Applelinks.com: Review: HP Scanjet 6300C

Don't let anyone ever tell you that a USB scanner can't be fast. It can, and this is one of them. (See below for speeds.) The 6300 has up to 1200 dpi optical resolution with 24 bit color. Included software includes HP PrecisionScan Pro 1.4 scanning software, HP ScanJet copy utility; pdf documentation and help files; Readiris™ OCR software; and Scansoft® Paperport™ document management software. This is not as much as provided for a PC, and perhaps one of these days HP will sweeten the bundled software for Mac users. There are also both the 6300Cse and 6300Cxi available for PCs with various web page development software provided, but one is probably better off with Dreamweaver or GoLive anyway.

The two-tone grey scanner is OK looking but isn't going to show up any Mac it sits next to, nor is it likely to win any design awards. Perhaps most obvious in external appearance are five blue buttons out in front. Some of these buttons may prove to be more important than others to various people, but with five, there is something for someone.

I'm not a big fan of buttons on scanners, probably because I tend to want to futz with anything I scan so that it is properly cropped, balanced, or whatever. About the only button that I liked with this scanner is the "Copy" button. It coordinates the scanner with your printer to create a "photocopying machine." While it will NOT replace a photocopying machine, if you do not have one, the copying button (using the bundled software) does do a much better job than a regular scan and printing from (say) Photoshop. Copying and printing a page of text (through my Laserwriter IIg printer) took a tad over 2 minutes. You can scan/copy with built-in optimization for text and line drawings, photos and greys, and copying in color.

The problem I have with these buttons is that there is typically no control with any of them. That is, if you lay a 4 x 6 inch picture on the scanner bed and press the E-mail button, since there is no intelligent cropping, not only will the photo be scanned, but the entire bed (8.5 x 11.5 inches) of the scanner face is scanned and sent as well. For testing the e-mail button, the settings were set to 72 dpi and low (jpeg) resolution; this entire scan was only 15k. However, it was still bigger than it needed to be--once properly selected, scanned, and saved in Photoshop's "Save for Web...," it was significantly smaller (6.6k). There is also no opportunity to name any scan created in this manner. The final scan is simply named "scan.jpg," and there's no option for anything else.

Also, the buttons are not absolute controllers. If you press the Scan button, the HP PrecisionScan Pro software kicks in and performs a preview scan. Once the program is open and a picture has been scanned, all one can do is to save the picture and then open the picture up in another program. If you place another picture in your scanner at this point and press the Scan button expecting it to start from where you left off, the software doesn't do anything. Once the HP PrecisionScan Pro software is started, the Scan button doesn't do anything. Once started, all subsequent scans must be initiated from the PrecisionScan software.

The reality is if you plan to use this scanner with specific software, such as Photoshop, you are much better off to initiate a scan from (say) Photoshop. Thus, to scan you go to the File menu then Import -> "HP Scanjet..." Once you've done that, the HP PrecisionScan program opens and you can then manually click on the preview button. Once you have selected the part of the photo and/or page you want scanned, you can then go to the File menu to -> "Scan to Adobe PhotoShop 5.5..." If you are likely to perform any actions in Photoshop (or any other image processing program of your choice) this order is most efficient and does not entail use of any of the buttons.

Scanning Times for various Resolutions.
Resolution (dpi)	Time*
72	12.5 sec
150	17 sec
200	19 sec
300	28 sec
600	1'12"/1'31"*
1200	8'35"/9'32"*

* All times are from the time the "Scan to Adobe Photoshop 5.5 ..." was selected until the image showed up in Photoshop. The last two entries display the time the scanning was completed and the time the image showed up in Photoshop. Previous entries were sufficiently fast as this was not a concern. (Back to top)

Although the times for the higher resolutions are not "blistering," the times for the lower resolutions are, and considering that this is a USB scanner, they are excellent. This scanner does have a SCSI port as well, but as it was the 2 x 50-pin High Density design, and I do not have such an adaptor, I couldn't use this connection.

The 6300C also comes with a strange little adapter for scanning mounted slides. (The little triangular thing sitting to the left of the scanner in the picture above.) To use the Slide Adapter, it is laid on the scanner glass with the lid open or removed from the scanner. You lay the slide under one side of the adapter, and internally a mirror helped aim a burst of light past the slide. What's very important is that you select the size of the intended scan before you scan the slide. Any enlargements after the scan will result in a very pixilated scan. The Slide Adapter didn't do a bad job, but is a limited alternative to HP's Transparency Adapter. For an extra accessory to purchase, the Transparency Adapter, at $99, is worth the money if you have many slides and/or transparencies to scan and want consistent, professional results. Perhaps my biggest annoyance with the Slide Adapter is that it is essentially impossible to use this without getting fingerprints on the scanner glass. In fact, its whole use is rather cheesy and rather crude. The results one can obtain from its use are rather impressive considering the simplistic manner in which it is used.

One of the bundled software packages is ReadIris, an OCR package for scanning pages of text and turning them into text than can be edited in (say) Word. It is OK, but unlikely to win any awards for quality or ease of use. Despite having Twain drivers, I could not get neither OmniPage Pro. (v. 8) nor TextBridge (v. 8.5) to work with this scanner. It is possible that they may work, but I couldn't achieve any success.

In short, the HP 6300C is a fast USB scanner that does provide proper color balance. It has a variety of buttons for those who want/need the crutch, but are irrelevant for anyone who wants to do any tweaking of the final image. (Keep in mind that if you wish to tweak with the HP PrecisionScan Pro software, you can't/shouldn't use the email, fax, or file button.) The big disadvantage is the cost. The 6300C scanner is not inexpensive, and the bundled software isn't that much of a grab. Although slower, the 5370C, bundled with HP's Transparency Adapter, is a better buy at $299. Since this is a new scanner, and USB scanner to boot, it's very possible that future versions of OmniPage and TextBridge will work more easily "right out of the box." At this point in time I am not sure where to point fingers on this particular problem.

Scanning Times for various Resolutions.

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Scanning Times
for various Resolutions.