Recently, my old Primax scanner gave up the ghost. I don't know why, nor do I care. The point is it had reached the end of its useful life and it was lifes way of telling me that I ought to get my finger out and buy something a little more up to date.

Easier said than done!

There is a vast array of scanners available on the market these days, either stand alone or as part of a multi-function device. The one thing that helped me along the way was the fact that I knew I didnt want a printer/scanner/copier all in one otherwise my nearly new printer would have been a waste of money!

And so it was that I bounced off down to PC World to have a browse around at the range that was on offer. Needless to say, I was a little disappointed. All the scanners they had were either cheap and nasty, multi-function or excessively expensive. Having come to the conclusion that i was unlikely to find anything of any use in PC World I decided to tackle the situation from another angle.

I returned home and used the internet as a weapon in my search. After being directed to a multitude of sites (either ones I didnt think I could trust, or ones where I couldnt find anything of interest) I finally stumbled across a well known, and well trusted website.... Amazon.co.uk.

Now, I didn't know that Amazon sold computer accessories so I was quite shocked when I saw the large range they had on offer.

I plumped for the HP G3010!

I wasn't disappointed......

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The Design
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The G3010 Photo Scanner has a really nice design, sleek and stylish in a smooth silver finish. The edges are very shapely offering a modern look and streamlined design. It looks quite simple to use whilst still maintaining an air of being powerful and of quality build.

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New Concepts
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The G3010 has a function that I had never seen before. It enables you to scan in 35mm negatives using a special built in film adaptor. As yet I have not used this function but I very much like the concept and it was certainly an influencing factor in my buying decision.

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The Useability
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The G3010 enables you to quickly and easily scan your paperwork or photos, scan your negatives or scan directly to a PDF file using the buttons on the front of the scanner. I particularly like the ability to scan to PDF as it makes it very quick and easy to scan things in and then fire them off as an email.

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The Resolution
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I was definitely pleased with the high resolution that the G3010 offers. It is capable of scanning at a high resolution of 4800x9600dpi which is more than enough for anybody's needs. Whilst we are on the subject of resolution, the colours that appear on your screen after scanning are almost an exact match to the original which is very impressive.

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Scanning
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This is obviously much the same as any other scanner in terms of the physical way that it scans your documents, one particular feature that i do like however is that you can scan more than one thing in at a time, and then save each of them as a separate file. It therefore makes the scanning in and archiving of old family photos a doddle as you can do up to three at a time!

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The Software
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The scanner comes bundled with HP Photosmart which enables you to perform many little tricks on your scanned image to improve its appearance. For example, if you are scanning in old photos, you can easily use the software provided to touch them up and make them a little more presentable, particularly in such areas as red eye removal and removing dirty marks/scratches from the original photo.

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The Size
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The scanning area is of letter sized proportions and the lid lifts up so you can put large items (such as books) under it.

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The Price
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I paid £65 from Amazon.co.uk

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The Full Spec
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Device Type: Flatbed scanner - desktop
Max Supported Media Size: 220 x 300 mm
Dimensions (WxDxH): 29.8 cm x 47.2 cm x 9 cm
Weight: 3 kg
Input Type: Colour
Resolution: 8-bit (256 grey levels) / 48-bit colour
Optical Resolution: 4800 dpi x 9600 dpi
Interpolated Resolution: 999999 dpi x 999999 dpi
Max Document Size: 220 mm x 300 mm
Supported Media Type: Plain paper, slides, bulk objects (such as books), film
Media Feeder Type: Manual load
Interface Type: Hi-Speed USB
Power: AC 120/230 V ( 50/60 Hz )
System Requirements: Microsoft Windows 98, Microsoft Windows 2000, Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition, Microsoft Windows XP Professional, Microsoft Windows 98 Second Edition / Windows ME, Microsoft Windows XP Professional x64 Edition, Apple MacOS X 10.3.9, Apple MacOS X 10.4 or later
Manufacturer Warranty: 1 year warranty

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Ease of installation
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I found that this scanner was incredibly easy to install with the drivers provided and had no problems at any stage of the installation.


I hope you have found this review helpful in your buying decision. I would certainly give this scanner 10/10 and recommend it to anybody. It certainly makes an attractive little addition to my desk. Just don't get caught scanning body parts :o)