If she's only sending (not receiving), then I think any old $2.00 fax machine will work fine. I don't believe there is a difference in resolution between low end/high end fax machines. If you plan on receiving, then you need to worry about paper, paper jams, etc., which is were better machines are nicer.

I use a $100 fax machine for sending our faxes, mainly because it's 3 seconds quicker than using the scanner. For receiving you should use fax software (computer) because:
1) you get plain paper faxes, without the cost of a plain paper fax machine
2) a complete record of all faxes ever received, maintained on your computer. I have every fax I've received in the last 2.5 years that I can review and print off at a moments notice.

I'm not sure what a scanner with a document feeder costs these days. If it's the same price as a fax machine, I would definitely go that way over a fax machine - from the receiving end it should be the same.

<font size=x-small>edited because I forgot "i before e except after c".</font>


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: glenn on 2002-01-30 17:14 ]</font>

On 2002-01-30 16:46, M wrote:
How do the copies look from such a machine? Are they adequate? My wife will be using it for forms with hand-written comments, and I want to make sure all of it will show up with decent legibility.

They look...much like the original.

[Griffin 1]

On 2002-01-30 15:21, M wrote:
There's a Panasonic plain-paper fax that includes a digital answering machine and a cordless phone for about $179. Any reason I should ignore this for the pricier HP's that don't include the phone/answerer features?

I use a Panasonic plain-paper fax for my business. I have never had problems with anything I've sent or received.

[Tobias Funke]

Originally Posted by glenn

I use a $100 fax machine for sending our faxes, mainly because it's 3 seconds quicker than using the scanner. For receiving you should use fax software (computer) because:
1) you get plain paper faxes, without the cost of a plain paper fax machine
2) a complete record of all faxes ever received, maintained on your computer. I have every fax I've received in the last 2.5 years that I can review and print off at a moments notice.

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