Brother VC-500W Compact Color Printer Review - Review 2022

A unique full-colour label printer, Brother's VC-500W Compact Color Printer ($149.99) uses the same cipher-ink (ZINK) technology deployed in today's mini photo printers, including our Editors' Choice HP Sprocket Select or the Canon IVY Photo Printer. With the VC-500W, though, you accept a lot more options, including churning out prints in varying widths and lengths up to 17 inches long, as well as Blood brother'south robust (albeit, at times, somewhat clunky) software. Like its pocket-size mini photo printer kin, the VC-500W is somewhat expensive to use, but it'south well-developed enough to serve both households and small businesses in printing full-colour labels for varying applications, making it the offset Editors' Choice in PCMag's new consumer color label printer category.

Mini Déjà vu

The VC-500W is not the offset label printer of its kind. Actually, it's the result of Brother's conquering and makeover of a previous product known as the ZINK hAppy Smart App Printer reviewed here dorsum in March 2022. Indeed, apart from the logo etched into the top of the chassis, the VC-500W and the hAppy look exactly alike. As you'll come across below, though, some upgrades and new software have brought this version up to a much more impressive and viable standard.

Though print quality and media costs are comparable, the main difference between the VC-500W and today'due south pocket-size photo printers is that the erstwhile gets its ZINK-brand paper from rolls, rather than individual precut sheets that you load inside the device. (I'll discuss media options and running costs in a infinitesimal.)

Measuring 3.8 by four.4 by 4.half-dozen inches and weighing 1.5 pounds, the Brother VC-500W is two-tone (with white sides and a blackness top) and slopes from a high point in the back to its low point in front. While most operations are handled via the bundled software, the gadget's minimal controls consist of three buttons—Power, Wi-Fi, and Cassette—as well as status LEDs for Wi-Fi, Cassette (paper whorl), and Swipe to Cut (cutter position).

Media rolls are attached to the dorsum of the device, as shown hither:

Your printed labels whorl out through an output slot located on the forepart of the chassis. You cutting them via a slider that scrolls across the top. Y'all actuate it with your fingertip.

As mentioned, you design your labels on your Windows, iOS, or Android device via Brother'southward arranged software, discussed momentarily. The VC-500W as well supports output from Microsoft Give-and-take, Excel, and Outlook via Brother'southward P-Touch characterization design and print software.

Design and Impress Apps

Another significant departure between the VC-500W and its pocket photo printer cousins is Blood brother'southward suite of label-making apps, which includes P-Touch Editor, iPrint&Browse, and Color Label Editor. Though that terminal one, available merely on Android and iOS devices and a holdover from the ZINK hAppy days, is a chip unwieldy, the programs make designing all types of colorful and dynamic labels a snap.

In many ways, P-Touch Editor and Color Characterization Editor provide indistinguishable functionality, though between the ii of them you get a wide range of clip art, fonts, frames, and other effects for designing your labels. Every bit mentioned, P-Bear upon Editor lets you pattern your labels in Discussion or apply Outlook or Excel to print batches from database records.

iPrint&Browse is, of course, Brother's default app for printing from and scanning to mobile devices, assuasive you lot to print from about iOS and Android apps.

So-And then Speed, Good Print Quality

Blood brother rates the VC-500W at 0.3 inch per second (ips) in Standard mode and 0.15ips in Bright style, which are nearly the speeds I clocked it at, varying slightly depending on content. Both modes print at 313 dots per inch (dpi). I tested the printer using a Samsung Galaxy Note 10 running Android 9.

Because that the other characterization printers tested hither print in monochrome only (with the exception of the Brother QL-800, which prints two-tone labels in black and cerise), comparing the VC-500W to them isn't quite relevant. In any case, during my tests, it printed 0.5-by-3.5-inch monochrome address labels in about three.v seconds in Standard mode. When I factored in cut, the time increased to almost 5 seconds, or about 12 cut labels per minute. Press in Bright mode took about twice as long.

Full-color labels have roughly the same corporeality of time to print. These speeds are less than half that of our electric current favorite consumer-grade monochrome labeler, Brother's P-Touch Cube Plus, and slower nonetheless compared to commercial-grade models such as the QL-800 (both Editors' Selection winners). Simply, again, comparison the VC-500W to these and other monochrome machines is apples to oranges. My experience is that the VC-500W is plenty fast plenty for what it does, and its output is well worth waiting for.

Specifically, output quality—aside from photograph output, which was neither bad nor spectacular—was excellent, with respectable particular; vivid, vibrant, and authentic colors; and minimal graininess. Photos were adequate, but not quite upward to what I've seen from mini printers such as HP's Sprocket Select, which are optimized (in some cases, quite impressively) for the task.

Somewhat Costly Labels

ZINK label rolls come in four widths—half, three-eighths, 1, and 2 inches—at lengths of 16.iv feet (1,968 inches), ranging in toll from $17.99 to $34.99. At these prices, a 0.5-by-3.5-inch characterization runs about 32 cents and a ii-by-iii.5-inch label volition cost you about 61 cents. The largest characterization possible is ii by 17 inches, and it'll cost yous simply over $two, with narrower media being somewhat cheaper.

Compared to Brother's P-Touch Cube Plus (and looking at 0.5-past-three.v-inch labels), the VC-500W's labels cost just 2 cents more than apiece. Larger labels, such every bit the ii-by-3.five-inch prints mentioned earlier, are slightly more expensive than similar (2-by-iii-inch) prints from ZINK mini printers. Depending on whether you buy a 10-, fifty-, or 100-sail media pack, for instance, the HP Sprocket 2d Edition prints for betwixt 45 and fifty cents an image.

In whatsoever instance, the VC-500W is a low-volume device not really designed for printing hundreds or thousands of labels each calendar month, and is therefore relatively expensive to use.

Labeling With a Bear on of Grade (and Color)

Equally long as your labeling tasks aren't loftier-volume, the Blood brother VC-500W is a keen little gadget. Without question, color-coding your labels in some situations can make things easier to find. Minor enterprises can also utilize this fiddling printer's output to label production and shipping boxes, for a touch of professionalism non otherwise available to them. The bottom line is that the VC-500W is, for detail homes and small offices that demand the color coordination, a highly useful gadget deserving an Editors' Selection.

Best Printer Picks

• The Best All-in-One Printers for 2022
• The Best Photo Printers for 2022
• The Best Light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation Printers for 2022
• The Best Inkjet Printers for 2022
• More Printer Reviews
• More than from Brother

Further Reading

• What to Do if Windows Can't Connect to Your Printer
• How to Recycle or Donate Your Old Printer
• New 3D Printing Method Takes Seconds
• Ford Creates 3D-Printed Locking Wheel Basics Using Commuter's Vox
• 3D Printing Helps Recreate Voice of 3,000-Year-Old Mummy

Source: https://sea.pcmag.com/photo-printer-reviews/36042/brother-vc-500w-compact-color-printer

Posted by: hancockfastir.blogspot.com

Share this post