HP Scanjet 4670vp review

As stylish as the Canon LiDE 500F (right) is, HP's Scanjet 4670vp trumps it.

Like the Canon, it can stand vertically on its edge, but it comes in two distinct parts. One is simply a document guide, while the other, only marginally thicker, is the scanner itself.

Each part consists of a plastic frame around a clear plastic panel, resulting in a scanner that you can see right through. Any document you place on the scanner bed is framed by the classy-looking border, as if on display.

This unusual arrangement has its advantages. It's easy to check you've inserted your document correctly. It's also possible to place the scanner flat on top of a large original, such as a poster, and capture it using a number of scans. With the software supplied, you can stitch all the scans together to create a single image.

The Scanjet's software bundle is above average, particularly as it includes Photoshop Elements, a cut-down version of Adobe's professional image-editing program. However, we weren't keen on HP's installation program. It's just too big; even the minimal installation takes up 364MB of hard disk space. It took an astonishing 35 minutes to install on our Pentium-M 1.6GHz notebook. HP's installer warned us the process might take more than 30 minutes on 'slower systems', but surely not on a brand new PC!

Once installed, HP's scan control software is less easy to use than some competitors' programs. It's possible to save and reload settings, but the driver doesn't automatically remember them between sessions. A4 previews were very fast at just five seconds, but scans, particularly at higher resolutions, weren't as good as we expected. Our 600 dots per inch (dpi) scan of a 6x4in photograph took 43 seconds, and its quality was only average.

As with the Canon, HP's supplied transparency unit is a simple backlight. Its magnetic door holds film or a single slide, and it clips neatly onto the scanner, but we found it difficult to position negative strips. Scanning a single frame at 2,400 dpi took 1 minute 26 seconds. This is a decent time, but the resulting image was a little dark and lacking in fine detail.

The Scanjet 4670vp looks fantastic, and has talents that make it handy in places where other scanners can't go. However, anyone tempted by its want-one design should consider cheaper, more conventional scanners that make a better job of the basics.