**The Canon 8800F has been discontinued and replaced with the Canon CanoScan 9000F.
Canon’s the preferred choice of photographers everywhere. Their film and digital camera equipment is used to create some of the world’s most beautiful images. But do their scanners live up to the name? We tested the Canon CanoScan 8800F Color Scanner to find out.
The Canon CanoScan 8800F is a professional-quality scanner at a surprisingly reasonable price. This photo scanner has a 48-bit color depth, producing over 281 trillion colors. It’s also easy to crank up the photo resolution to flawless quality, topping out at 19,200 dpi. This is made possible with the CanoScan 8800F’s bundled software, which includes ArcSoft Photo Studio and Adobe Photoshop Elements.
Photo and Film Scanning
Between the software and the Canon CanoScan 8800F’s built-in functions, it’s easy to remove imperfections from your photos, including scratches and fading from aged and antique photos. This scanner can also handle scanning documents, film, negatives and slides, without slouching in any category. Whether for personal or professional use, this is the best picture scanner you need.
Time Saving Features
On top of its quality scanning capabilities, the Canon CanoScan 8800F manages to also save time and energy. Since it lights by LED instead of the traditional fluorescent lights, the CanoScan 8800F is mercury-free (and bears the Energy Star label). Since its lamps are powered by LED, that also means no long wait times for your scanner to load up. Once it’s on, the CanoScan 8800F can scan multiple images at once, with room for up to 4 slides or 12 35mm frames (positives or negatives) at a time. Transferring data from your scanner to your computer is also quick, thanks to USB 2.0.
It’s hard to find reasons not to like this scanner. It’s compact, it’s inexpensive and it does a great job. Perhaps the biggest issue worth noting is that it’s a few years old. Though that doesn’t detract from the CanoScan 8800F’s quality, it does mean doing a little extra work to make it compatible with the latest operating systems. This scanner was built in the days of Windows Vista, so don’t forget to check for driver updates if you’re running Windows 7 or Mac OSX Snow Leopard.
Don’t let the small price tag fool you. Even though it costs less than $200, the Canon CanoScan 8800F is a professional photo scanner worthy of the Canon name. Whether you’re a creative professional or just want to get your family photos on disk, this color scanner deserves a spot on your desk.
