Customer Reviews

HP ScanJet 8250 Document Scanner

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

We use the 8250 in a small office with 3 employees. We scan our mail daily and use it for larger jobs as well. Most scanning is letter sized black and white pages. The software that HP packaged with the scanner was worthless. Unbelievably, the driver was 100s of megs and even at that did not work properly. Luckily, we discovered on HP's website a small "commercial" driver for the 8250. This driver stripped out the "bells and whistles." We used that driver for about 6 months. The problem was our actual scanning speed using the "commercial" driver was only 4 pages per minute. Finally, HP updated the commercial driver and now we are getting about 13 pages a minute, which is acceptable for us.

The ADF does not jam as often as other scanners we have owned. We dab alcohol on the roller when it starts to act up. I have an HP 6110; Epson 1200U, and the 8250. All feed well. I have returned the Fujitsu ScanSnap and a Microtek scanner, because neither could feed properly. My rule now, is that I will not buy a scanner that I do not already own, unless I can test its ADF.

After reading the review "correction and complaint" I was trying to figure out where this person was coming from. He/she is incorrect on all their points.

1) The color rendition is incredible and looks nearly identical to the item scanned.

2) You do not have to choose the image size. When I scan a letter document, the scanner knows it. And when I scan a legal document, it knows that too. I don't even know how to trick the thing.

3) As for the grayscale having to be chosen every time: Under "scan settings" you can choose your default settings. You can tell it to default to 1 bit or 8 bit grayscale, or many different color options. This will be the default setting if you elect not to change them every time you scan.

I wonderered if this reviewer had just opened the box and didn't bother to read the manual or play with the software settings before posting. Or maybe he's a Canon person.

Oh well. Just thought I'd dispell some untruths on the scanjet 8250. In my opinion and use, it has been a great, full featured scanner!

I bought a refurbished Scanjet 8250 for $80 in Aug 2008, figuring that even if it didn't work, I'd only be out $80 rather than the original price of $800. Anyway, I have owned HP automatic-document-feeder scanners before (most recently the Scanjet 5550c w/single-sided ADF), so I alreay knew all about the quirky, slow, and clunky HP scanner software. Out of the (refurbished) box, the included original driver/software (HP Imaging 2.2) did not work with my Windows XP Pro SP3 Pentium 4 2.4 GHz Thinkpad. There were various errors and crashes, even after patching with the latest updates from the HP website. Thankfully, there was a completely new set of drivers/software dated May 2007 (HP Solution Center), which did end up working just fine, though it thought the scanner was an 8270 for some reason. Yes, HP's new software (just like the old software) is well over 100 MB and is still slow and clunky, but it includes an image/picture manager w/rudimentary photo editing features. If you don't want to deal with HP software, then HP provides a much slimmer TWAIN driver that includes most or all of the scanners features, though you wouldn't be able to use the scanner front panel buttons. You can use a third-party document manager such as PaperPort with the TWAIN drivers. I chose to install and use both sets of drivers/software. Anyway, after 2 weeks of use, the ADF hasn't yet jammed on me (from my experience with the HP 5550c ADF scanner, jams are fairly rare and that scanner has kept working for 5 years straight now). The front panel buttons are convenient and very customizable, so I've assigned each button for particular common scanning tasks I do (e.g grey scale 200dpi PDF, grey scale 300dpi for OCR, color 300dpi for scanning 4x6 prints, etc). Of course, you can use the software to do the same things, but the buttons speed things up.. Overall, once you get used to the software and configure it to do what you want, you will find that this is a very capable machine. I look forward to many years of service from this HP scanner.

I bought this refurbished so my expectation (also after reading some reviews) were not high. I use it in a small Health Care office and there are tons of paper work to be scanned all the time. We just recently Scanned over 2000 pages in a single run and had no paper jam. It worked perfectly and fast. The software that comes with the scanner is not that great. I recommend a 3rd party software. Nuance OmniPage 16 is the software I use with the scanner and they work great together. Be aware that the learning curve is pretty tough. To be Honest, at first I hated the scanner and the software. I thought they were junk because I couldn't figure out how to make it do what I want it to do. But luckly, I decided to be patient and experiment with Scanjet 8250 and OmniPage 16 (lots of trial and error). Once I figured it out, I couldn't believe what an amazing product this is. I ended up buying a second one for back up.
I gave it 4 of 5 stars because of the software learning curve.
I use Vista Premium. Just like the Scanjet 8250 and OmniPage 16, I hated Vista at first but now I love it :)

Yes, this is a cranky product, think back to the early days of "plug and play." You plug and sometimes play. However, download the right drivers and manual and spend a bit of time and you have an outstanding scanner that, as used equipment, works very well.

I got this scanner because I wanted the duplex ADF so I could archive a couple shelves worth of documents. Has been working great. I was actually quite impressed with the software and the options available. The searchable PDF for a document form is perfect - It automatically adjusts for landscape documents and inserts them in the PDF appropriately. The majority of typed text is recognized and converted to copy and pastable text which was a huge bonus. I bought mine as a used/off lease machine and haven't seen any downsides to that yet. My only beef is that when using duplex mode it takes 3-4 times longer to do a double sided document vs two single sided documents (but this sure beats having to manually flip the pages)

I bought this unit refurbished for $65 to scan all my important documents from my file cabinet. I downloaded the driver software from the HP website. After some initial glitches, I read the manual and figured out how to set the various options I needed. I am extremely satisfied with the performance of this product. The automatic document feeder works flawlessly, even on two sided documents. This was an excellent investment.
Update: I just scanned 250 photos using the automatic document feeder and experienced NO jams. This scanner has already paid for itself in time savings.
Orlando, FL

The main problem with this scanner is its below average scanning software. The scanning area of the preview is a mere 15% of the screen (and if you'd like a close up, prepare for a rescan of the document!). And forget about using a third party scanning applications, nobody but HP will be able to use this piece of junk.

Contrast in the scans are by default bad, making the content of the document difficult to read. You can adjust the contrast in the first page (although it is a time consuming process, and since the document scan is a mere 15% of the total screen area, you are left second guessing the optimal settings). But believe it or not, by the time you scan your second page, the settings will go back to default, forcing you to readjust them.

If you think you can scan a document to a third party application and manipulate it with it via TWAIN (such as Windows Imaging), and save yourself the pain of having to deal with HP Scan, think again. You will end up with a beautiful picture of THE LAST PAGE ("oh yes, this is by design" - HP Technician).

The ADF is prone to paperjams, and they are tough and time consuming to clear. Only the smoothest paper will allow pass through without problems.

I open a case with HP support (case no. 7161364157). They told me a technician would call back (this was a month ago). Still waiting for the call.

HP really dropped the ball with this twinky. If you are planning to buy a document scanner, this is not the way to go. If you are planning to buy a photograph scanner, I suggest one of Epson's Perfection scanners, and save yourself 500 dolars worth of junk.

I expected much better for the price. Software is a little quirky. Scanner after moderate use has stopped working. Scanner gives a "DMA TimeOut" message, then it won't do anything and even the on/off button won't work. HP customer support? Forget about it. There must be other scanners out there that are reliable.

The technical data is wrong. The scanning area is 8 1/2 by 14. The auto document feeder scans both sides.
The color scans are below average. It's amazing how distorted and super saturated the colors are, considering the price. It took me hours to fiddle with all the slide bars and dials to come up with an image that more closely represents that actual colors of the image. It took 5 seconds for my $80 Canon flatbed to come up with an almost perfect image. You would think at this price, HP would have spent a little more time fine tuning the software. When scanning on the HP, you have to choose the size of the image every time you use the auto feeder otherwise everything comes out legal size. The default choice is true color, it is necessary to choose grayscale for every scan if black and white documents are going to be scanned. Now let me figure this out, this scanner is aimed at offices primarily for document scans and grayscale has to be chosen every time? The color scanning is so poor, why is it the default if that is not what this scanner is made for. I have to pick grayscale every time I scan. That is a hassle. You can make a custom profile that can be programmed to the buttons on the front of the scanner, but the buttons don't work for Paperport which comes with the scanner. The auto feeder only reads one side at a time. It flips the pages over and reads the other side. It is cool to watch, but I wonder how long the intricate workings of this mechanism will last... The pages have to be reasonably sturdy and thick otherwise the papers jam and everything has to be rescanned.