I got a home scanner, a Reflecta Crystalscan 7200 (known as Pacific Image PrimeFilm 7200 in the U.S.). It's a dedicated 35mm film scanner that should be a bit on the lower-end of the spectrum. I have been using it to re-scan some negatives, on the left you can see (a small part of) a scan I made with SilverFast SE 9, without doing any post production. On the right you can see the scan the lab sent me.

To be honest I am quite blown away and find it it very unexpected that the home scanner seems to do a much better job. The colors seem accurate to me (on an auto profile). The resolution appears quite a bit higher, even though both images have the same dimensions and the image seems sharper! And I haven't even used this scanner at the highest resolution, this is a 2400 dpi scan.

What do you think?