Scanner Reviews

I purchased a Midland 74105XL as a gift, but gave it a quick test to make sure all was well before wrapping it up, and it performed exactly as could be expected.

I compared it to an Oregon Scientific WR-8000 'All Hazards' portable and an Icom IC-M3A marine VHF handheld radio. Reception quality was good on the active weather channels in this area, however there weren't any alert warnings broadcast at the time, so I can't comment on that feature. The Midland was a bit better than the Oregon Scientific, probably due to it's telescoping antenna vs. the short 'rubber ducky' type on the WR-8000. The Icom being a transceiver, and having a more sensitive receiver was better than both. The AM/FM section of the 74105XL works as well as any inexpensive portable radio.

The build quality of the 74105XL is also typical of an inexpensive radio (and typical for Midland) - sort of cheap feeling, but perfectly adequate for tabletop use. I had posted a negative review here on Amazon.com on the similarly featured Midland WR10 All Hazards radio based on it's less than user-friendly design. Fortunately, the layout of the 74105XL is much more straightforward.

Something that's probably applicable to just about every All Hazards radio currently in use in the U.S. is the quality (or, lack of) artificial speech used for NOAA's weather radio broadcasts. Up until a couple years ago, the broadcasts were recorded by a real, live human. They have since been replaced by a computer synthesized voice, and it sounds just like what you might expect - very artificial. According to the NOAA weather radio site [...], they are currently in the process of upgrading all of their stations with a newer technology, more natural sounding speech system. They even have sample audio files available for audition.

The 74105XL does not feature the SAME specific area warning system, so it's probably best suited to milder climes or environments where a highly localized warning may not be as essential. As a good, basic weather radio, the 74510XL does the job. By the way, the recipients I gave the radio to are happy with it!

this product is one of the most important things u should have if u want u your your family to be safe

This weather radio has it all!! Auto Alert, AM/FM, 7 Channels, Great Size. Bottom Line is it saved me last year during hurricane season. 5 Stars!!!

The scanner works fine, but slowly in USB 1 ports. When connected to the USB 2.0 hub, although the scanner was recognized by Windows XP, there was no response from the scanner, although on and properly connected. Several hours of uninstalling and reinstalling its software and downloading USB patches and updating drivers from Viaarena.com did nothing to solve the problem. If the problem isn't cracked in the next day or so, the scanner is going back where it came from.

I just received my Epson 4870, and have just spent a frustrating 12 hours getting this thing to work reliably.

My observations so far:

1) The hardward and drivers are very unreliable. Half the time, neither the Epson nor the Silverfast are able to communicate with the scanner. Turning the scanner off and on and rebooting the computer sometimes helps, but I sometimes I have to reboot multiple times in order to get it to work. I am using the USB cable that came with the scanner.

2) After upgrading to Silvertfast to 6.0.2 to get ICE support, the software simply stopped working, freezing Photoshop.

3) When I am lucky enough to get the scanner to work, the Epson software often quits halfway through the scanning process, citing an inability to communicate with the scanner. This is very frustrating, as I am scanning 120 film, which takes a good 20-30 minutes per slide (with ICE enabled).

4) The scanner is S-L-O-W. If you are scanning medium format film, be prepared to spend 30 minutes or more on each scan (not counting retries due to the unreliable nature of the scanner).

5) There is no way the resolution on this thing is 4800 DPI. Although I haven't been scientific about it, my guess is the real resolution is closer to 2700 DPI.

6) The scanner does not come with a carrier that supports 120 film longer than 12 cm. Although I knew going in, I would have liked to have a carrier that accepts longer film strips, because I also shoot using a 6x17 panoramic.

7) Epson technical support is 9-6 Monday through Friday only. I work during the week, so my chances of getting any support from Epson are close to zero, unless I decide to take a day off work.

I am very unhappy with this purchase, and will be looking into returning my scanner back to Amazon, probably replacing it with a Canon 9900.

I scan only 35 mm black-and-white negative film (including C-42). Scanning at 4800 dpi, 16 bit I get beautiful scans with great detail (about 58 MB files). Love the automation of scanning 24 negatives at once. It takes only about 70 minutes. Scan quality better than a pro-photo cd and close to the quality of a drum scan.

Setup was easy. Build quality is good. I'm quite happy. Would highly recommend.

This scanner has probably good hardware but you can expect big problems with software. The colors of photos scanned from negative film depend on the other shots on the same strip. Unfortunately even if you tell the scanner not to use color correction it does it anyway. Scanning 20+ negs with 3200dpi takes more than 5 hours. It was more or less acceptable for me if I could expect normal result. Unfortunately it happens often that after hours of waiting you have to delete pictures with heavy blue cast and put strips into the scanner in another order and hope that it will work (sometimes it helps).

I have asked from Canon customer care if there is another software or a way to configure this one somehow. They answered that I have to ask from Adobe. :-)

I assumed that, having a Firewire interface, this scanner would have really good Mac OS X support. Boy was I wrong. The CD came with no obvious installer, but a bunch of unintuitively named installers deep inside folders with no clues about the order of installation. I was able to download better installers from Canon's web site, but even so, the installation was painful. The installer would actually install another installer and then launch Internet Explorer to give you instructions on what to do next. There were several pieces of software to install, each one using this Byzantine method. At least the instructions in IE were clear.

The scanner driver is quite bad. The layout of the interface is poor (not to mention ugly) and the software sucks up all available CPU power when idle (strangely, CPU power goes down to 5 or 10% during scanning). Also, the installers load daemons that watch for button presses on the front of scanner. These suck up 5 or 10% of the CPU when the scanner is disconnected and output error messages continually to the system log files (they to grow to hundreds of megabytes and it becomes very difficult to find anything useful in them.)

Now, scanner software has a reputation for being bad and I just assumed that if Canon's were terrible I would buy the fantastic VueScan shareware program. I should have done my homework: Canon uses a proprietary communication protocol with this scanner, so it will only work with THEIR awful software. I recommend checking carefully and only buying TWAIN scanners, unless you KNOW the software that the scanner comes with is good.

Finally, I keep having a problem where, in the middle of a scan, the driver tells me that it has lost communication with the scanner and to check the cable. Once this happens, only a reboot will restore communication. Disconnecting the scanner, power cycling it, changing the cable, etc have no effect.

I sent tech support queries to Canon several times about these problems and never received a response.

On the hardware side, the negative scanner insert is pretty flimsy (though it hasn't broken yet) and does not hold the negatives flat. The lid does not quite close all the way. I usually have to put a small book on it to get it flush with the glass.

The scans that I have made are quite nice. But the pain associated with them has meant I have not used the scanner as much as I intended and have spent far too much time making those few scans.

I bought this unit to scan old b/w negatives & pictures. I had to increase my RAM from 128M to 512M and upgrade my USB to 2.0. Once I did that, things worked better. However, I still couldn't save a bmp file directly without it crashing. After speaking with Canon tech support--which was far more helpful on the scanner side of the house than their copier side--I found that the ArcSoft software had some issues. I began to use the included Adobe Photoshop Elements program exclusively and, what a difference! The truly extraordinary ability of this program to take a faded, discolored photo and, via auto color correction, restore it to vibrant, rich colors is astonishing! Even b/w pictures can be easily enhanced with the auto contrast feature. Have been able to scan old box camera negatives (120, 620, 116 & 616 formats) using the carrier, to my great delight. One caveat, the large format carrier for negatives is not as robust as the 35mm negative carrier. My normal scans of positives is at 400 or 800 dpi. It's impressive that a photo the size of a quarter can be effectively enlarged with great integrity. I have pulled out subtle details in photos that had escaped my notice even with the aid of a conventional magnifying glass. If you scan your photos at a minimum of 400 dpi you'll be amazed at how much they can be enlarged with little to no visible pixelation. I haven't tried batch scanning. None of my local retailers carried this unit. As one explained to me, the general buying public tends to go for the cheapest, low resolution scanners. Am so glad I went for this more powerful, utilitarian unit. Its versatility to work with negatives from 35mm to large format 4x5, as well as 35mm slides, and photos or documents makes it a great choice. The Canon program Scangear is easy to use and even a novice can quickly master it in short order.

I Searched for a scanner with a [price limit] I seen them all and got this one. very easy to use, a nice bundle of software. "HP" did good with this one.

I bought this scanner a couple of months ago and I've been very happy with it. Although it has some weak points the scanner itself is so good that you won't even notice it.

Good points:

- It's fast as long as you are not using 1200 or 2400 ppi. It really slows down on those resolutions when scanning in color.

- Great images. The photos scanned with the 5400c are sharp, crisp and vivid. Sometimes when you get an image which is too bright or too dark you can easily correct it from the driver.

- The installation is a breeze. There is an illustrated poster which helps you setup your scanner and in a couple of minutes you're ready to scan your image.

- The software is great. Although it lacks some advanced color settings I think is good enough for everyone. And I don't know why is Mike saying in his review that you cannot specify output format. In fact there are many formats that you can save to:

- tiff
- gif
- jpg
- bmp
- pdf
- html
- fpx
- pcx
- png

- rtf

- There is an option to send your results to MS WORD, Excel, Adobe photoshop, etc

WEAK POINTS:

- If you want to scan with 48 bit color mode you have to choose it every time from preferences setting - it's also rather hard to find it.

- slow on 1200 & 2400 ppi modes.

- no printed manual

- the ocr software is also not the best.

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I think it's a very good scanner for the price - buy it and you won't be disappointed. If you have any questions, please mail me: ...

I have recently bought an entire new computer system: monitor, CPU, printer and scanner. I was interested in a lower model scanner at first until I was talked into buying this model. I have NEVER regretted this purchase. I am a photographer and have prints from just about everything that need cropping after being scanned and this scanner does the job well. Scan resolution on this is great and the print quality when it comes out is just as sharp. I couldn't ask for more:)

In the market for a complete system like me??? Read my other reviews on: HP 753n computer, HP mx70 monitor, and HP 7350 printer.

Well, having recently upgraded to Windows XP, and having been otherwise quite happy with my Visioneer 6200 USB, I find that Visioneer's almost non-existent customer support gives me the following answer when trying to load the new driver required if you run XP on your system:

"Windows XP

Visioneer will not be applying for Windows XP logo for the scanners listed below, however these scanners will most likely still function properly.

Visioneer 6200"

CORRECTION: NO THEY WON'T! Apparently, they want me to fork over more money for another scanner rather than update the driver that many of their customers, like myself, will need in order to use it with XP. What a company! If they think I will ever buy another one of their products again, they are badly mistaken.

Shame on you, Visioneer! Stay away from these people, as they don't even have an email address for customer support.

I bought a Visioneer 6200 USB 11 months ago. This month it failed. I called the tech support number...and held for 1/2 hour before giving up. The next day I held for 1 1/2 hours before giving up. Today, after an hour hold time, I finally got through to a tech. Although I had the answers to her questions, she would not talk with me because I was not at home in front of the scanner (I don't have enough time to wait on hold for them while at home). I had already verified through e-mail correspondence the probable problem, however, they would not send parts or a new unit. Carefully consider how you may be left out in the cold when you purchase this item!

Having all but given up on the idea of scanning with my Visioneer 6200 under Windows XP, since the PaperPort software that comes with it no longer works and cannot be updated, I decided to try to use some of my other programs to try to access the scanner. While I was able to do so using third party software, I can no longer access my many scans done prior to the XP upgrade, as the PaperPort Program that manages the scanner and stores the scans will not run at all. If you are planning on going to XP and using this scanner, be sure you back up all of your PaperPort scans, or they will be lost. Like the people at Visioneer tech support, they will be inaccessible, unavailable, and/or no longer there when you need them.

I have owned my SnapScan 1212u for almost a year and I am, as of this moment, searching for a different brand. The help available is nil. The scanner has big problems interfacing with the SCSI drivers...and I cannot even begin to explain why I have waited this long to replace it. But to give you an idea...every time I want to make a scan...I have to unplug the machine, replug in, and then hurry back and hit the scan button so that the software can detect the scanner while the scanner is 'gearing up' for it's run. This is not an occasional problem....it is every single time I use it. Sadly I thought this was normal until I was more informed. It does not install well. And adding it to newer machines is hell on earth. If I could...I would rate this -5 stars. Good luck to all...but I am unhappy with AGFA. Thanks!

Brief history: I wanted a scanner, USB was a big plus, the price was right, so I opted for the Agfa 1212U. The scanner arrived, and the install was a breeze. The few test scans I did looked nice, darn nice. The software was pretty good too. I was happy.

When I settled down to do some serious scans (family photo restorations) I found a terrible flaw in my scanner. The underside of the plastic scanbed had trash and debris on it. Because it was under the glass, I couldn't clean it off. Every scan showed these little "shadows" from the debris.

I attempted to call Agfa customer service. Mistake. Agfa does a marvelous job of directing you circles, not answering emails, and making relevant information hard to find. Their 'customer support' is a joke. Had I known the low regard Agfa has for their customers, I would have bought another brand.

In the end, I went through the retailer and another scanner is on the way. If Agfa had the tiniest respect for their customers, I would have rated the 1212U four or five stars. But, I cannot recommend this product, or any other Agfa product, very highly.

I don't really have any complaints about this scanner. So far, it has done everything that I have needed it to do. I did have a little bit of trouble installing it. (Be careful to follow the directions exactly.) Also, the user interface seems a little clumsy to me. But, all in all, I'm satisfied with my purchase.

This scanner appears to have pontential but it turns out be be a flop. Many of its advertised options only work if you own a Epson printer. This fact that it only works with other Epson products is never mentioned until you get the product home and try to use it. When it fails to work the Epson Tec support people are quick to inform you that you will have to purchase one of their printers to use many of the options. If it was more compatible it could be a outstanding scanner. My advise is not to purchase the Epson 640U scanner! I have learned to hate mine.

People, you have to READ! This scanner works GREAT with non-Epson printers. If your install CD doesn't include the requisite patch (remember, you have to LOOK) you can get it through a link on the Epson 640U Support page the Epson web site.

This scanner provides great quality for the price. It produces high quality images which print very well. It's one touch features are very convenient. A great product.

Software interface takes much too long to load, and the slide and negative scans are poor quality.

Everytime you scan a new image, the "scanner lamp" warming up message appears, even if you've just used the scanner. This typically takes 15-20 seconds.

After the warm-up, if you need to switch from the default flatbed mode to a slide or film mode, the "scanner lamp" warming up appears still again.

Software installs with all sorts of bundled stuff for the average user, but most annoying to get rid of when you don't want it, like the e-fax (electronic fax service). After using the uninstall, I found I had to go through the registry and manually delete efax entries to keep the button from appearing on every program on my computer.

After installing, I hauled out my older Visioneer -- better scans, better price, faster GUI.

slide scans are rubbish, only good for documents

the results you get from this scanner will take your breath away.i have it teamed up with an epson stylus color 880 printer and the results are nothing but fantastic. the scanner is so easy to use, many operations done with the pushing of one button. to send anything to e-mail is especially easy.i have copied and printed photos from old sports illusrated magazines(from the 60's) and the results were amazing. at the price this scanner can't be beat.

I am using this product with a JetDirect print server. It scans, faxes, and prints over my network with no problems.BUT, the scanner carriage wastes time traveling to the opposite side for ADF scanning. It wasted even more time when the carriage would doulble pass per page using the ADF until I upgraded to the lastest firmware. The scanner carriage has a nervous twitching habit for no apparent reason. For faxing, this product is snobby when it come to socializing with other(COMM ERROR 321)fax machines, whereas the competitive products talk just fine to all fax machines using my same senario. YES...I have a clean phone line. YES...I've tried all possible combinations of V.34 and ECM being either on or off. I've been into the Developer's Menu. Have no clue on solving the fax issue in here. PRINTING IS FLAWLESS. If this poduct could digest some attention deficit disorder medication, then it would have some potential.

I have had my HP Laserjet 3330 for a couple of years now. Despite its fairly bulky size, I enjoy being able to get my separate printer, scanner, and fax machine off my desk, so I save a lot of space. The flatbed scanner was a must-have feature, and I love the automatic document feeder. Print quality is consistently speedy and high quality and I save bundles compared to an inkjet-based multifunction. (Those may cost less initially, but you'll pay for it in those overpriced ink cartridges!).

My primary use for this device is as a printer, my main complaint is the paper tray is very cheap and poorly designed. Try to remove the tray without removing the paper first and you have a big mess on your hands.

As a fax machine, this is a huge step up from my old dedicated fax machine, since I can fax directly from my computer, with the flatbed scanner, or with the automatic document feeder. I do have a couple of gripes with the fax software, though (see list of gripes below).

As a scanner, I love having both the automatic document feeder and the flatbed scanner for scanning oddly-shaped documents. When I first purchased it, the ADF was horribly slow because the scan head would have to go all the way over to the left edge to reach the adf, then returned all the way to the right edge between each page. It made it slow and tedious. HP fixed that bug with a BIOS update available on their web site in early 2003. Otherwise, I love its ability to put a big stack of documents in and walk away. I have scanned thousands of black-and-white documents and the speed is adequate and the ADF rarely misfeeds. Do NOT, however, purchase this scanner for its ability to scan photographs. Color scans are of dissapointingly poor quality. (pretty much unusable for high quality scanning of photos).

I have great success networking this printer in a peer-to-peer environment. I think there was some comment about being able to use the scanner and fax functions from networked computers, but I have never attempted this.

Gripes:

I had hoped to clear up my desk with a multifunction that could do everything I wanted to do with a printer, fax, and scanner. Now it appears that I need to purchase a scanner for scanning my color photographs since the quality is so poor. I get streaking lines through all darkly-colored sections of a photo. The scanner is fairly slow, and the maximum DPI is 600 dpi. There is no available transparency adapter for this scanner if you wanted to scan negatives, although with the color scanning quality problems and low scan resolution you wouldn't want to try.

The software that ships with this, and all HP products, IMHO is of very poor quality. My third-party scan drivers that work with most TWAIN-based scanners won't work with this scanner, either. The fax software is fine if you want to send pages from all one application, but it lacks the ability to temporarily store pages if you want to fax some sheets from, say, Excel, with a cover page from Word. You have to print some of them out and put them in the ADF, which seems kind of wasteful, but I don't fax a huge volume so it hasn't affected me as much as it might affect others.

Overall

At the time I purchased this unit, I felt it was the best laser-based multifunction on the market. When you purchase a multifunction, you are sacrificing your ability to get the best of each product; fax, scanner, and printer. Of course, you don't have to have three pieces of equipment on your desk, either. In this case, recognize that the scanner is probably the weakest link in this product and I would emphasize that if you are purchasing this product for scanning black-and-white documents, you will probably be happy with it. If you have hopes of digitizing your photo albums, keep looking.

I've had the 3330 for about 6 weeks and am very happy so far. Two concerns so far, one is with using odd sized paper, and the other is the scanner function. If scanning is an important function, you will want a different machine, I've never had a dedicated scanner that was so very slow. Making copies and sending faxes goes well, not sure why the scanner is so slow.

I use Windows XP Home and had some trouble with using odd size paper, e.g. small envelopes, 5 1/2" x 8 1/2" paper, etc. HP Service wasn't very helpful, just suggesting that I reinstall the drivers. Did get it working by defining custom paper sizes in my MS Office suite, so now it works fine with any paper I want to use.

Except for the paper problem, and the slow scanning I would have given it 5 stars

This scanner has many good points, but doesn't live up to the HP name. It warms up slowly, scans slowly, and the manual slide mechanism on the 6390 version is a pain. I bought it to support a busy customer reception area, and it just isn't up to the job. Being a relatively expensive scanner, and an HP, I expected more.

The SCSI interface is VERY nice, and using it reduces the time per scan considerably.

I did not purchase my 6350 at Amazon, but did so elsewhere. I have lived with this scanner for 2 months now. Here are my thoughts on this product. Note that the 3-stars and title I give this product are slightly misleading. The scanning quality is exceptional. The automatic document feeder (ADF) is a huge plus, and convenience. The software package included is alright. The setup and connections were no problems at all. With minor tweaking of this product, HP could really make it a scanner that will get it 5-stars in every category. Consider the following: 1. The scanner does not include faxing software, or at least I could not find any. This is a minor issue, however.... 2. The scanner optical "glass" surface had smudge marks and foggy spots, right out of the box. Perhaps better quality control/assurance practices at HP will fix this. Items with such obvious defects should never leave the manufacturing facility. Note that the average user cannot clean the underside of the scanner "glass". Hp does not recommend this for the 6350. 3. HP should have packaged the standard document cover with this unit as well. In cases where the ADF is required to be removed for repairs, the standard top could easily be put on. 4. The construction and design of the unit is not conducive to keeping the interior dust free. I state this as the chassis has several visible openings, that could introduce dust, fibres into the inside of the scanner. Perhaps HP designed it this way for ventilation and dessipation of built up heat from the unit. HP could perhaps better the design in future versions of this model. Since the 6300 is the identical model without the ADF, this fact applies to it as well, and other similar HP models too. In summary, I am quite pleased with this product. It does have the potential to be a GREAT product with a little more effort on HP's part. Sincerely, aba4430

I have this scanner for more than a 1.5 years now. I have choosen it because it's HP, and for the document feeder (there is no slide adapter with the 6350, it is bundeled with the 6390).

What I did not like is the miss of a printed manual (only on CD-rom) and the lack of an extensive on-line help (the help is very brief)! The 5 buttons on the scanner is just a joke for me, never used - I always wanted to make a scan/copy with other settings than the defaults. I have also configured the scanner to be used over our netwrok, whcich does not have much sense to me, but it works without problem.

The scanner have a SCSI-II interface, which let's it transfer data to the computer as fas as it reads from the glass. The document feeder is very useful, especially when making photo copies (the photo copy utility is very useful) or whith OCR through big quantities. The control software is really good too, let's you take control of all settings, no cut down.

I can recommend this scanner for all serious soho users!