Umax Astranet iA101

This scanner is aimed at the home user who perhaps wants to scan family photos or, say, archive a library of photographic prints. It's a USB model with 14bits per channel and 600 x 1200 pixels per inch optical resolution.

A one-touch operation is becoming the hot feature for consumer models and Umax has really pushed the boat out, providing no fewer than four programmable buttons on the front panel. You can scan, copy, fax or email from an original using nothing more than the tip of your index finger.

A push-button configuration applet lets you assign functions to each of the four buttons. The copy button can be configured to send the output direct to a printer, and the custom button can be configured to email or fax a scan.

The fourth button, confusingly labelled 'powersaving', fires up your browser and connects to www.imageol.com. This is an online personal photo library service to which you can upload images and share them with friends, family and anyone you give access to. Making this facility available as a one-touch option will make scanning and uploading pictures to the web a thing of the past.

In the quality department, the iA101 gave absolutely no cause for complaint, reproducing accurate colour and sharp image detail. In fact it was difficult, if not impossible, to distinguish the results from the more expensive Astra 6450.

Only the most demanding users will be disappointed with the performance - an A4 300dpi scan completed in 50 seconds. And if you're scanning for the web at much lower resolutions and output sizes you're unlikely to be sitting around tapping your foot.

Bundled software includes MGI PhotoSuite III LE, PhotoDeluxe 3.0 home Edition, and VistaShuttle.

Contact:
Umax 01344 871 340
www.umax.co.uk