Computer Reviews

Excellent picture quality, I am no expert, yet I can easily see the diffence between my pictures and my friends' Canon and Kodak cameras. Size is pretty decent, I carry it everywhere in my pocket ( that's if I don't mind a bulky pocket though ). The night vision makes people go aaaawwww, but is not as practical as it initially sounds. I got a 256Mb pro stick for movies, and I am pretty happy with it. I could use a stronger optical zoom, and certainly a different location for the built-in flash.

Bottomline, I love my camera. It's helping me store my memories in better quality than ever.

the sony dsc-v1 is a top-notch camera that is more portable than its competition. it offers full manual control, 5MP resolution, and 4x optical zoom. i do have a few nits though...

pros:
- 5MP, 4x optical zoom.
- great image quality.
- above average resolution, good tonal balance, good color response.
- full manual control.
- images exhibit very low noise, even at higher ISO.
- image processing parameter control (contrast, saturation and sharpening).
- very fast auto focus!
- quick startup, fast shot-to-shot times (except when shooting TIFF).
- fast write times to memory stick.
- has NightFraming which allows you to focus and compose your scene in total darkness with the aid of the infrared emitter, then shoot a full-color shot using the built-in flash. very cool.
- better than average movie mode.
- compared to the competition (canon g5 and nikon 5400), the dsc-v1 is more compact: dimensions are 4.0"W x 2.6"H x 2.3"D weighing 10.9 oz.
- solid build quality.
- bright, high resolution LCD monitor with anti-reflective coating that works.
- battery charges in-camera, charger doubles as AC adapter.
- hot shoe for external flash (limited to specific sony flashes, though).
- many optional accessory lenses (telephoto, wide angle, filter lenses) available.
- histogram in Live view, Record review and Playback modes
- USB 2.0 means faster downloads.

cons:
- colors a bit washed out.
- noise levels higher than expected
- some purple fringing.
- mild chromatic aberrations visible.
- higher redeye occurrence.
- RAW format not supported.
- saving a TIFF file locks up the camera.
- continuous shooting capability limited to 3 frames.
- minimum ISO setting at 100.
- zoom control is oriented differently so it will take a few tries to get used to it.
- ergonomic issues: tiny menu and resolution keys, very easy to block the flash and optical viewfinder with fingers, left index finger falls right on top of the pop-up flash, suppressing it.
- lots of key functions are buried in menus.
- below average battery performance.
- no separate user settings.
- like most sony products, you pay a premium, pushing up the price.
- expensive memory stick pro cards.
- uses a proprietary battery so add a few bucks to buy a spare (or maybe two given the battery performance).
- the supplied 32MB memory stick is inadequate - again, more $$ for more memory.
- you'll need to remove from tripod to get to the battery or memory stick.

sony has succeeded in delivering a camera that has virtually the same feature set as canon's g5 and nikon's 5400 but in a more compact package. it's not perfect though. RAW format is not supported and writing a TIFF file still takes way too much time. and there are some ergonomic nits that is uncharacteristic of sony. still, this is a great package and worthy of consideration.

i hope this helps your buying decision. peace.

Before you buy DSC-V1, here are some tips about it:
The camera is excellent, considering image quality and features. You can manually set the functions or set the automatic mode (helps beginners but provide features for more advanced photographers - get the manual in Sony Website). The image is better than P92, for V1 has bigger Carl Zeiss lens. P92 is very very easy to use, but V1 has a range of features not available in P92.
1) it requires extra memory stick (which, as you might now is more expensive than compact flash). 256Mb is recommended. 128Mb provides 80 photos full-quality. (any 5.0 Camera, whatever the brand, needs extra memory though.)
2) Spare battery would be useful. The NP-FC11 lasts about 80 minutes and take 2hrs to recharge.
3) Unlike old Sony cameras, you can take pictures faster (whether P32, P92 or V1), but when using V1 with flash, you need to wait few seconds to energy recharge (a bad thing if you need the flash and don't want to miss a thing) - but it's like 3 seconds.
4) A very nice feature is the nightframing and nightshots - it has infrared visor for very dark places.
Comparing to P92, the improvements are amazing. I used them both and found P92 easy to use, but V1 has many useful features, better for those who want to make creative or art photos.

I got my speakers about a month ago. Mainly I go them for the iPod. They have amazing sound quality. For speakers so small the sound is amazingly crisp and clear. The bass is good, but a little unclear when turned up to maximum power. (It takes some adjusting on the subwoofer to get the bass right.) The little lights under the speakers provide for a nice little effect. Overall I think they were a good buy. I would have given them 4 stars except for the problem that I had with them when first bought. They worked for about 2 days and then one day the speakers decided to play full-blast all the time, and I couldn't turn them down. Luckily the product was still in warranty, and I was able to get new ones. So far these new ones have been great and have no problems.

Ok, these aren't the only computer speakers that can provide amazing sound, but considering you have to spend another $100 to find something that is even close should make your buying decision pretty easy.

I only bought these speakers from amazon.com for their amazing price, but I would never purchase speakers without hearing them first. After about a month of looking I was able to narrow my speaker choice down to two speaker systems, "BOSE MediaMate" two-piece system (for $99) and the "Klipsch ProMedia 2.1" system (for $169), the JBL Creatures weren't one of my choices because I was ignorant and thought they were too ugly considering I am not an apple owner.

The Klipsch system blew me away with it's powerful bass and clear satellites. I was immediately blown away again when I heard the clarity of the Bose speakers, which made a mockery of the Klipsch satellites. This is great right?, except for the fact that the Bose system does not include a seperate sub which meant that the bass, although clear, was not very strong.

If only I could find a speaker system that combined the bass of the Klipsch and the clarity of the Bose system for a reasonable price...

In case you didn't get the idea, the JBL Creatures were the solution to my problem. As I was walking down the aisle of my local...store I heard the JBL creatures playing the new James Bond movie. Wow. Ever since then I knew that the JBL's were the best choice for my college dorm, and that was for $130 dollars in the stores. Considering Amazon.com has them for less..., you would have to be stupid or deaf to not pick up a pair of these amazing speakers.

WOW!!! These speakers are the best I have ever owned by far! They blow the little tinny sounding speakers on my ibook away!!!! The JBL Creature Speakers might be small (the satalites) but they sure are LOUD! My only problem with these speakers are the subwolfer is too big on my desk, and I don't have any room on my floor for it.

Watching DVD's with these babies are just like being in the theater! GREAT BASS! I love the lights under the two satalites, nice touch!

Playing CD's, mp3's, AAC's, and games with these are a pleasure! I especially love turning up the volume (with the touch sensitive buttons on the left satalite) when I'm playing games on my computer (such as Starcraft!) and enjoying being emmersed into the game! The sound is very crisp and clear, no muffled sound.

These speakers are worth every little penny I paid for them! My speakers arrived the next day, and I was so excited to get them out of the box and try them!

I also use these with my ipod...AWESOME!

I got my speakers about a month ago. Mainly I go them for the iPod. They have amazing sound quality. For speakers so small the sound is amazingly crisp and clear. The bass is good, but a little unclear when turned up to maximum power. (It takes some adjusting on the subwoofer to get the bass right.) The little lights under the speakers provide for a nice little effect. Overall I think they were a good buy. I would have given them 4 stars except for the problem that I had with them when first bought. They worked for about 2 days and then one day the speakers decided to play full-blast all the time, and I couldn't turn them down. Luckily the product was still in warranty, and I was able to get new ones. So far these new ones have been great and have no problems.

Ok, these aren't the only computer speakers that can provide amazing sound, but considering you have to spend another $100 to find something that is even close should make your buying decision pretty easy.

I only bought these speakers from amazon.com for their amazing price, but I would never purchase speakers without hearing them first. After about a month of looking I was able to narrow my speaker choice down to two speaker systems, "BOSE MediaMate" two-piece system (for $99) and the "Klipsch ProMedia 2.1" system (for $169), the JBL Creatures weren't one of my choices because I was ignorant and thought they were too ugly considering I am not an apple owner.

The Klipsch system blew me away with it's powerful bass and clear satellites. I was immediately blown away again when I heard the clarity of the Bose speakers, which made a mockery of the Klipsch satellites. This is great right?, except for the fact that the Bose system does not include a seperate sub which meant that the bass, although clear, was not very strong.

If only I could find a speaker system that combined the bass of the Klipsch and the clarity of the Bose system for a reasonable price...

In case you didn't get the idea, the JBL Creatures were the solution to my problem. As I was walking down the aisle of my local...store I heard the JBL creatures playing the new James Bond movie. Wow. Ever since then I knew that the JBL's were the best choice for my college dorm, and that was for $130 dollars in the stores. Considering Amazon.com has them for less..., you would have to be stupid or deaf to not pick up a pair of these amazing speakers.

WOW!!! These speakers are the best I have ever owned by far! They blow the little tinny sounding speakers on my ibook away!!!! The JBL Creature Speakers might be small (the satalites) but they sure are LOUD! My only problem with these speakers are the subwolfer is too big on my desk, and I don't have any room on my floor for it.

Watching DVD's with these babies are just like being in the theater! GREAT BASS! I love the lights under the two satalites, nice touch!

Playing CD's, mp3's, AAC's, and games with these are a pleasure! I especially love turning up the volume (with the touch sensitive buttons on the left satalite) when I'm playing games on my computer (such as Starcraft!) and enjoying being emmersed into the game! The sound is very crisp and clear, no muffled sound.

These speakers are worth every little penny I paid for them! My speakers arrived the next day, and I was so excited to get them out of the box and try them!

I also use these with my ipod...AWESOME!

I have owned a Canon TX and Canon 650 film cameras. I was always very happy with my Canon film cameras. I bought the 10d thinking that I was finally able to get a digital replacement for my old Canon film cameras.

I have now owned my 10d for over a year. The picture quality is only fair. It often selects ISO 100 and gives me fuzzy pictures. The white balance is extremely poor compared with the film cameras. The "full automatic" mode does a poor job of focus and white balance. The "creative" modes are similar to the film cameras but don't seem to work so very well. I am just having a terrible time trying to get the settings right to get good pictures! After a year of trying I am extremely frustrated with it.

Finally, the print pictures I get from it are _always_ too dark. It seems I need to post-process EVERY PICTURE in photoshop to get the gamut correct, or brighten/enhance/correct the photos to make them look right. Argh!

It's all probably user error, but I never had these problems with my old film cameras. If I could easily get PhotoCDs made I would go back to film immediately!

The Canon EOS 10D is my third digital camera. I started years ago with a Nikon 900, then a Casio QV3000, and just got my Canon yesterday.

Immediately the one problem that annoyed me the most about my two previous digital cameras was fixed - no more long delays between pressing the shutter and taking the picture. In fact you can take a rapid series of up to 9 shots which the camera will buffer until it can write them all to compact flash.

Years ago I had a 35mm film version of the Canon EOS, sadly it was stolen. I knew before buying this camera that I was impressed with the quality and ease of use of the Canon EOS series. The autofocus on the 10D is much faster and quieter than my years ago Canon camera. The user interface on this camera is the best I have seen.

One thing I'm not impressed with yet is the automatic white balance, I think my Nikon and Casio both did a better job, but there are options you can select for the EOS white balance, and this sort of thing is easy to tweak later with Irfanview or Photoshop. I'd give the Canon EOS 10D a 10 for ease of use, a 10 for rapid response to shutter button actions, and a 9.5 on photo quality with the 28-90mm f/4-5.6 II USM lens I'm currently using.

If you have been waiting for a top quality 35mm digital SLR at a reasonable price, I'd say the wait is over.

This is one great camera! I owned a D30 before which at the time was an excellent DSLR also.
The 10D's accurate and fast auto-focus is an enormous improvement over the D30 and D60. The magnesium alloy body feels a lot sturdier than previous models. Battery life is almost endless, especially if you use the BG-ED3 battery grip which contains two batteries. Picture quality is almost flawless. Perhaps a little soft right out of the camera, but that's easily remedied in Photoshop. Color rendition is great, particularly if you take the time to build your own color profiles.
For the price you can't go wrong. Spend some of the money you save in buying the 10D instead of a more expensive camera on one of Canon's "L" lenses. You won't regret it.
Unfortunately the Canon software that ships with the 10D sucks. Never mind. Buy a decent RAW file conversion utility like Capture One DSLR LE and keep yourself happy. Believe me, your sanity is worth the $... extra.

Blue Mist is a nice color for the new palm, but the only setback is the price. Only a few would want to buy each cover individually, just to costomize their m100. Palm should sell them as a set for $10.00 more.

At least, thats what I think.

i like the new palm, it is a good device with a handsome, contemporary design that appeals to the younger and techno-illeterate buying market. Today, people have money to throw away, and this is something to throw away into.

Ruby Pearl is a nice color for the new palm, but the only setback is the price. Only a few would want to buy each cover individually, just to costomize their m100. Palm should sell them as a set for $10.00 more.

At least, thats what I think.

i like the new palm, it is a good device with a handsome, contemporary design that appeals to the younger and techno-illeterate buying market. Today, people have money to throw away, and this is something to throw away into.

I got a whole set of these because the original one that my Palm came with was getting kind of boring. I like being able to change it whenever I like. The first couple of times, I had trouble getting the cover off, but once I got the hang of it, it was easy.

I had this other headphones plugged into my computer. Then when I got this one in the mail, I unplugged the old one and plugged in the 497. I almost went deaf! I didn't expect it be so loud and crisp... and I had the treble set too high on my sound card. I was hearing things that I never heard through my other headphones. he HIs are amazing on this unit, and the LOWs are just enough that I don't feel drowned in a sea of bass.

It's pretty comfortable... but it gets painful wheN i wear this with my glasses on. The legs (is that what they're calle?) on my glasses dig into the side of my head when I have this on. People tell me I have a big head though, so maybe that may have worsened the effect. It's pretty comfortable without my glasses though. The only thing being that I'm as good as blind without my glasses... so listening to music and working on my laptop is pretty hard to do.

One of the charms of headphones is that they're a lazy person's no-brainer technology. No programming, digital settings, or instructions are necessary to using, benefitting from, and evaluating the product. Consequently, I now have along with broad experience in cans more of them than I require. The only pair I've been absolutely and completely satisfied with are the Sennheiser PX100's, which can be transported safely in a back pocket and worn and enjoyed interminably. But they do require careful folding and storing, and I thought the top-rated (by Cnet) HD-497's would be handier for my studio work at the radio station.

A few observations about comfort. They're light enough but also just a trifle tight--something you certainly notice after the first hour of wearing them. Any of these phones that sit on the edges of your ears are likely to produce heat and sweat after a limited amount of time. This is as true of the 497's as of my heavier Sony MDR V-600's. For extended listening, the best bets are extremely lightweight phones like the PX100's, which don't sit on the "rim" of the ear, or phones that completely encircle the ear. I've got some heavy, loose-fitting Panasonic RP-HT660's that can be worn for hours because the weight is on your head, not your ears.

I can't speak to the durability factor of the HD-497's, though I'm somewhat surprised to see how tightly-fitting the detachable speaker wires are. Whether they would save you a broken set of headphones in the event of tripping on the cord (I've lost one pair that way) remains to be seen. Also, I've discovered no shorter wires made available by Sennheiser, so the detachability factor appears to be no more than a slight advantage. As for convenience, these phones can't be folded and stored in a little storage bag, like many of their larger competitors, so I wouldn't judge them to be good travelers.

As for the most important consideration, they sound great. Adequate bass (with no sense of artificial "boost," like the more expensive Sony's) and clear, brilliant highs (discernibly brighter than those of the Sony V-600's). They're a tad more efficient (louder) than the PX-100's, and they tend to bring mid-range instruments--the piano, for example--more forward in the mix. Indeed, the sound is transparent, clear and crystalline. Still, I almost prefer the more democratic balance of the PX-100's, which place you mid-center instead of front-center in the concert hall. The HD-497's are great for shorter listening episodes, but for going the distance, give me the PX-100's any day. (They're also 25% less expensive. For that matter, the Sony CD-180's, at one-quarter of the price, compare quite favorably in every respect with the HD-497's, with diminished treble being the major difference.)

I bought these for my Rio Volt SP250 portable. I am very picky about speaker/headphone quality and find these to be outstanding considering the source and the ... price. You can get better sound but be prepared to pay four times as much to do it, and the high buck ones probably won't run off of a portable.

The 497's get plenty loud even driven off the Rio Volt, but really need a more powerful source to deliver a solid bass punch. I'm looking at portable headphone amplifiers to fix this minor quibble.

They really are much more comfortable and smoother than my Sonys but could still be a tad more comfortable. That's because with their limited padding they still press (50%) against my normal sized ears. They are also too bulky and hot for the gym. I save them for home and walking the dog, and sweat up the Sonys at the gym.

I did a little research into 'navigation systems' before looking over this particular one, so that way I wouldn't be so impressed. Didn't work - this is a SWEEEEEEET little set-up. You can transfer it from on car to another, and even bring it on trips with you for use in rental cars, too. No re-tooling of your dashboard, or other permanant modification of you vehicle is needed. I'd really like to own one in the worst way (because I can't read a real map to save my life), however...

I did run into a snag that really put the brakes on this purchase. Although all the major routs in the U.S. and Canada are in the unit already, you still need to load up the 'memory card' (which IS included along with an interface cable) with the areas you want fine detail for - that's how it can route you to a specific movie theater, restaurant, or house.

That's where the map CD comes into play. All that detail IS given to you on the CD, but has to be read from your home computer, and then transferred to the memory card - I have absolutly NO problem with that, except that the CD interface is for Windows systems only! No Mac support at all. I even called Garmin direclty.

If you have a Macintosh computer, make sure you at least have access to a friends PC before you get this. Otherwise you'll be a little frustrated. After you get it set up the first time, you'll have no trouble at all. I persoanlly don't have a PC, so I had to hold off. Hopefully Garmin will start supporting Mac soon enough, and I can try for a later generation of this.

This unit does an excellent job of helping you navigate, whether in familiar or unfamiliar territory.

I have lived in the same city for 32 years and I explore a lot. Still, when asking the StreetPilot to calculate routes for some of my favorite Sunday rides, it has managed to show me some nice alternative routes to the ones I've been using. While they may not have been the absolute fastest, they have often been improvements in regard to road surface or traffic. If you like to explore, you'll love this unit.

Another example: Last weekend I went to a huge regional softball tournament west of town. Getting out afterwards, traffic was awful, backed up and at a standstill. I simply went the opposite direction, away from town, for half a mile. Then, I took the first reasonable route that went north of town, and asked the unit to calculate a route home. It gave me a good, fast one that probably got me home 20 minutes sooner than if I had gone the "direct" way in all that traffic. I couldn't have done it without the StreetPilot.

One huge advantage of this unit is that it accepts a 128 MB data card to load MapSource maps. If you're going on a cross-country trip, you will easily require all of that space. Even the next-biggest Garmin units, which allow 24 MB of storage, are severely limiting by comparison.

The voice guidance system is well-implemented. The voice itself is quite pleasant. On a long trip, that's a huge plus. It gives excellent advance notice of all turns, and even tells you to "stay left" or "stay right" when appropriate. A nice feature is the graphic display of the remaining miles/estimated time to the next turn.

The only negatives: 1) It's not WAAS-enabled. You will not get the accuracy of position with this unit that you will with almost any other current unit from Garmin or Magellan. This is seldom a problem, since the software is intelligent enough to put you on the correct road, even if accuracy is only within 40 feet at the time. But a few times, it has registered me as being on a nearby side road, most often when that route is approaching mine at an angle of 40 degrees or less. 2) The packaged MapSource software is sometimes out of date. For example, passing through Rising Sun, Indiana to get to the riverfront, it always wants to route me through roads that don't exist anymore, having been eliminated where a Casino was built several years ago. If I didn't know the area, I'd have problems. Again, this is rare.

Final note: Read the manual. Become thoroughly familiar with all the functions and all the options. Some (not all) of the complaints in prior reviews could have been resolved if the authors had read the manual.

I love it! It was extremely intuitive. Easy to use, lots of features, voice/speaker feature is great.

These CDs are amazing - far better than the TDKs I had used before, which surprised me because I've long preferred TDK cassettes over Memorex. Actually, I've preferred almost everything over Memorex, and I only bought these because it was such a good sale when I saw them, and because I had become so irritated with the outrageous fail rate of other CD makers. I bought this pack of 50. Out of the 20 or 25 I've burned, I've not had a single bad one, which is amazing in the world of CD-R media. They burn quickly and cleanly and without a problem; my CD-RW has never had a problem using them (which it sometimes has with others).

I highly recommend these disks, and will not be using any other manufacturers any more (unless at some point Memorex proves itself unworthy). But when you have something that works so perfectly, what's the point of trying any other brand any more? There is no point. So I will use these exclusively.

As a last irrelevant note, the black color, while not necessary, nor making a bit of difference to recording or playback, *is* really cool looking.

This isn't really a review, persay - but I've long since used the normal Memorex brand - I just purchased the Black CD-R's for the first time, mainly because of an interesting article. For those of you who say that the 'color' of the disc doesn't effect anything - well, you're wrong.

A CD is reflective, that's how the laser reads the data. The less reflective (IE: Lighter color dye) the harder it is for the drive to read the data, where as more reflective (IE: darker color dye) makes it far easier.

Why do you think Sony chose the black CD's for the playstation? It wasn't for the copy protection bit - it was because they used inexpensive lasers and it's easier for them to read the black CD's.

The black writing surface of these media lends itself to error-free writing, as the dark color absorbs the light emitted from the laser. 50 cd's written to without a single problem. Highly recommend if the price is right.

I bought a S820 to replace my old Epson Stylus Color 600. I'm totally blown away by the speed and quality of the output. Printed an image I took with a digital camera on 1 of the free 4x6 Photo Paper Pro samples, I couldn't believe it came out of an inkjet!!
I prefer the S820 over the S820D because of the legacy (parallel port) support and [price] difference. I process all my photos before I print them so the direct print feature in S820D is not important. I liked the idea of the integrated CF reader in the S820D, until I found out that the printer needs to be turned on in order to transfer files to an attached PC. S900 gives the same quality as the S820x but 2x as fast. However, I can't see myself printing more than 30 photos a month, so I can't justifies paying... more for the S900.

you use Canon paper. I just replaced my old Epson600 since it never would print color well with Windows XP. This Canon blew me away when I used the Canon Photo Paper Plus (mid range glossy). An 8.5 x 11 picture from my Canon A40 (only 2 mp) is indistinquishable from a photolab film print. There is zero pixelation even under a magnifying glass. So do NOT believe the ususal reviews that say a 2 mp camera is OK only for medium quality 5x7 printing. The quality of prints on other brands of paper is mediocre so only use the Canon paper. I bought some cheap other brand glossy 4x6 paper and the results were not very good. Colors were fine but there was pixelation. The fact that this printer has 6 tanks solves the problem of cheaper printers. Refills are not costly if you know where to get them. Canon printers were good years ago and then Epson took the lead in color printing. Now Canon has come back strong with a real winner.

Bought this printer after owning an Epson which caused me only problems. The prints from my digital camera were awful and I had to continuously clean the printhead. Ran out of lots of ink that way. So, I researched this printer and bought it a few days ago. Installed the software and got it up and running in less than half an hour and started printing out pictures with the paper they included (Canon). Then bought Staples brand (cheaper) glossy photo paper - standard and printed about thirty pictures from that. These prints were reproduced from 35mm photos that were scanned. I use Photoeditor to edit them then print them out. They look identical to the original and much better than the Epson... If you want great photo prints for a very reasonable price, buy this printer!

After setting this up in about a minute I was scanning. The software/driver package is average. Warm up takes only a couple of seconds becuase it is not a CCD/lamp scanner, it is a CMOS scanner which requires less power and less components. Hopefully it will bring more reliability. USB powered. Easy for people to "borrow" or bring to a friends house. Just remember to lock/unlock it when traveling and scanning. Images are average but the speed is awesome. Beats my UMAX 1220U (1998) scanner by far. I'll probably try out epson scanners next, the quality and speed on that is supposed to be really good. If you are looking for fast, simplistic, reliable scanner, the LiDE 20 fits the bill without paying a big bill.

Like the previous reviewer (June 18), I debated on whether or not to get this scanner. But I figured the price was low and overall the reviews were very favorable. I'm glad I did. It is very easy to set up - just take it out of the box, install the software, plug in the usb cable and it is ready to use. Note: I only installed the drivers, not the image editing software because I use other programs instead, like Macromedia's Fireworks. It installed on Windows XP with no problems, and also interfaces with my image editing programs perfectly.

This scanner looks very good, and I like the slim design. I use lower resolutions because most of the scans are for the web or for viewing on a monitor - even at lower resolutions they look great. The biggest delay is when you make the first scan - it takes about a minute to calibrate. After that, the speed of the scans is relatively quick. It's nice not needing a power cord. Be advised that you will probably have to use a powered usb hub, not the one on the motherboard. I already had one so this was no problem.

Negative: when I scan multiple pictures, the software doesn't always recognize each picture - it sometimes combines more than one. Or, it chops off parts of the pictures. However, I might not be following the instructions so I'll give the scanner and software the benefit of the doubt here.

Overall for the price, this is an excellent value - good quality and good looks. I am happy with this purchase.

I just received my Canon Canoscan LiDE20 scanner and I must say that I'm quite impressed so far.

Software took about 20 minutes to install & it includes a good general image editing program, but I'm used to using Picture It that came on my system so I normally use the bundled software for the initial scan only, plus I don't like wasting time learning new software when I can use something I'm already familiar with. Also included was an OCR program (I've never used OCR that much and I probably won't use this one much either)

The scanner is very small and lightweight.

There's NO power cord, the scanner is powered through the USB cable (I have mine plugged into a POWERED USB hub and it works just fine)

The scanner is quiet while previewing or scanning.

Image quality is very good considering the price of the scanner.
I also considered the LiDE 30 that was a few bucks more, but I'm glad I saved the cash and got this model.

I've been scanning at 300 dpi and 400 dpi today, and after printing the images on photo paper I can't see much difference from the original.

The speed of the preview is good at less than a minute per page.

Depending on the resolution I'm using, the actual scan is quite fast also. Example: a 7" by 11" image scanned at 400 dpi takes a little over a minute to completely scan.

My old umax scanner (that won't work with Win XP) takes 2-3 minutes per preview and depending on resolution, takes 5-20 minutes per scan.

You have options for magazine, photo & other standard methods of scanning. I use the custom settings to raise the resolution to 400 dpi color. (I haven't scanned anything over 400 dpi yet, but I'll get around to that sooner or later) You can also change the image before scanning, including briteness & contrast, etc. I normally leave the other settings alone and tweak the images later.

I have noticed that unlike many other flatbed scanners I've used, the scan bulb is not lit at all times, only when scanning.

The scanner also features "ON FRONT" scan buttons, but I've never been a fan of one touch scanners, so I don't use them.

My only complaint is that after I scan images, onscreen they look pixelated and grainy, even if I use them in MS Publisher they look distorted. When the image is printed, it comes out just fine though.

Overall this is a great little scanner for the price.