Fujitsu ScanSnap S1500 Instant PDF Sheet-Fed Scanner for PC
by Fujitsu Imaging
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List Price: Our Price: $414.49 You Save: $80.51 (16%) Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Buy Used: from $360.00 (click here) Category: CE See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Fujitsu ScanSnap S1500 Instant PDF Sheet-Fed Scanner for PC
Customer Review: I'm Smitten
Summary: 5 Stars
OK, I'm still in the honeymoon phase with my shiny new ScanSnap, so maybe that is why I so smitten. However, I've owned 4 other scanners before, and I have hated every one of them. Needless to say, this "ain't my first rodeo." The ScanSnap installed fairly easily (removing all the tape could have gone more smoothly), and the install was straight forward on an XP machine. I installed all the software from the DVD, and that was a tad bit slow, but once it was over it was over. Since I was replacing a paper mangling HP scanner that I had finally thrown in the trash (by way of against the wall first), I had an overflowing stack of things to scan immediately.
It was amazing. I kept finding myself saying, "Cool!" after every scan. It didn't care what size I threw at it, which way I inserted or even how many. It just popped right on and started scanning without error. I was able to customize scan locations and qualities without having to read any manuals or PDFs, and the paper handling (mega-important) has been absolutely flawless. If I have a complaint, I have noticed that it will insert an occasional blank page into a pdf when scanning two-sided docs. However, it seems to do this when the originals were folded, and the scanner reads the creases on a blank back-side as something worth saving. It's really a small detail and doesn't make me love it any less.
I have no input on longevity or durability, as I have only had it a month or so.
Customer Review: Great Hardware, Abysmal Software
Summary: 3 Stars
I used this scanner to digitize about 20 years worth of college magazines. The hardware is amazing: the scans are incredibly fast, high quality, and there is no lamp "warm up" time. Using other scanners after getting this was painful.
This scanner has two major shortcomings:
1) The software is terrible. There is no TWAIN driver, so you can't scan directly into Photoshop or Acrobat. The included software does the job well enough, but a scanner at this price range should not be restricted to proprietary software. Further, the device loaded my computer with a ton of unnecessary software, and there was no option to install just part of the package. I have to run probably 3 or 4 background processes, even when I'm not scanning. My preference whenever possible is to install minimal proprietary software and use the stuff built into Windows and my image processing software.
2) The literature for the scanner advertises 11x17in. scanning with a special carrier. In practice, this feature does not work well. You will be left with awkward scans that are missing regions and are awkwardly presented. I would NOT recommend this to anyone who needs to scan 11x17in. documents whole. I found that cutting my 11x17in. spreads in half before feeding them into the scanner was a better way to scan, but this may not be an option for everyone.
Fujitsu should put some more effort into developing generic software options for this hardware.
Customer Review: Awesome Scanner
Summary: 5 Stars
Awesome for the price!!. but read some of the negative comments before you buy and you wont be disappointed. It does everything it says it does. I've not had any problems with paper jams other than for old papers with torn edges. What do you expect to happen. Been using it for 4 days.
Pros
This thing is tiny when folded up
You get adobe acrobat 9 standard for free - thats like $299 - I was going to buy it anyway
Duplex scanner - 40 pages per min (double sided)
Fast
I like the scansnap organization software - some of the reviews ive seen reviewed an older version of this software
automatic feed detection - just rescan from that page - no need to do whole stack. Easy to unjam. Press one button
OCR's as it scans - not tried this. Easier to just batch it in adobe after the scans. That works great.
Cons
The feed and collection trays neeed to be folded out so therefore could be a bit problematic for those heavy handeded people among us
No twain drivers - yes but i only want to create pdf's so its great. Press one blue button and its done
Cannot name document before scan , but its easy to do it afterwards. Actually after scanning 200 docs - it was easier to this after the scanning.
Not tried cards - didnt buy it for that i have a card scanner
This baby is sweet. Glad i purchased it and well on my way to a paperless office.
Customer Review: The S1500 shall set you free
Summary: 5 Stars
I'd been wondering what to do about the increasing encroachment of papers in my home office, figuring that it wouldn't be long before I'd no longer be able to accommodate so much as an additional notebook of papers on my many shelves. Afraid that it might be a bit of an extravagance, I nevertheless ordered a Fujitsu S1500 about 6 months ago. Over ten thousand scanned papers later, I'm happy to report that this is the niftiest little gadget I've bought since my first GPS. It scans quickly (Fujitsu's claim of 20 pages per minute seems about right) with a minimum of fuss, and produces beautiful-looking PDFs. The software--both ScanSnap Manager and ScanSnap Organizer--work exceptionally well for my needs, and the Organizer includes the ability to do simple edits on the scanned docs before you save them away. The S1500 also comes with Adobe Acrobat 9 which, I was surprised to find, works *much* better than an older version that I'd used years ago, and is indispensable for annotating documents.
I suppose I could complain about lack of TWAIN support, but I have no reason to do so. The software that came with the S1500 serves all my scanning needs. (I don't use it to scan photos, and I wouldn't recommend you buy it for that purpose. The scanner seems to leave little scratches on photo stock.)
This is one of those products that, once you've used it for a few months, you wonder how you did without it.
Customer Review: All the hype is true. 2 minor gripes.
Summary: 5 Stars
So everyone that owns one of these raves about how wonderful it is. People describe it as being a game-changer like the iPhone is for cell phones. And it is. It is that good. So small, so fast, sucks in pages quickly and turns them into great pdf files that are easily managed (saved into a file or email or other options). This is great for an office that wants to go paperless or needs to transmit signatures with better clarity than a fax machine (e.g. real estate documents).
I rate this scanner 5 stars despite 2 small demerits: First, even on the highest compression some files are bigger than I'd prefer. Often times I just want to save an archived version of a document so I don't have to put the paper version in storage or I might want to email a longer document. The file sizes are progressively smaller with higher compression but I'd like a higher maximum. Second nitpick is that the OCR isn't the greatest. It's free, so I shouldn't complain and it's works better with higher resolution, but often it has a large number of mistakes which makes the conversion to searchable ODF less valuable. It would be nice if the OCR feature used some type of spelling database so it could guess between similar looking characters based on which would make a word and which produces gibberish. Again, I'm very happy with the scanner and wish I would have bought one earlier.