I took a thumb drive and some "dayglo" Paulson Starbursts (arc yellow and hot pink) to Best Buy and Staples Saturday to see if I could test drive some scanners. I could only test some all-in-one's (Epson Artisan 800 and Workforce 600, and a HP OfficeJet model that cost $299), since those were the only ones on the shelf that had a USB slot. None of the standalone scanners were set up on a computer, so I wound up borrowing an Epson Perfection 500 to see how it would work. The final verdict? Epson Perfection...and it wasn't even close.
(arc yellow on left, hot pink on right)
Epson Workforce 600
Epson Artisan 800
HP OfficeJet
Epson Perfection 500, arc yellow
Epson Perfection 500, hot pink