I also found out the hard way that the unit must be kept plugged in. I had the unit plugged into a powerstrip with the rest of my computer. I would shut off the power to everything when I turned off my computer. I couldn't understand why I was going through ink cartridges so quickly, so I called Canon support. After talking with two techs we figured out why I was having this problem. Power must remain supplied to the unit in order to put the carriage in a home position which seals off the ink cartridge so it doesn't dry out. After pointing out the fact that this was one major point that they forgot to mention in the manual they were very apologitic and sent me 2 new ink tanks free of charge.

I have used this unit for everything and have been very pleased with the quality of prints you are able to obtain with it. Grant it they are not the 1200 dpi resolution that you would get with some more expensive units but they are good enough to print out fairly decent color photographs. Quality paper makes a big difference! I have printed out business brochures which turned out fantastic on the higher quality paper.

I have been doing a LOT of scanning photographs for a family photo video that I am putting together. It does a good job of scanning these pictures but if you run one through the scanner feed more than four or five times you will start to notice light track lines across these pictures (even if you keep your feed rollers clean). Because of this I am currently shopping for a flatbed multifunction unit - Canon makes one called the multipass F50 which is also a multifunction unit but has no rollars to leave track marks on my pictures. This is quite a bit more expensive though so if you can get by with only scanning a picture a couple times the C530 might still be a good choice for you.

The fax speed is great with the G3 technology you can scan a page in about three seconds and with the error reporting feature turned on you will know right away if you fax has been sent or received properly.

The printer has a built in nozzle cleaning feature which can clean out clogged nozzles with just the touch of a couple buttons. Since I have been keeping the unit plugged in the nozzles stay fairly clean and my ink tanks last pretty long.

Don't be expecting a speed demon with this machine it is not a high speed printer - full color photos take a few minutes. Just remember that this isn't a $300 machine and you can't have everything for almost nothing and you will be happy with it. All in all for the money I would say that this unit is definitly a good buy.