HP scanners 2200c vs 3500c vs 5300c?

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rob.davies73

I have the choice of using 3 scanners and I'm not sure which would
give me the best high quality colour photos.

From reading the specs on HP's website it seems to me that the choice
is between the 3500c & the 5300c as the HP 2200c has only 600dpi.

Now the 3500c has a greater bit depth (48bit) over the 5300c (36bit).
And both have optical resolution of 1200dpi. But the 5300c has "1200
x 2400 hardware resolution".

Which do you think would give the better results? The greater bit
depth or this 'higher hardware resolution'?

TIA.
 
I have the choice of using 3 scanners and I'm not sure which would
give me the best high quality colour photos.

From reading the specs on HP's website it seems to me that the choice
is between the 3500c & the 5300c as the HP 2200c has only 600dpi.

Now the 3500c has a greater bit depth (48bit) over the 5300c (36bit).
And both have optical resolution of 1200dpi. But the 5300c has "1200
x 2400 hardware resolution".

Which do you think would give the better results? The greater bit
depth or this 'higher hardware resolution'?

TIA.
Click to expand...

None of the HP scanners are the best choice. The hardware for HP scanners is
OK, but the software stinks.

You want the hardware resolution spec also known as Optical Resolution. Go
with 1200 DPI or greater. The other number is "made up" pixels.

If you are only scanning paper photographs, any of today's USB scanners with
a CCD sensor are plenty good.

You never need more that about 1200 DPI for any paper photograph.
Normal resolution for paper photos is about 300 DPI.

I use Canon Scanners.
http://www.usa.canon.com/consumer/controller?act=ProductCatIndex1Act&fcategoryid=104
Check the Film and Negative Scanners. Check the specs on the CanonScan
8800F.
http://www.usa.canon.com/consumer/controller?act=ModelInfoAct&fcategoryid=120&modelid=15561

Stay away from the LiDE series unless you must have portable scanning.
The LiDE series are CIS sensors, No depth of field.
http://www.carlmcmillan.com/DOF/DepthofField.htm
 
If you are only scanning paper photographs, any of today's USB scanners with
a CCD sensor are plenty good.
Click to expand...

Is this so also for grey-scale pictures in books if the pictures have
a great variety of grey tones within a small contrast range? Scanners
appear to differ there: Some have 8 bit, some internally (hardware) 16
bit but externally (output) only 8 bit, some have 16 bit for grey.
Since 8 bit means only 256 shades of grey, 16 bit both internally and
externally seems to be necessary for the aforementioned purpose. Or
have you made other experiences?
 
Robert Jasiek said:
Is this so also for grey-scale pictures in books if the pictures have
a great variety of grey tones within a small contrast range? Scanners
appear to differ there: Some have 8 bit, some internally (hardware) 16
bit but externally (output) only 8 bit, some have 16 bit for grey.
Since 8 bit means only 256 shades of grey, 16 bit both internally and
externally seems to be necessary for the aforementioned purpose. Or
have you made other experiences?
Click to expand...

Pictures in books and magazines may require descreening because of the
printing process.
http://www.scantips.com/basics06.html

8 bit output is sufficient for most uses for Grayscale pictures. The paper
photograph does not have the amount of detail to require 16 bits (65536
shades) of grayscale levels. 16 Bit grayscale is mainly for use in scanning
film.

It does not hurt to have the ability to scan in 16 bit grayscale. Not needed
for paper photographs.

You can not save a 16 bit grayscale image as jpg, jpeg is only an 8 bit
image format.
Color jpg is three 8 bit values of Red, Green, and Blue. For 24 bits total.
 
8 bit output is sufficient for most uses for Grayscale pictures.
Click to expand...

In a graphics program, I have reduced the number of bits to 8 for some
pictures with the characteristics above. It does make a difference -
usually only small but even that can simplify the picture too much
(for my purpose). I wonder though whether it would help to scan the
grey pictures as if they were coloured? 24 bit RGB is enough for me in
graphics editors. Does this necessarily imply that a so called 48 bit
(depth of colours) scanner would do the job? Or is, as you seem to
indicate with respect to the Moire effect, not the scanner hardware
but the driver software decisive?

If I should decide to buy an A4 scanner with 8 bits for grey, then I
am considering the HP G4050. Is this choice appropriate or is, as
someone has said, the driver software of HP scanners simply too weak?
 
Robert Jasiek said:
In a graphics program, I have reduced the number of bits to 8 for some
pictures with the characteristics above. It does make a difference -
usually only small but even that can simplify the picture too much
(for my purpose). I wonder though whether it would help to scan the
grey pictures as if they were coloured? 24 bit RGB is enough for me in
graphics editors. Does this necessarily imply that a so called 48 bit
(depth of colours) scanner would do the job? Or is, as you seem to
indicate with respect to the Moire effect, not the scanner hardware
but the driver software decisive?

If I should decide to buy an A4 scanner with 8 bits for grey, then I
am considering the HP G4050. Is this choice appropriate or is, as
someone has said, the driver software of HP scanners simply too weak?
Click to expand...

I am the one that said HP software "stinks".

The HP G4050 is as good as any scanner, as I said before, the HP hardware is
fine, just the software is not up to par. It is about the same equivalent
hardware as the Canon 8800F. Price is about the same price.

It does make a difference anytime you reduce the bits of resolution, It
really depends on the original art work, Graphics can be very demanding on a
scanner. Graphic art is a whole another subject when it comes to scanners.

Grayscale vs Line art?
http://www.scantips.com/basics4f.html

Photographic Resolution
How much can we scan?
http://www.scantips.com/basics08.html

Moiré comes from the interaction of the tiny dots of the Contact Screen that
is used to be able to print a continuous tone picture. It is made up of
small dots, which you can see with a magnifying glass. Look at a magazine
picture with an 8 power loupe and you can see the individual dots.

Those dots are what the scanner sees.

48 bit color is equivalent to the 16 bit grayscale scanning. It is 16 bits
each of Red, Green and Blue.
24 bit color converted to grayscale is the same 8 bit grayscale, you do not
get any extra resolution by scanning grayscale in color. You just triple the
file size.
 
48 bit color is equivalent to the 16 bit grayscale scanning.
Click to expand...

Just to be sure: Can one scan either colour (e.g. 48 bit = 3x16 bit)
or grey (e.g. 8 bit)? Or does a scanner always combine both colour and
grey information?

If colour scan excludes the extra grey bits on the hardware side, does
the colour scan of a grey original look (almost) grey or is it rather
a pretty much coloured image, i.e., would the tones of grey be spoilt
by too many red, blue, green colours, which are only close to grey in
a subjective view?
 
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