	Scan in black and white, not greyscale When scanning in greyscale, the file size tends to be several times larger than in black and white. Greyscale scans tend to pick up any crinkles in the paper and the end result is a rather messy image. In black and white, the scanner will pick up the important information - borders, text etc. - but is not sensitive enough to also pick up feint lines or shading. The end result is much clearer and better if you intend to reproduce the image at some point.

	If you have an A3 scanner... Why not turn A4 documents 90 degress and scan them in landscape instead? This will speed up the throughput considerably as the scanner has less work to do to feed each page.

	Are you sure you need a network scanner? There are just a handful of scanners which are designed for standalone network scanning. The problem with this is that you have less choice in specification and you can pay a lot more for something relatively basic, just for the network functionality. An alternative is to enable several workstations on your network access to one scanner. The result is that each user is able to use the scanner as if connected directly to their PC, without having to relocate the unit each time. This way you also get a wider range of scanners available to choose from as the only requirement is a USB connection (which 99% of scanners now have!) It can save you a lot of money or get you a lot more for your money. To do this, you'll require a Silex SX-2000U2 USB device server. It also works with printers and other USB devices.

	Don't rely on the manufacturer's warranty Most of the scanners come with a 12 months manufacturer's warranty. The service varies dramatically between manufacturers - some offer a next day swap-out, an engineer within 3 days or worse still a return to base, meaning you can be without your scanner for up to a week! An alternative to this is taking out the extended cover available on all scanners. We'll get an engineer to you within 8hrs (or 4hrs if you opt for this service) and if the machine can't be fixed within another 8hrs, we'll give you a temporary equivalent to tide you over. Contact us on 0800 088 7362 for further details or take a look at our warranties explained guide.

	Selecting a resolution (dpi) For general A4 black and white documents (such as invoices, letters etc.), you don't need to set a high resolution for scanning. The majority of our document scanners scan up to 600dpi, but this is not necessary for day to day scanning. Instead, we recommend 200-300dpi max. Of course, if you find the quality isn't quite good enough try increasing this. Even colour documents needn't be scanned at full resolution - only photos should generally require 600dpi. Remember - the higher the resolution the more space the resultant file will take up on your PC. Also, the scanner will have to scan more thoroughly, and therefore each page will take longer to scan.