CardScan Executive v8 Card Scanner

by CardScan

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 8.1 x 2.8 inches ; 15.2 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B000H1DCI4
• Item model number: CS-A08180-ENG
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (69 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
  • #24 in Electronics > Computers & Add-Ons > Scanners
• Date first available at Amazon.com: June 2, 2007

Product Description

From the Manufacturer

The CardScan® Executive is the "Best-in-Class" business card scanner. Easily drag and drop contact data from email or web pages and it's instantly placed in the correct fields of the CardScan software or mobile device. Manage your contacts in CardScan software or seamlessly sync with your software and mobile device.

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Saving time capturing business cards is only the beginning.

Designed for the power user and those with more advanced contact management needs, CardScan Executive allows you to scan, drag and drop or import contacts, and manage them with ease. Synchronize your data with Outlook®, Lotus® Notes, ACT!* ®, GoldMine®*, Palm® and Windows® Mobile devices. Batch scan a trade show’s worth of cards - the Executive can handle it - it comes with a faster, more powerful scanner that adds color to your contacts.

Scanning business cards is only half the story. You’re likely getting as many contacts in email these days. We make quick work of that, too.

Simply highlight the contact information in an email signature, web page or other text file and drag it over to the CardScan software. It’s instantly placed into the correct fields. It can’t be much easier than that!

If you’re sync’ing to Outlook, you now have your contact data there too, all with one click of the mouse. CardScan is also the only leading business card reader with online back-up, web access and an updating service. We keep your data safe so you can access it anytime.

User Interface

How’s it different from other CardScan products?

If you use a PC: Only solution in the industry to include free, secure online backup and updating service.

If you use a Mac: CardScan Executive for Mac does not currently include the online backup and updating service.

Features & Benefits

Fast!
The fastest scan speed – up to 30 cards a minute!

Easy-to-use Software
More than a business card scanner CardScan’s powerful, easy-to-use software is a complete contact management solution.

Versatile
Capture contact information from almost anywhere (business cards, email signatures, web pages and more).

Convenient
CardScan puts your contact information where you want it and keeps you in sync (Outlook, ACT!, Notes, GoldMine, Palm or Windows Mobile, Blackberry and more).

Safe
CardScan keeps your contact data safe, securely backing up your data to our CardScan At Your Service™ online service at no charge.

Risk-free
All CardScan products offer an unconditional risk free 30 day trial because we’re sure you will like our products as much as we do.

Get the latest “how-to” tips to make your CardScan contact management solution work harder for you.

Your CardScan solution comes with so many features that you may find yourself wondering how you ever got along without it. From the simple but all-important capture of contact information to producing mailing labels at breakneck speed, you’ll find each feature a golden opportunity for you to get and stay organized.

Scan and Launch
Insert the card and voila! You’ve launched the program.

Quick Search
Just type a few letters and the software springs into action.

Organize
Use Categories to display contacts by whatever they have in common.

De-Dupe
Resolve conflicting or duplicate information with the Duplicate Wizard.

Sync Up
Keep your Outlook/Outlook Express®, Palm®, Windows® mobile device and smartphones up to date and identical.

Drag and Drop
No business card necessary; just an email or other electronic document.

One-Click Email
Select the contacts you want, click the email button and off you go.

Easy Labeling
A print wizard guides you gently to the right format, fields and font; the software does the rest.

Safeguard
Use CardScan At Your Service™ for online access with secure backup.

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What’s in the Box:

Package Contents: Personal V8 Business Card Scanner, Detachable USB cord, CardScan version 8 Software, 2 Year Limited Warranty

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Frequently Asked Questions:

CardScan® ExecutiveBusiness Card Scanne

How long will it take me to set up the product and get my cards scanned in?
You can set up your CardScan system in about five-ten minutes for individual users, or a few minutes more if you are using one of our solutions for CRM systems. Between 20-40 cards can be scanned per minute, depending on your system and whether you scan in color or black and white.

Can the product read hand written notes?
The product will scan hand written notes, but will not be able to interpret them. An image will be saved of the notes for you to refer to or type in later.

Can it scan insurance cards/receipts/driver’s licenses?
The card will scan most anything that fits within the dimensions of the width of a business card, but the software is not set up to put the information on cards other than business cards into special fields. The image of these cards will be saved, however.

What PDAs does CardScan work with?
Currently, CardScan works with Palm, Handspring, Sony CLI É and Windows Mobile devices.

How accurate is your product?
CardScan can accurately scan most business cards. If you can read the card, CardScan can also. The product will also highlight any fields it feels might be wrong so you can verify the information and correct it if necessary.

Product Description

CardScan Executive features a desktop card scanner and full-featured contact management software -- ideal for the power user. Synchronizes easily with Outlook, PDAs, smart phones plus ACT!, Lotus Notes and GoldMine. Color scanning and fast 3 second scan.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

52 of 52 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Highly useful and accurate, January 17, 2007

By 

Tangible - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: CardScan Executive v8 Card Scanner (Office Product)

I'm not sure why the previous reviewer had so much trouble with the character recognition. Perhaps it is a defect in the particular unit he received. In my case, it did a very fine job recognizing the data on a large variety of business cards. Very fast, and easy to use. I did not activate the integration with Outlook, but did set it up to make the Cardscan contact list available in Outlook, and that worked just fine.
My only quibble is with the free online backup that they offer: the fine print tells you that they will email everyone on your contact list periodically to encourage them to join up. This sounds like a great way to lose all your friends, so I didn't do it.

33 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Exceeded Expectations, June 16, 2010

By 

P. Scott Pope "Scott Pope" (Chicago, IL) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: CardScan Executive v8 Card Scanner (Office Product)

After years of delaying the purchase of a business card scanner, I decided to make the plunge after amassing a pile of 300+ business cards. Generally, I am an early adopter of any technology that introduces additional efficiency into my life. However, I was a bit skittish about obtaining a business card scanner due to the negative impressions of the product category. However, despite a few of its shortcomings, the CardScan Executive has been a worthwhile investment.

In the past, coworkers have argued that the accuracy of such products is so low (<90% that they offer little value beyond the manual entry process. While the OCR accuracy of scanning complicated multicolored business cards is in fact only 85% to 90%, the CardScan software facilitates very rapid manual correction of the data. Not only are all of the relevant fields laid out in a consistent tabular form regardless of the original order, but the CardScan software highlights questionable data. At the same time, it allows the user to compare this data to the saved scanned image of the card. This juxtaposition is an important element of the value proposition of CardScan Executive solution. Regardless of the accuracy, the scanned images can be flipped through while inspecting the estimated OCR text. It is important to note that the user can scan hundreds of business cards, rapidly one at a time, before any of the time consuming manual correction takes place.

This automated process capability is one element of the software that I didn't fully understand before purchase. Assume you have 500 business cards that have elaborate graphics, which leads you to correctly guess there may be a high error rate. This isn't necessarily a problem as you can 1) scan all of the cards then 2) process (i.e. OCR)then 3) verify manually. The manual step can be done weeks later if you chose. In my case, I often don't know if I will need any of the cards, so the ability to scan and throw away the paper cards is important. Unfortunately it does not have a multi-card sheet feeder so assume that 5-10 seconds per card must be devoted to the original scanning process.

Another shortcoming of the CardScan Executive solution is that it does not learn as it goes. For example, if you have several business cards with crazy graphics from employees of a single company, the software does not recognize that you already identified key text on the previously manually verified cards. Moreover, where it can correctly recognize URLs and email domain names, the software can't intelligently determine the company name with this information. The difference between the domain name and the spelling of the company name is most notable with companies that have elaborate icons embedded in their company names.

The limitations of the device and software are most likely driven by cost. For several thousand dollars, the afforementioned limitations could be addressed. Yet, at this price point, most individuals who place a value of their time of greater than $20/hour (very low bar for white collar workers) and who want to digitize more than 225 business cards throughout the life of the product will receive a positive return on their investment.

Calculation
3 minutes saved per card for 225 cards = 11.25 hours
11.25 hours @ $20/hour = $225 > $200 purchase price

Pros
Relatively fast scanning
Easy Setup
Software productivity aids for manual verification

Cons
No automated sheet feeder
Does not learn from previous verifications or intelligently extract data from the different parts of the card to improve OCR (i.e. company name matched to URL/email domain)

41 of 43 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Terrible Tech Support, June 2, 2008

By 

TwinAce "TwinAce" (Redondo Beach, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: CardScan Executive v8 Card Scanner (Office Product)

The product worked for three days and then stopped working. CardScan is one of these companies that asked not to return the product to the store but to contact their customer service if the product has a problem. I was on hold with customer service for 35 minutes before giving up. I wrote their tech support an email regarding the issue. Two days later I received a response asking me what scanner I had purchased and what color the light was showing (even though all this information was provided in the initial email). After sending this information again they determined that the unit I had purchased was defective and they would send me a new unit. The unit they sent me turned out to be refurbished. I was incredibly disappointed that it took so long for their tech support to respond and that they did not keep to their commitment an exchange the defective unit for a new unit. Considering I had spent close to $300 on a NEW unit and not refurbished one and the unit I purchased only worked for three days this was the least they should have done. This company does not stand by their product.