Richard Jantz

Epson Perfection 3200 Photo

The powerful Epson Perfection 3200 Photo is designed for advanced users. This 48-bit color scanner provides USB 2.0 (also compatible with USB 1.1) and FireWire interfaces. As you'd expect of a professional-level unit, it can scan both reflective and transparent materials; its 4-by-9-inch transparency area and three sturdy film holders are less typical. But what really sets this model apart is its 3200-dpi resolution, higher than we've seen before in this class of scanner. The advantages of this ultrahigh resolution will appeal primarily to photographers, designers, and other graphics professionals--image files captured at a high resolution are very large, and the additional data is unlikely to be practical for users without graphics training. With 3200 dpi you can make bigger enlargements (than you can with a 2400-dpi model) before you begin to lose image quality or detail. For example, at 3200 dpi you can capture enough pixels from a 35mm slide to enlarge the image to 11 by 14 inches at a printer resolution of nearly 300 dpi. Imagine blowing up a postage stamp to fill the front of a sweatshirt, and you'll have an idea of what this scanner can do. Tested using its USB 2.0 interface, the Perfection 3200 Photo demonstrated good speed in most--but not all--of our scan tests. The 3200 performed faster than most other corporate models on lower-resolution (300-dpi or less) tests, but it fell behind the pack on our test at 1200 dpi. For example, it knocked off a 300-dpi full-page scan of black-and-white line art at a brisk 15 seconds (the fastest score among corporate scanners), but took nearly a minute to scan a 2-by-2-inch color photo at 1200 dpi, about 20 seconds longer than the fastest model (the Microtek ScanMaker 8700 Pro Design) took to finish the same test. Still, the 3200 scored well enough across the board to land in second place for overall performance among the corporate models we compared for our May 2003 issue. With the exception of our 600-dpi gray-scale photo test, the 3200's times were all faster than those of its predecessor, the discontinued Perfection 2450 Photo, which we tested using FireWire. We found the Perfection 3200 Photo's image quality very good overall, but we weren't as knocked out as we had anticipated being, considering its high resolution. For example, a scan made at the maximum resolution of 3200 dpi didn't display noticeably finer details than those made by 2400-dpi units. In general, though, its scans showed a high level of color accuracy, with strong details in both shadows and highlights.
Our judges expected to see more-dramatic differences between this model and lower-resolution competitors on high-resolution scans, particularly our page of line art and type. But except for displaying a few slightly thicker straight lines, the Perfection 3200 Photo didn't generate significantly sharper edges or better detail. Tiny 4-point type and fine cross-hatching patterns looked little different whether they were reproduced by the Epson's 3200-dpi scan or rivals' 2400-dpi scans. The Perfection 3200 Photo does not include a FireWire card or cable in the box, so Windows users with PCs that lack an available FireWire port will have to supply their own (both can be purchased for $60 or less). Microtek's ScanMaker 6800 includes a FireWire card and cable for the same $399 price as the Epson scanner alone. And no optional document feeder is available for the Epson unit, which is a drawback for users who want to scan legal-size documents or do large amounts of optical character recognition.
The 3200's case has a single push button, which activates the scanning process. By default the button launches Epson's Smart Panel utility, an interface to several common functions--including scanning, copying, e-mail, and scanning to Web (via Epson PhotoCenter, a free photo-sharing site). You can also configure the button to launch a specific task, such as OCR (via Epson's built-in OCR engine from NewSoft). The software bundle includes two image editing applications: Adobe Photoshop Elements 2, which provides most of the editing tools that nonprofessionals will ever need, and LaserSoft Imaging's SilverFast SE 6, a Photoshop-compatible plug-in that provides advanced tools such as quick scratch and dust removal and adaptive color restoration. Unless you are producing work destined for printing on a four-color press, these two applications should meet all your needs. The 3200 comes with an updated version of the EpsonScan driver, which has a more tightly organized interface than earlier versions, incorporating a scrollable option area that changes according to the scan mode you select. You get three user modes: Automatic, which is great for beginners; Home, which displays a streamlined version of the basic manual controls; and Professional, which provides full access to all scanner controls, including color adjustment and gamma correction. The driver also lets you save color-rich 48-bit images, but since the bundled image editors don't support 48-bit image editing, you can edit only 24-bit images--unless you have a 48-bit-compatible image editor, such as the full version of Adobe Photoshop.
The Epson Perfection 3200 Photo is aimed at serious photographers who have the inclination and skill to hone their images using scanner settings and software.