Canon PIXMA MP640 Printer Review
Canon PIXMA MP640 Network ready Premium Photo Printer is a brilliant Wi-Fi All-In-One which gives you excellent photo quality and speedy document printing, copying and scanning. The PIXMA MP640 is built in seamlessly into home networks including a Wi-Fi and an Ethernet port.
Features:
Canon PIXMA MP640 All-In-One Photo Printer could be easily distinguished from the Canon’s new range of PIXMA all-in-one printers as there is one tell-tale sign; a blue, flashing Wi-Fi logo. It is a mid-range multi-function printer with several charming features been build into this machine by Canon as twin paper trays and CD/DVD direct print. It could be named as a device of substance, with the company’s unique design which sets the control panel in the scanner lid, protected when not in use by a fold-down cover, which itself contains the machine’s 75mm LCD display.
Particularly the control panel is well laid out with large, easy-to-use buttons for the main functions, two programmable buttons for context-sensitive entries and Canon’s unique little click-wheel for selecting menu options. Beneath the lid, there exists a standard flatbed scanner and if we lift the whole of the scanner section up, we get easy access to the five cartridges in the semi-permanent head carrier. Five cartridges include two blacks, a pigmented one for printing text and a dye-based one for picking out details in photo prints.

The front corner on the right hand side includes a curved cover, which hinges open to reveal three memory card slots, adding CompactFlash to the standard SD, MemoryStick and xD mix. In order to welcome USB drives as well as PictBridge cameras, it has a USB socket below the slots.
The Canon PIXMA MP640 Multi-function printer handles the paper in a very versatile manner, with a 150-cassette which slides in under the machine from the front, supplementing a standard 150-sheet upright tray at the back. Even though the cassette and the rear tray are capable of feeding photo blanks and plain paper, Canon recommends us to use the rear tray for photo blanks and the cassette for plain paper.
Canon’s convenient direct CD/DVD print facility is also available with this all in one device, where we load disc blanks into a carrier which slots in from the front, once we pull down an internal cover. Canon offers a good selection of support software, which includes an excellent CD/DVD label design applet and installation is also pretty simple. Canon employs a straightforward wireless connection, which is a two-stage process, where the printer is first logged onto the wireless network, using WPA or WPS so that the software installation then picks up the newly available printer.
Performance of PIXMA MP640:
Canon quotes ISO print speeds for normal mode printing and the headline figures on the PIXMA MP640 are 9.2ppm for black print and 8.1ppm for colour. But, in reality a five-page black text print returned a speed of 5.66ppm and the longer, 20-page document increased this to 6.56ppm. Moreover, five-page black text and colour graphics print gave 3.95ppm. These speeds are not too good, but are in the middle of the range for an inkjet all-in-one in this price range.
Duplex print speeds are better than before, as the paper rests for only a second or so between sides, which is not the case in some of the machine’s competitors as they wait as long as 15 seconds before printing the second sides. The appearance of the print is awesome when compared with a direct print, with colours coming out very close to the original with no signs of banding. Areas of solid colour are a little mottled, but then they are in the original prints too.
Colours are bright, crisp and clear. Black text is generally sharp and dense, though there is occasional feathering of ink into the paper fibres, giving a more fussy appearance. Still the photo prints are the best we have ever seen from any SOHO machine. Colour blends are clean and smooth with a better shadow detail. Colours are natural, bright, and clear, and correspond well to those in original images and foreground detail is sharp and precise.
The five cartridges are the only consumables in the PIXMA MP640 Inkjet Multifunctional Printer and they’re all priced reasonably. These are competitive with machines such as the HP Photosmart Premium C309g, tested recently, but a little higher than for any of the new Kodak ESP machines.
Warranty:
Canon PIXMA MP640 Network ready Premium All-In-One Photo Printer is available with a back to base warranty of one year.
Verdict:
Canon PIXMA MP640 is a versatile, well-designed, easy-to-use all-in-one device. This may not be the cheapest printer to run, but we do get some high quality photo prints, better than average plain paper prints and the facility to set up plain and photo paper simultaneously. We also get the facilities to print on CDs and DVDs and to duplex pages with less speed overhead than from most of its competitors. It doesn’t do quiet enough to secure an award, but it will not disappoint us, if we do pick one up.
Check other Multifunction Printers, other Canon Photo Printer Models in this website.
Canon PIXMA MP640 Inkjet Photo Printer - Technical Specification Table
| Manufacturer | Canon |
| Model Name | PIXMA MP640 |
| Printer Type | Colour inkjet |
| Dimensions (W x D x H) | 450 x 368 x 176mm |
| Weight | 8.8Kg |
| Languages Supported(LCD) | 22 Languages selectable: Japanese, English, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese, Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, Finnish, Russian, Czech, Hungarian, Polish, Slovenian, Turkish, Simplified Chinese, Greek, Traditional Chinese, Korean |
| Standard Features | Network ready Premium All-In-One Photo Printer with Wi-Fi/ Ethernet, Easy-Scroll Wheel and 7.5cm (3″) colour TFT display. DVD/CD printing |
| Sheet feed capacity | 150 x 80g/sm tray + 150 x 80g/sm cartridge |
| Media Types Supported | Plain Paper Photo Paper Pro Platinum (PT-101) Photo Paper Pro II (PR-201) T-shirt Transfer (TR-301) Photo Paper Plus Semi-gloss (SG-201) Matte Photo Paper (MP-101) Photo Stickers (PS-101) Envelopes Glossy Photo Paper "Everyday Use" (GP-501) Photo Paper Plus Glossy II (PP-201) High Resolution Paper (HR-101N) |
| Media Input | Front Tray: Maximum 150 sheets Rear Tray: Maximum 150 sheets |
| Max Paper Weight | 260g/sm |
| Print Head Resolution (dpi) | 9600 enhanced |
| Carriage Resolution (dpi) | 2400 enhanced |
| Scan resolution (ppi) | 4800 x 9600 |
| Number of ink colours | 5(2 blacks) |
| Memory Card Compatibility | Compact Flash Type I Multimedia Card Secure Digital (SD) Memory Stick xD Picture Card Memory Stick Pro MicroDrive MiniSD Memory Stick DUO Memory Stick PRO Duo SDHC |
| Connectivity Technology | Cable, Wireless, USB, PictBridge |
| Supported Operating System | Windows Vista SP4 Mac OS X v.10.3.9 - v.10.5 Vista SP1 / Windows XP SP2, SP3 Windows 2000 Professional |
| Software Included | Canon Easy-PhotoPrint EX, Canon MP Navigator EX Canon Easy-WebPrint EX, CD-LabelPrint |
| Power Consumption | 14W |
| Extra Features | Scan to card or USB, 75mm LCD display |
| Printing Software | Canon Easy-PhotoPrint EX, MP Navigator EX, Easy WebPrint, Solution Menu, MyPrinter, driver |
| Noise Level | 63dBA |
| Warranty | 1 Year |






