Product Reviews

The ScanJet G4050 from HP is a desktop flatbed and transparency scanner aimed at the home photo market. Its claim to fame is that rather than use three channels for scanning from both reflective and transparent originals, it uses six channels for transparencies. Scanning this way, according to HP, increases the colour accuracy of the scan by sampling each pixel six times and doubling the amount of data collected to 96 bits. Maximum resolution for transparencies is 4800 x 9600dpi.

The G4050 itself is a chunky beast. If you're used to the svelte scanners that barely seem thicker than the paper they're scanning, this will come as something of a shock. Its grey and black colour scheme does it no favours in the fashion stakes and it looks decidedly utilitarian sitting on a desk beside an iMac. We did, however, like the solid handle on the front of the lid and the gearing on the hinge. The lid houses a transparent media adaptor and the robust hinging helps protect it from being accidently dropped onto the platen, which could be disastrous for both. On top of the lid are the now ubiquitous buttons for automating tasks such as scanning, copying, scanning to PDF and scanning transparencies.

Round the back of the scanner are a USB port, on/off switch and power socket.

The built-in transparent media adaptor in the G4050's lid, together with the supplied templates, enables scanning of up to 16 35mm slides, 30 35mm negative frames, two medium-format film frames or one large-format film frame at a time.

All those features for scanning transparencies are great, but most users will spend their time scanning reflective originals, and the G4050 offers plenty of scope for this. The scanning bed accommodates up to four 6 x 4in photos and splits them into separate documents or files, on scanning. The built-in dust and scratch removal works

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on reflectives as well as transparencies, although like most dust and scratch removal systems, it adds significantly to the amount of time taken to scan. Talking of speed, the USB 2 connection ensures regular scans, with dust and scratch removal switched off, are surprisingly nippy.

The scanner driver offers plenty of options: selecting automatic settings is straightforward, but, equally, if you want to dig around and fine-tune the settings, there are plenty of options. One thing that did confuse us is that the settings seemed to be split between drop-down menus in the main window, the menu bar options in the main menu bar, and settings in the Preferences window. There seemed to be little logic as to which goes where. For example, resolution and colour bit depth are set in the main window, along with exposure options, but de-screening is in the main menu bar, and setting a colour profile is done in the Preferences window.

Image quality from colour reflectives is good. Colour tends to be a little over-saturated, but detail is captured well and scans are in sharp focus. We like the fact that multiple photographs are automatically split into individual documents and can be selected and adjusted independently at the pre-scan stage.

Scanning negatives and slides wasn't quite as successful. When scanned using the six-colour process, colours seemed very punchy when compared with the original prints, as if saturation had been beefed up post-scanning - for example, blue skies seemed unnaturally deep. By contrast, detail was lacking and scans were distinctly soft. We're not sure the benefits of the six-colour process justify the emphasis HP places on it when highlighting the performance of transparency scans on the G4050.

The HP ScanJet G4050 is reasonably priced for a quality desktop scanner that doubles as a transparency scanner. It makes a good job of reflective scans, too, as well as offering an option to optimise scans for Kodachrome and Ecktachrome slides, so if you have a need to scan that material, it may be a good buy. However, our reservations about the quality of negative and film scans make the £199 price tag seem expensive for a scanner we would only be happy using for reflective originals. These days, all-in-one printers, scanners and copiers do a great job of scanning, and if you want to scan transparent media, you're still better off buying a dedicated slide scanner or outsourcing the work.