HP ScanJet 7400C

SCSI, USB flatbed scanner handles pages and transparencies, too.

Product: HP ScanJet 7400C color scanner
From: Hewlett-Packard
For: Windows PCs, Macintosh
Street Price: About US$470
Pros: SCSI-2 and USB 1.1 connections. PrecisionScan Pro software includes advanced image image enhancement features. Other bundled software provides text recognition via OCR, creative print formatting, scan to web, network scanning features. Front-button access to color and B&W scan modes, scan-to-fax, email, OCR, and several other features. Energy Star-compliant sleep mode. 8.5" by 14" maximum document size. A transparency adapter suitable for scanning negatives, slides or 5x5" transparencies, is included. True 2400-dpi optical resolution.
Cons: No on/off switch on the unit. Because USB is not supported by some computers (e.g., those running Windows NT), some users may require an additional cost SCSI interface and cable (US$60). Firmware bug on some units causes 2400-dpi negative scans to be rendered incorrectly.

Introduction
The wide selection of "entry-level" scanners has led to a greater-than-ever number of computer users now including a scanner in their computer purchase or upgrade plans. This article will examine the reasons why you may want to spend a few hundred dollars extra for a model such as the HP ScanJet 7400C with additional capabilities.

The ScanJet 7400 series replaces HP's previous ScanJet 6300 family of scanners. In addition to the 7400C we reviewed, the company also offers the ScanJet 7450C, which includes all of the features of the 7400C, plus an automatic document feeder and Iris Readiris Pro 6.0 OCR software for converting text to electronic files. The ScanJet 7490C includes all of the features of the 7450C, plus a SCSI kit for fast connectivity to a PC or Mac, image-stitching software for tiling originals larger than the scanner-bed size and Corel Draw 9 image-editing software.

Setup
The HP ScanJet 7400 was a breeze to set up on our test PC running Windows Me. We simply plugged it in, connected the supplied USB cable and our computer prompted us for the driver CD. A moment later, we were scanning. The CD also includes several other applications, providing additional capabilities. These are discussed later in this review.

The 7400 further extends the "one-button" tradition that we have noted in our reviews of several other of the company's scanner models. This time, however, there is not one button on the front of the unit, but several. They are controlled by the driver software program and allow you to define which application is launched when a button is pushed, and what action will be taken. For example, you can elect to OCR directly into Microsoft Word, push the colour or B&W "Copy" buttons to directly print any number of copies of a scanned image, or scan images directly to a file or fax with a simple push of a button. Inter-application communication is also provided. The PrecisionScan Pro software allowed us to scan and send the result directly into an application. We tested this feature with Adobe Photoshop 6.0 (which is not included).

Claims versus Reality
HP says that, with the ScanJet 7400, you can view an image in as little as four seconds. This is true, but you may not experience this level of performance in everyday usage. When the machine is in low-power "sleep" mode and the front-panel scanning button is pressed, it can take significantly longer to wake up, load your scanning application, launch the PrecisionScan driver, warm up the lamp and complete the preview. Even in a best-case scenario, where the PrecisionScan software is pre-loaded and the scanner is already "awake," this lamp warm-up procedure (optional, but recommended to ensure consistent colour) still results in a 15-second wait until the preview is completed. It is only when subsequent scans are completed without requiring another lamp warm-up that you will achieve the claimed four second preview. When scanning from within Photoshop or using the PrecisionScan program's Send to... option in our tests, invoking a new scan via either a front panel button or by manually invoking the software from the computer typically took almost a minute to initialize, warm up the lamp and complete a preview scan. Then, depending on the resolution you choose to scan at, a high-quality final scan can take several minutes more.

We should also mention that, on our test machine running Windows Me with 256MB of RAM, scanning directly into Photoshop 6 occasionally failed due to out-of-memory constraints. Consider running Windows 2000 for more reliable results.

The 7400C is capable of scanning at optical resolutions up to 2400 dpi. In fact, even higher interpolated resolutions are possible. It captures 48-bit colour, allowing 16 bits of colour depth for each of the red, green and blue channels. The lid features a extensible hinge design that allows objects such as books or other non-flat items to fit easily into the scanner. If desired, the lid can be removed entirely.

We uncovered a significant bug during our tests of the transparency adapter. As you may know, colour negatives have a slightly orange hue. The PrecisionScan software handles the removal of the orange mask incorrectly when rendering these images at the scanner's highest optical resolution of 2400 dpi, resulting in a positive image with strong orange highlights. Oddly, this effect does not occur when scanning at a lower resolution. See the following images  for examples of the problem:
Negative mode-1200 dpi.jpg | Negative mode-2400 dpi.jpg | Transparency mode-2400 dpi.jpg
(Around 20K each, these JPG images were scanned from a transparency original and have been reduced in resolution for easy viewing.)

We confirmed this bug with HP. The company says the defect only exists on certain units (those being the first ones released in Canada) and is not a product wide problem.  There is apparently a firmware upgrade available from HP (we could not find it on the HP website) that will fix the problem in the affected units.

Software and Compatibility
In addition to the Precision Scan 3.0 software with fully integrated OCR (PC) and device driver, the 7400C ships with:

• Caere OmniForm (PC): turns paper forms into electronic forms
• Corel Print Office (PC): photo-editing and template-driven design system
• Boomerang WebShop (PC): a website creation, management and publishing program
• eFax Messenger Plus (PC): fax any document from your computer
• I.R.I.S. CardIris (PC): scans, archives, catalogs and indexes business cards
• Emotion3D Web Edition (PC): create animations for web pages
• ...and a few other goodies, including "Remote Scanning" LAN drivers, allowing the scanner to be shared with up to five users on an office network.

A different collection of software is supplied for the Mac.

• Corel PHOTO-PAINT 8 (Mac)
• ReadIris 6.0 OCR software (Mac)
• PaperPort 5.5 document management software (Mac)
• FAXstf 6  fax software (Mac)
• ColorSync profiles
• Auto F/X Photographic Edges (not compatible with Mac OS 8.5)

Documentation is supplied in electronic PDF (Acrobat) format, along with the necessary Acrobat Reader software. The unit is compatible with Mac 8.5 and above, and, on the PC, Microsoft Windows 98, 2000 and NT 4.0 (NT is supported by the SCSI port only). HP has changed the SCSI protocol used by the 7400 series scanners from that of older ScanJets. This means that users of other platforms such as Linux, HP-UX, Solaris and so on may not be able to use third-party scanning software titles to control the unit. This also makes the 7400 unsuitable for use with specialized vertical market scanning apps, such as the OpenBook application from Arkenstone.

Options
An optional 50-page automatic document feeder allows unattended multiple-page and legal-size scanning at speeds up to 15 pages/min. We did not test this feature.

Conclusion:
In our view, the 2400-dpi optical resolution of this scanner is high enough, and the resulting scans sharp enough, that we can wholeheartedly recommend it for users expecting to produce graphics output of professional quality, particularly when enlargements of a small original are required. The transparency adapter produced results superior to those of any other flatbed scanner we've ever tested in this product's price range, marred only by the 2400-dpi bug we uncovered when scanning negatives. Although not as convenient to use as a tray-based slide holder found in a unit such as the Agfa DuoScan, nor capable of as high an optical resolution as a 4000-dpi output of a dedicated slide scanner such as the Nikon Super CoolScan 4000 ED, the results were sharp and the colour accuracy good. The HP software allowed us to easily obtain optimal results -- even warning us when we were scanning at higher than necessary resolutions. For users who need a legal-size flatbed scanner with transparency scanning capabilities, this is a good solution. Recommended.

For Further Reading:

• CAUTION - HP 7400 not recommended for use with Arkenstone blind/low vision products.