Slowly but Surely
Written: Dec 15 '99
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Cheap, Good Grayscale
Cons: Slow, Bad Color, Big
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| calbear81's Full Review: Hewlett Packard ScanJet 3200C Flatbed Scanner |
I bought the HP ScanJet 3200C at Staples after I needed to find a cheap scanner that I thought could do the job right. Having worked at a scanner company over the summer, I had an idea of what to look for in a scanner. At first, I was going to buy a scanner from the company I worked for, but then I had doubts. I ended up getting a HP because I had heard many good things about it. After setting it up and reconnecting my printer, the only setting I had to change was the Parallel Port Mode in my BIOS. With most scanners, you have to change the mode from SPP (Standard Parallel Mode) to EPP/ECP (Enchanced Parallel Mode) in order for both the printer and scanner to work together.
Speaking from experience, the scanner is very slow and I truly understand why it was so cheap. It took a minute to warm up and after that it took forever to do a scan. The quality of black and white and grayscale scans are excellent but the color was just way too poor. The colors usually came out too bright and might be a problem with the light reflection off of the white lid. If you're using Photoshop, you usually end up with an "okay" picture as long as you adjust the levels, or just auto-adjust them with a Ctrl-L command on the PC. The scanner is also way too big and becomes a hassle to fit on most people's desks.
Offering color-depth of up to 30 bits, the ScanJet 3200C boasts excellent color reproduction and offers high resolutions when used in certain programs. The software included was very weak. For the home user who just needs to scan in a few pics and send them or post them online, it's fine. However, for me, the limited access to settings on the Twain driver made it very troublesome to use. I couldn't change the resolution (DPI) on the images and was forced to manually change it in Photoshop.
My verdict is that the 3200C offers enough power for the average home user, but I would recommend getting a Canon or Microtek. If you have more money to spend than $100, then go for a higher line of HP Scanners after you've read some reviews on the color quality. I'm giving this scanner to my little brother and investing in a quality product next time. Sorry HP.
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
calbear81
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Member: Roger Wong
Location: Berkeley, CA
Reviews written: 45
Trusted by: 21 members
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