Canon MF Toolbox for Windows

Canon MF Toolbox 4.9.1.1.mf18 is a free Windows utility from Canon for scanning on MF series multifunction printers. You download Canon MF Toolbox when your office device prints and copies fine but you want one-click scanning to a PDF, an image, an e-mail or a shared folder from the PC.

Specifications

What MF Toolbox does

Canon's MF multifunction printers, sold as imageCLASS or i-SENSYS depending on the region, combine a printer, a scanner and often a fax. The printer part works through the standard driver, but scanning needs extra software, and MF Toolbox is the classic answer. It opens a small panel with large buttons such as Mail, Save, PDF, OCR and Custom. Each button stores its own settings: colour mode, resolution, file type and destination. Once configured, you put a page on the glass or in the feeder, press the button and the file lands where you wanted it, without going through a generic Windows scanning dialog every time. That makes the program handy in small offices where the same kinds of documents are digitised all day, such as invoices, signed contracts or ID copies. Newer Canon models use MF Scan Utility instead, so check which tool Canon offers for your exact model.

Supported systems

Canon's system requirements page for the driver lists the following:

• Windows Vista, 7, 8.1 and 10;
• Windows Server 2008, 2008 R2, 2012, 2012 R2 and 2016;
• the scanner driver and MF Scan Utility support Windows Vista, 7, 8.1 and 10 only;
• the UFR II (V4) and UFRII LT (V4) printer drivers support Windows 8.1, 10, Server 2012 R2 and 2016 only.

See the full list on the Canon UK requirements page.

Installation

1. Go to the Canon support page and select your printer model and Windows version.
2. Install the scanner driver for your device first; MF Toolbox relies on it.
3. Run the MF Toolbox installer and finish the wizard.
4. Connect the printer by USB or network and open MF Toolbox from the Start menu.
5. Set up each button once: file type, resolution and destination folder.

Tips

For text documents, grey scale and a moderate resolution give clean, light files; colour and high resolution are only needed for photos. If the program does not see the scanner, reinstall the driver for your exact model and check that the device is not in sleep mode. Download Canon software only from Canon's own support site: driver bundles from random pages are a common way to spread adware.

Pros and cons

• Pro: free and lightweight.
• Pro: preset buttons save time on repeated scans.
• Pro: direct scanning to PDF and e-mail.
• Con: works only with supported Canon devices.
• Con: dated interface.
• Con: newest models moved to a different utility.

Alternatives

For working with scanned files, our site also lists PDFCreator and PDF Candy Desktop for assembling PDFs, ILovePDF for compressing and converting them, and Adobe PDF Reader for viewing.