Buy Advice - 35mm Slide Scanner

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.scanner (More info?)

I'm in need of some advice. I have about 3500 slides of my late
fathers that span from the 1950's to the 1990's. I want to digitize
these for safekeeping. I own an HP S20 but after scanning a couple
hundred slides, I find it is rather slow and the resolution and colour
depth are not as high as newer units.

I've been looking for comments regarding the Epson 4870 versus the
Canon 9950F and the Nikon Coolscan 5000 with the slide feeder. I want
a reasonable balance between speed, resolution, and quality. I like
the Canon because it will do 12 slides at a time, but I understand
that the images may not seem as crisp as the Nikon. Obviously, it is
also a third the cost.....but can I compensate with software
sharpening? I also have read that with the dust removal software
running, it is considerably faster than the Epson.

I would appreciate peoples comments, good or bad, on any of the above
scanners.

Thanks,
FRP

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.scanner (More info?)

If you were going to be scanning slides on a regular basis I would suggest
investing in a dedicated slide scanner. However, that would mean you would
need a flatbed scanner to scan everything else. If you look at the time it
is going to take you to scan just 3500 slides, you can see that you are
talking about a considerable effort. 3500 slides scanned in batches of 15,
taking 15 minutes to set up and scan each batch is about 72 hours of work.
That's 292 batches of slides!

Of course, you will be doing this over some period of time, so the ability
to scan multiple slides may not be a factor. I would seriously consider the
Epson 4870 as it has the combination of resolution and multiple slide (and
film) scanning necessary to produce quality scans.

"FRP" <frpyatt@yahoo.ca> wrote in message
news:bca3v094i33dupgmdplq6q51ukagoai5su@4ax.com...
> I'm in need of some advice. I have about 3500 slides of my late
> fathers that span from the 1950's to the 1990's. I want to digitize
> these for safekeeping. I own an HP S20 but after scanning a couple
> hundred slides, I find it is rather slow and the resolution and colour
> depth are not as high as newer units.
>
> I've been looking for comments regarding the Epson 4870 versus the
> Canon 9950F and the Nikon Coolscan 5000 with the slide feeder. I want
> a reasonable balance between speed, resolution, and quality. I like
> the Canon because it will do 12 slides at a time, but I understand
> that the images may not seem as crisp as the Nikon. Obviously, it is
> also a third the cost.....but can I compensate with software
> sharpening? I also have read that with the dust removal software
> running, it is considerably faster than the Epson.
>
> I would appreciate peoples comments, good or bad, on any of the above
> scanners.
>
> Thanks,
> FRP

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.scanner (More info?)

On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 20:24:27 -0500, FRP <frpyatt@yahoo.ca> wrote:

>I'm in need of some advice. I have about 3500 slides of my late
>fathers that span from the 1950's to the 1990's. I want to digitize
>these for safekeeping. I own an HP S20 but after scanning a couple
>hundred slides, I find it is rather slow and the resolution and colour
>depth are not as high as newer units.
>
>I've been looking for comments regarding the Epson 4870 versus the
>Canon 9950F and the Nikon Coolscan 5000 with the slide feeder. I want
>a reasonable balance between speed, resolution, and quality. I like
>the Canon because it will do 12 slides at a time, but I understand
>that the images may not seem as crisp as the Nikon. Obviously, it is
>also a third the cost.....but can I compensate with software
>sharpening? I also have read that with the dust removal software
>running, it is considerably faster than the Epson.
>
>I would appreciate peoples comments, good or bad, on any of the above
>scanners.
>
>Thanks,
>FRP

It looks like an easy decision based on your requirements. You
should go with the Nikon. You will never be happy with anything
less.

And remember that you can sell it when done.

PJ

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.scanner (More info?)

On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 20:24:27 -0500, FRP <frpyatt@yahoo.ca> wrote:

>I'm in need of some advice.........

>I would appreciate peoples comments, good or bad, on any of the above
>scanners.

You didn't ask, but there's one other thing implicit in your
project - How to store the scans.

You should know that while factory mastered and PRESSED CDs
will probably last scores if not hundreds of years with relatively
easy storage requirements, CD ROMs that you WRITE yourself
will not. Recent reports have life expectancies as low as just a
few years. The dyes are not long-term stable.

You can pick up Magneto Optical drives on ebay pretty
cheap that can write media that does last. That's why the
Feds use them almost exclusively to store 'evidence'.
So do video production companies and many others.

When they 'upgrade' to bigger and bigger ones, they
tend to dump perfectly useable gear super cheap, like
less than a penny on the dollar, ie 1.3 gigabyte sizes.

I like Maxoptix, but use Sony and HP, too.

Bill