Scanner advice

[Jill]

I was wondering if the folks here had any advice on choosing a scanner.
Its for reasonable quality home use : genealogy, family photos and old
books - not professional production

Uses:
Digitising old photographs
Digitising old [out of copyright] books - my limited understanding is that
this can be awkward in many models.
OCR [when I get my head around it]
and if it can be done in the budget - digitising microfilm/fiche and slides.
maybe some large items as well

Easy of use is important. I am not retired and have to fit in hobby around
alot of other things so something that can be quite quick is nice. If its
good to use it could end up with quite a bit of use, if you know what I
mean.
What it looks like is of no importance at all

The sorts of places I have looked are http://www.misco.co.uk; http://www.ebuyer.co.uk;
but they don't seem to have much of a range and I don't know what features I
am looking for

Budget is around £150 - £200.

I appreciate any advice you can give me, thank you

--

regards Jill Bowis
Surnames search
Senior, Ashworth, Pulman, Crossland, Ambler, Neutkens, Hebblethwaite,
Nuttal, Taylor
Mair, Brown [ABS], Lawrie, Sutherland, Rainey, Hunter, Pittendriech, Sumner,
Moss, Houghton, Hampson, Owen, Smethurst,
Lister, Vaughan, Maltby, Tomlinson, Stewart[London], Yabbicom,
Smith[Leicester], Beaumont, Gibson, Wickings
Bowis, Palin, Parish, Foster, Newlove, Yabbicom, Goodall, Stewart [Paisley],
MacKinlay, Watt, Green, Smith, Weir, Hair,
One name : Bowis http://www.bowis.co.uk One place: Ardchattan, Argyll
http://www.benderloch.org.uk/forum

[Allen]

Jill wrote:

I was wondering if the folks here had any advice on choosing a scanner.
Its for reasonable quality home use : genealogy, family photos and old
books - not professional production

Uses:
Digitising old photographs
Digitising old [out of copyright] books - my limited understanding is that
this can be awkward in many models.
OCR [when I get my head around it]
and if it can be done in the budget - digitising microfilm/fiche and slides.
maybe some large items as well

Easy of use is important. I am not retired and have to fit in hobby around
alot of other things so something that can be quite quick is nice. If its
good to use it could end up with quite a bit of use, if you know what I
mean.
What it looks like is of no importance at all

The sorts of places I have looked are http://www.misco.co.uk; http://www.ebuyer.co.uk;
but they don't seem to have much of a range and I don't know what features I
am looking for

Budget is around £150 - £200.

I appreciate any advice you can give me, thank you

I don't know what prices are like in the UK, but in the US you could buy

a very, very nice scanner for that price--one that will do everything
you included in your want list except microfilm or microfiche. I have a
Canon CanoScan 8400F that I bought a year ago for well below your target
price. It came with a good OCR program and software for scanning color
slides and negatives. I have scanned several thousand slides with it and
have been satisfied with the results, though slide scanning is rather
slow and rather awkward. It will scan very slightly larger than US
letter size (8.5 x 11 inches) and will cover your A4 according to the
documentation; scanners that will handle anything larger are quite pricy
in the US, and probably also in the UK. Again, I don't know about prices
or availability of specific models in the UK, but you should be able to
find something quite nice, and which will add considerably to your
enjoyment of your hobby. One caution--don't expect miracles from OCR;
different typefaces, quality of printing etc makes proofreading an
absolute requirement.
Allen

[Charlie Hoffpauir]

On Wed, 17 Jan 2007 10:05:59 -0000, "Jill"
<[email protected]> wrote:

I was wondering if the folks here had any advice on choosing a scanner.
Its for reasonable quality home use : genealogy, family photos and old
books - not professional production

Uses:
Digitising old photographs
Digitising old [out of copyright] books - my limited understanding is that
this can be awkward in many models.
OCR [when I get my head around it]
and if it can be done in the budget - digitising microfilm/fiche and slides.
maybe some large items as well

Easy of use is important. I am not retired and have to fit in hobby around
alot of other things so something that can be quite quick is nice. If its
good to use it could end up with quite a bit of use, if you know what I
mean.
What it looks like is of no importance at all

The sorts of places I have looked are http://www.misco.co.uk; http://www.ebuyer.co.uk;
but they don't seem to have much of a range and I don't know what features I
am looking for

Budget is around £150 - £200.

I appreciate any advice you can give me, thank you

As Allen has already said, there are lots of choices in that price
range, but most of them will have a problem with scanning books unless
you are willing to "unbind" the book to get the pages to lie flat.

There is one scanner that I know of that I've considered buying, but
have yet to justify, that is supposed to correct that problem. Here's
a link to their web site.

http://www.datamind.co.uk/Merchant/plus ... 0_home.htm

The web site explains it quite well. I suppose if I had a number of
books to scan, I'd get one.

If you do get it, I'd really appreciate some feedback on what you
think of it. I generally read the newsgroup, or you can email me
directly at this address: charliehoffp at yahoo dot com.

Charlie Hoffpauir
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~charlieh/

[Jill]

Charlie Hoffpauir wrote:

On Wed, 17 Jan 2007 10:05:59 -0000, "Jill"
[email protected]> wrote:

I was wondering if the folks here had any advice on choosing a
scanner.
Its for reasonable quality home use : genealogy, family photos and
old books - not professional production

Uses:
Digitising old photographs
Digitising old [out of copyright] books - my limited understanding
is that this can be awkward in many models.
OCR [when I get my head around it]
and if it can be done in the budget - digitising microfilm/fiche and
slides. maybe some large items as well

Easy of use is important. I am not retired and have to fit in hobby
around alot of other things so something that can be quite quick is
nice. If its good to use it could end up with quite a bit of use, if
you know what I mean.
What it looks like is of no importance at all

The sorts of places I have looked are http://www.misco.co.uk;
http://www.ebuyer.co.uk; but they don't seem to have much of a range and I
don't know what features I am looking for

Budget is around £150 - £200.

I appreciate any advice you can give me, thank you

As Allen has already said, there are lots of choices in that price
range, but most of them will have a problem with scanning books unless
you are willing to "unbind" the book to get the pages to lie flat.

Books are what really appeals; but unbinding them does not
I could just take digiphotos of the old photographs but being able to OCR
and play with some of my old books has possibilities I would like to explore
Slides and microfilm/fiche are also of interest

There is one scanner that I know of that I've considered buying, but
have yet to justify, that is supposed to correct that problem. Here's
a link to their web site.

http://www.datamind.co.uk/Merchant/plus ... 0_home.htm

The web site explains it quite well. I suppose if I had a number of
books to scan, I'd get one.

Hmm- looks appealing but would need another scanner to do things like slides
etc

If you do get it, I'd really appreciate some feedback on what you
think of it. I generally read the newsgroup, or you can email me
directly at this address: charliehoffp at yahoo dot com.

Charlie Hoffpauir
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~charlieh/

will do
thank you for your time

--

regards
Jill Bowis

Pure bred utility chickens and ducks
Housing; Equipment, Books, Videos, Gifts
Herbaceous; Herb and Alpine nursery
Working Holidays in Scotland
http://www.kintaline.co.uk

[Charlie Hoffpauir]

On Wed, 17 Jan 2007 16:44:57 -0000, "Jill"
<[email protected]> wrote:

Charlie Hoffpauir wrote:
On Wed, 17 Jan 2007 10:05:59 -0000, "Jill"
[email protected]> wrote:

I was wondering if the folks here had any advice on choosing a
scanner.
Its for reasonable quality home use : genealogy, family photos and
old books - not professional production

Uses:
Digitising old photographs
Digitising old [out of copyright] books - my limited understanding
is that this can be awkward in many models.
OCR [when I get my head around it]
and if it can be done in the budget - digitising microfilm/fiche and
slides. maybe some large items as well

Easy of use is important. I am not retired and have to fit in hobby
around alot of other things so something that can be quite quick is
nice. If its good to use it could end up with quite a bit of use, if
you know what I mean.
What it looks like is of no importance at all

The sorts of places I have looked are http://www.misco.co.uk;
http://www.ebuyer.co.uk; but they don't seem to have much of a range and I
don't know what features I am looking for

Budget is around £150 - £200.

I appreciate any advice you can give me, thank you

As Allen has already said, there are lots of choices in that price
range, but most of them will have a problem with scanning books unless
you are willing to "unbind" the book to get the pages to lie flat.

Books are what really appeals; but unbinding them does not
I could just take digiphotos of the old photographs but being able to OCR
and play with some of my old books has possibilities I would like to explore
Slides and microfilm/fiche are also of interest


There is one scanner that I know of that I've considered buying, but
have yet to justify, that is supposed to correct that problem. Here's
a link to their web site.

http://www.datamind.co.uk/Merchant/plus ... 0_home.htm

The web site explains it quite well. I suppose if I had a number of
books to scan, I'd get one.

Hmm- looks appealing but would need another scanner to do things like slides
etc

Yes, but just about any true file scanner will do a much better job on
scanning 35mm slides and negatives than any flat bed that you can get
for under $1000. If you don't already have a flat bed (or even if you
do) then a cheap flat bed for prints and a file scanner for slides and
negatives is the best route to go.

If you do get it, I'd really appreciate some feedback on what you
think of it. I generally read the newsgroup, or you can email me
directly at this address: charliehoffp at yahoo dot com.

Charlie Hoffpauir
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~charlieh/

will do
thank you for your time
Charlie Hoffpauir

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~charlieh/

[Charlie Hoffpauir]

On Wed, 17 Jan 2007 11:12:50 -0600, Charlie Hoffpauir
<[email protected]> wrote:

On Wed, 17 Jan 2007 16:44:57 -0000, "Jill"
[email protected]> wrote:

Charlie Hoffpauir wrote:
On Wed, 17 Jan 2007 10:05:59 -0000, "Jill"
[email protected]> wrote:

I was wondering if the folks here had any advice on choosing a
scanner.
Its for reasonable quality home use : genealogy, family photos and
old books - not professional production

Uses:
Digitising old photographs
Digitising old [out of copyright] books - my limited understanding
is that this can be awkward in many models.
OCR [when I get my head around it]
and if it can be done in the budget - digitising microfilm/fiche and
slides. maybe some large items as well

Easy of use is important. I am not retired and have to fit in hobby
around alot of other things so something that can be quite quick is
nice. If its good to use it could end up with quite a bit of use, if
you know what I mean.
What it looks like is of no importance at all

The sorts of places I have looked are http://www.misco.co.uk;
http://www.ebuyer.co.uk; but they don't seem to have much of a range and I
don't know what features I am looking for

Budget is around £150 - £200.

I appreciate any advice you can give me, thank you

As Allen has already said, there are lots of choices in that price
range, but most of them will have a problem with scanning books unless
you are willing to "unbind" the book to get the pages to lie flat.

Books are what really appeals; but unbinding them does not
I could just take digiphotos of the old photographs but being able to OCR
and play with some of my old books has possibilities I would like to explore
Slides and microfilm/fiche are also of interest


There is one scanner that I know of that I've considered buying, but
have yet to justify, that is supposed to correct that problem. Here's
a link to their web site.

http://www.datamind.co.uk/Merchant/plus ... 0_home.htm

The web site explains it quite well. I suppose if I had a number of
books to scan, I'd get one.

Hmm- looks appealing but would need another scanner to do things like slides
etc


Yes, but just about any true file scanner will do a much better job on
scanning 35mm slides and negatives than any flat bed that you can get
for under $1000. If you don't already have a flat bed (or even if you
do) then a cheap flat bed for prints and a file scanner for slides and
negatives is the best route to go.

that should read "film" not "file".


If you do get it, I'd really appreciate some feedback on what you
think of it. I generally read the newsgroup, or you can email me
directly at this address: charliehoffp at yahoo dot com.

Charlie Hoffpauir
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~charlieh/

will do
thank you for your time
Charlie Hoffpauir
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~charlieh/
Charlie Hoffpauir

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~charlieh/

[John Nichols]

"Jill" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...

I was wondering if the folks here had any advice on choosing a scanner.
Its for reasonable quality home use : genealogy, family photos and old
books - not professional production

Uses:
Digitising old photographs
Digitising old [out of copyright] books - my limited understanding is
that this can be awkward in many models.
OCR [when I get my head around it]
and if it can be done in the budget - digitising microfilm/fiche and
slides.
maybe some large items as well

Easy of use is important. I am not retired and have to fit in hobby around
alot of other things so something that can be quite quick is nice. If its
good to use it could end up with quite a bit of use, if you know what I
mean.
What it looks like is of no importance at all

The sorts of places I have looked are http://www.misco.co.uk; http://www.ebuyer.co.uk;
but they don't seem to have much of a range and I don't know what features
I am looking for

Budget is around £150 - £200.

I appreciate any advice you can give me, thank you

--

For digitizing books and using OCR I recommend Wizcom's SuperPen

Professional hand held scanner pen. I've great luck with it, and use it
quite a bit for work. It's available on Amazon.com (U.S.) for $150.00,
probably at an equivalent price at their U.K. site. For flatbed which is
what you'd want for photos and documents that are too large for a hand
scanner, I use a Canon 3 in 1 ImageClass 3110 laser printer and scanner.
I've been very happy with this, the color is quite good, (48 bit internal
depth, and 1200x2400 dpi for color resolution.) I bought this two years
ago, so I'm sure it's been replaced, but you can probably find something
comparable.

[Jill]

John Nichols wrote:

For digitizing books and using OCR I recommend Wizcom's SuperPen
Professional hand held scanner pen. I've great luck with it, and use
it quite a bit for work.

Thank you -- an interesting device.
I fear the books I have in mind have too many images within the body of the
text which might outweigh the benefits of this type of machine.

It's available on Amazon.com (U.S.) for

$150.00, probably at an equivalent price at their U.K. site. For
flatbed which is what you'd want for photos and documents that are
too large for a hand scanner, I use a Canon 3 in 1 ImageClass 3110
laser printer and scanner. I've been very happy with this, the color
is quite good, (48 bit internal depth, and 1200x2400 dpi for color
resolution.) I bought this two years ago, so I'm sure it's been
replaced, but you can probably find something comparable.

I am grateful for your time and ideas.
I think that a flatbed that enables convenient book scanning is my direction

--

regards
Jill Bowis

Pure bred utility chickens and ducks
Housing; Equipment, Books, Videos, Gifts
Herbaceous; Herb and Alpine nursery
Working Holidays in Scotland
http://www.kintaline.co.uk