Good scanner (Please help!!!)

[shurik92]

I am in a market for a scanner. I have thousands of photos laying around that I would like to convert into digital format. I am kind of an idiot on the subject. I have a Microtech 3800 but it takes forever to scan in a picture in decent quality and the results are less then great. Some of them are quite old and fragile. I also have hundreds of negative strips. What is the best scanner on the market in terms of price and what is good in terms of price to value? Also, what features should I look for to improve the quality and speed of scanning. Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

[Zepper]

Most Epson scanners are very good and you can get them cheap off eBay, here in FS/Trade or direct from the Epson store at epson.com clearance dept (refurbs mainly and usually free ground shipping). Have you considered scanning four or more at a time? Just attach them to an alignment sheet and you can separate tham as needed later with any photo manipulation software.

.bh.

 

[jmarkos]

My recomendation is Canon LiDE500F. It's mid-price, new tech and will be a great starter machine to get you into your project. Be sure to consider HDD back-up, processor speed and RAM when getting started. If you using negative strips you might want to look at the film scanners. Good luck, you'll love the results when you build a slide show, add music and watch the memories with family & friends on the DVD

 

[HDTVMan]

My recommendation although evil is buy a high end scanner and return it within the return policy.

Sorry about that its just that I believe they should rent out high end scanners because there are so many people looking to do this.