Fujitsu ScanSnap S500 Clr 18PPM/36IPM Dupl Scanner

by Fujitsu

Product Details

• Shipping Weight: 11 pounds
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B000F3YSQ4
• Item model number: PA03360-B505
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (55 customer reviews)
• Date first available at Amazon.com: July 7, 2004

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

The ScanSnap S500 is a complete Office Solution designed to improve your productivity and to solve your office scanning problems. Turn Images on paper into PDFs You can turn the documents that clutter up your desktop into PDFs, and manage and archive them on your computer. You can use the Adobe Acrobat software package with this scanner to display these PDF documents. ScanSnap product can also automatically recognize the type of documents, color or black & white so scanned image files can be made smaller when scanning documents containing a mixture of color and black & white pages. You can also have the scanner automatically remove blank pages in documents in order to reduce the size of files even more.

In one step, the ScanSnap S500 digitizes both sides of a document in a single pass, in color, and at an amazing speed of up to 18 pages per minute.

With the auto paper size detection feature you can Scan mixed batches of documents varying in size.

Scan 18 double-sided pages per minute
In one step, the ScanSnap S500 digitizes both sides of a document in a single pass, in color, and at an amazing speed of up to 18 pages per minute.

Advanced features for the ultimate ease of use
With a touch of the button the ScanSnap enhances the user experience with a host of automatic features, including:

• Auto paper size detection Scan mixed batches of documents containing paper ranging in size from business cards to legal sized documents
• Auto de-skew Automatically straightens and aligns text and images into their correct orientation
• Auto blank page deletion Save storage space and eliminate the need to edit scanned documents with the ScanSnap’s ability to recognize and delete blank pages

Instantly create searchable PDF files
The included "ScanSnap Organizer" automatically converts scanned data into searchable PDF files, while the ScanSnap S500’s image enhancement technology increases character recognition for more precise OCR accuracy.

Scan directly to Microsoft Office Applications
The bundled ABBYY FineReader enables the user to scan documents directly to applications such as Word, Excel and PowerPoint.

Quickly organize business card information
Scan business cards directly to your contacts database with the included CardMinder application. CardMinder captures information written in 7 languages from scanned business card images and stores this information in an easily accessible format.

Simple installation and operation in a compact design
The ScanSnap easily installs via its USB 2.0 interface and its small footprint requires less space than a letter size piece of paper.

What's in the box
ScanSnap S500, power cord, USB cable, software includes: full standard version of Adobe Acrobat 7.0, CardMinder 3.0 Business Card Software, and ScanSnap Organizer V 3.0 Software, set up disc, getting started guide and operator's manual

Product Description

liOne button scanning to searchable PDF liScan directly to Microsoft applications li20% faster scanning speed liBusiness card scanning liColor Duplex 18 pages per minute liEnhance productivity with Fujitsu service and support

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

158 of 159 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Despite a few problems, I am ecstatic about this system!, April 26, 2006

By 

California Dreamin "sr538" (San Francisco, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Fujitsu ScanSnap S500 Clr 18PPM/36IPM Dupl Scanner (Office Product)

I purchased this scanner to improve the operation of my CPA office (consulting/audit practice), and to get rid of a good part of (roughly 40 crates of) files I have accumulated over my career. Before making this purchase I reviewed the CPA Computer report Accountants Guide to Going Paperless, the AICPA IT section whitepapers, I attended a few paperless workshops, and I read Amazon reviews of earlier Fujitsu products and Visioneer products. My unit serial number was #5XX, so mine is one of the first of this model sold. This review is based on only one week of experience using the S500, but I think it is better to share this information now than to wait until I have more to report.

The S500 appears to be similar to the previous model the FI5110EOX2 which has been heavily, and positively, reviewed on Amazon and also in the references listed above. Differences between the S500 and the earlier 5110 are as follows -
* Integration with ABBY OCR, so the S500 can produce searchable PDF's and other formats!!! This was a major limitation with the 5110EOX2 which could only produce graphic PDFs. The ABBY OCR is not perfect, but hopefully gets enough keywords right to make the document findable.
* One touch scan to PDF, to Word, to Excel, to Power Point, to ScanSnap Organizer (which produces searchable PDFs), and to Cardminder (for business cards).
* Inclusion of Adobe Acrobat 7.0!
* 20% improved scan speed (up to 16 pages per minute, with a 50 page feed bin), and the ability to append consecutive batches to the same PDF file. In practice I think I will often be using highest resolution (Excellent, 1200dpi/600dpicolor) mode with max compression, which is significantly slower - about 25sec/page scan time and 10sec/page OCR time on my new Compaq presario laptop. The lower resolution modes (going down to Fastest, 300dpi/150dpicolor) might be sufficient for older print documents without marks or illustrations, that do not have much value to me, that I doubt I will ever look at again but can't just toss.
* Automatic document size detection so you can feed batches of mixed size documents. (plus all the document handling features from the 5110, including reasonably good automatic handling of mixed single sided and double sided documents)
* File compression which is claimed to reduce file sizes 20-50 percent.
* A significant cash manufacturers [censored] for purchases from authorized dealers is currently available for this product through the Fujitsu website.

Here are the limitations I have seen with this scanner so far (4000 scans of documents and business cards) -
* It sometimes feeds two sheets at once, most often the first two sheets in a batch, so I will have to keep my eye on the first sheets it feeds. If the documents have page numbers it will be easy to know how many documents I have fed and compare this with the scanner count. If the documents do not have page numbers I will need to count them by hand, or keep I very close eye on the scanner throughout the scan, or just live with a very occasional missed page due to the mechanism feeding two sheets at once.
* I assume staples will damage the mechanism, and so I will have to carefully inspect all documents for staples before scanning.
* The OCR is alright but not perfect. There are frequent OCR mistakes when scanning business cards, and several mistakes per page on spreadsheets (7's sometimes become 1's, 5's sometimes become S's, 0's sometimes become O's, missing decimal points, extra junk characters etc). White text on black background and black text on grey background have poor results. Fortunately the graphic image is retained in the searchable PDF, and is also retained in Cardminder, so that even when the OCR is not perfect I can still see what the original looked like.
* If a spreadsheet had relationships between the columns, I can recalculate the relationship and compare my recalculation with the scanned information, which seems to detect almost all errors in scans to Excel.
* Scan to Word often results in a slightly different format or positioning of text than the original document.
* The scanner does not support TWAIN (a uniform driver interface for scanners), instead it has a proprietary interface. Based on my research, the proprietary interface is better than TWAIN, so if the included software meets your needs then this is not a limitation. However if you absolutely must use some 3rd party software that requires TWAIN then you should not buy this scanner!
* The PDF files produced by the system are not fully compressed, even with maximum compression selected. Running PKZIP does not increase the compression significantly, however in Adobe 7.0 I click File | Reduce File Size | For Adobe 7.0 and subsequent, and files compress perhaps by up to 80% ! This additional Adobe compression claims to have no loss of visual quality and is fast for PDFs of a few megabytes, but quite slow for huge PDFs, and seems to produce much more additional compression on high resolution scans than on low resolution scans. Why can't Fujitsu/Abby use this Adobe 7.0 super compressed mode to begin with or add it to their batch process manager? I have not figured out how to get the system to reduce this annoying extra process step.
* After installing the scanner, Outlook caused my XP system to hang three times a day with a fatal "STOP ERROR" causing a blue screen and a reboot. I called tech support, and found it very easy to reach a live person who listened to me sympathetically and had some useful troubleshooting information, but did not have an immediate fix and took me down a few false paths. Microsoft crash analysis was worse than useless and incorrectly concluded that the problem was in my graphics driver which was not the case. In the end, through trial and error, I diagnosed the problem myself. It turned out that the Blue Soleil bluetooth USB wireless networking drivers installed in my system and plugged into Outlook were incompatible with something in the S500 package, perhaps with the S500 drivers or the Adobe 7.0 Outlook plugin. Uninstalling Blue Soleil caused the problem to go away completely.
* Every now and then (2%?) of scans, when I press the green scan button or when I click continue in the scansnap manager window, the image scanning and file saving window comes up on my screen, but the feed motor never starts turning. The system appears locked up, and the only way to reliably start scanning again seems to be to disconnect and reconnect the power plug on the back of the scanner.
* When scanning paper that is rough or perforated, sometimes the ejecting page will push the previously scanned page out of its neat stack in the output pile, and in the worst case spill several pages from the output pile onto the floor! I have learned to place the scanner at the rear of a deep desk, and to set a block at the front of the desk at the front end of output pile to push back against any paper that tries to fall out.
* I was able to use the software to convert some previously scanned graphic PDFs to searchable PDF's, however the Abby manual does claim that only files produced by ScanSnap are supported (though I suppose one could always print a hardcopy and then scan it again using ScanSnap).

Despite the problems listed above, this system is helping me better communicate with my clients, and in the long term I think it will significantly reduce the clutter in my office.

47 of 48 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent buy!, May 11, 2006

By 

Alejandro Dezerega (Santiago, Chile) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Fujitsu ScanSnap S500 Clr 18PPM/36IPM Dupl Scanner (Office Product)

I was looking for a scanner that could digitize pages larger (in length) that standard letter size (8,5x11 inches). In my country (Chile) nobody now sells legal size scanners (or almost scanners at all - they have all moved to multifunctional devices). When shopping at Amazon for this specific figure, I found this very new product (even in the Fujitsu page it is quite new). I wondered if it would work for my needs.

In that sense, Scansnap S500 was and is an excellent buy. It worked flawlessly from the first scan. I was surprised with the speed of the scans! I couldn't measure the speed, but I believe from the jobs I did that the 18PPM speed is accurate.

The adobe acrobat standard version 7.0 is an excellent bundle, as well as the ScanSnap Organizer and the ABBYY Finereader OCR software.

I was very pleased with the simple way of scanning the documents with the software. Put the batch, press a green button and that's it. ScanSnap Organizer pops up and everything goes smoothly. Afterwards, I can edit the documents with Adobe Acrobat.

Why I didn't give it 5 stars: very simple - the driver from Fujitsu does not comply with the Windows logo testing. A warning pops up when plugging the USB cable and windows XP detects the hardware. Fujitsu should spend just the little effort that is needed to get the driver properly certified. This is not the time of the Apple III, Macintosh or Original IBM PC, where writing a driver was a major task. The same with the minimum effort that means developing a driver that is Twain/ISIS compliant. These two minor issues should be addressed by Fujitsu soon.

Both issues were clearly documented, so no surprises. At least the documentation is very clear about them.

In summary, I really recommend the product for its use. The price is very competitive and the software bundle is extremely attractive.

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars amazingly fast document scanner, June 2, 2007

By 

Terry R. Nye (Kingsport, TN) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Fujitsu ScanSnap S500 Clr 18PPM/36IPM Dupl Scanner (Office Product)

Wow! That is the first word that came to my mind when I scanned my first document with the Fujitsu S500 scanner. Wow! It scanned so quickly that I wasn't sure I did it correctly until I saw the .pdf file pop up in Adobe Acrobat only moments later. If you are needing a fast document scanner, you need look no further.

Everything about this scanner reflects quality. It arrives well-packaged with all necessary connecting cables, software (including Adobe Acrobat 7 standard edition), and documentation. The S500 is much smaller than I had envisioned from its picture, but this is a big benefit as it takes up very little space on the desktop. Despite its small size, the scanner feels solidly built. The power supply has a standard detachable AC cord so there is no brick to take up valuable outlet space. The printed documentation is outstanding. A full-sized printed manual is provided (in several languages) which is detailed and thorough. The S500 scanner is quite intuitive to use, but the manual leaves no question about how to use it properly.

The scanner opens somewhat like a flower. One simply lifts up the lid, which forms a backboard for your documents, and then fold down an inner lip to catch the scanned documents as they exit the scanner. A power button is present when you open up the scanner, but you really never need to use it -- the scanner automatically turns on when you open it up and shuts itself off when you fold everything back in place. The only other button is a large scan button, which makes scanning documents extremely simple. When closed back up the scanner's interior is completely covered, keeping it dust-free.

The S500 scanner is very versatile. You can scan full-color documents in a wide variety of sizes without any special configuration -- the scanner will automatically sense their margins and make the appropriate scan. I found this even worked with thin, thermal paper credit card receipts without any special handling. You can place a stack of documents in the scanner and configure it to scan them automatically and in sequence. Odd-sized documents (e.g. newspaper clippings, photographs, etc.) can be scanned using the included carrier sheet. The scanner can be configured to send scanned documents to a variety of programs including Adobe Acrobat; Microsoft Word, Excel, or Powerpoint; Cardminder (a business card organizer that can route scanned business cards directly into Microsoft Outlook); ABBYY Finereader (an OCR software); and SnapScan Organizer (a .pdf organizer). The software can also be configured to make searchable .pdf files. All of the software mentioned above, except for the Microsoft Office software, is included with the scanner. The S500 is small enough that it could be easily used as a portable scanner. In fact, a carry case is available for separate purchase from online vendors.

The thing that really sets the Fujitsu S500 scanner apart from other scanners is its blazing speed. The S500 warms up very rapidly (literally within seconds), scans a document on one or both sides automatically within seconds, and quickly generates a full-color .pdf file. I have never seen such a fast scanner. You really have to see it to believe it. By comparison, it would take me several minutes to scan even a single document on one side with my Hewlett Packard 6300c flatbed scanner. The difference in scanning speed is absolutely incredible. Despite its rapid scanning speed, document scan quality is quite good with the S500, and it is certainly good enough for accurate OCR with the included ABBYY Finereader software. Scanning resolution can be adjusted, although it is a little awkward to configure. Scanned images are inferior with the S500 even when configured to scan at the highest resolution/quality setting. My flatbed scanner clearly makes nicer image scans, although it takes much longer to produce them.

Fujitsu's customer service is somewhat lacking. My scanner arrived with a corrupt SnapScan setup disk. Calling Fujitsu customer service sent me on a merry chase from one phone menu to another. It took seemingly forever to ultimately connect with a human. Once I did, though, the friendly customer service representative directed me to Fujitsu's ftp site where I was able to download the needed software and burn my own replacement CD. I'm sure they would have happily mailed me a replacement if I had requested it. Where the service is lacking, aside from the maddening loops of phone menus, is the poor sales support. If you call customer service for pre-sales information, after going through endless phone menus, you will ultimately be told to leave a voicemail for a representative to call you back. The S500 owners manual recommends replacing the scanner carrier sheet after 500 scans and provides a part number for a 5-pack of carrier sheets (which turns out not to be a correct part number). But you cannot purchase replacement carrier sheets from Fujitsu! The Fujitsu customer service agent I spoke with had no idea where you could purchase replacement carrier sheets and referred me to a 3rd party vendor in New York who said they could order them but couldn't give me an accurate price. Eventually, I found online vendors where they can be purchased after doing a Google search (I have since found out you can purchase them through an Amazon vendor).

There are some negative aspects to the S500 scanner. Since it is designed to be used primarily as a document scanner you can scan only sheet-fed individual documents. You cannot scan books or any other bound materials unless you unbind them into individual sheets. There is no Twain driver for the S500 scanner (Fujitsu sells other scanner models that do have a Twain driver), so you cannot make scans within other programs -- instead, all scans have to be made through the SnapScan program, which can then direct them to the programs mentioned earlier in this review. This limits the software you can use with the S500 scanner. Depending upon what you intend to scan, you have to readjust the configuration settings within the SnapScan program before your scan. This is awkward and should be more automatic. It takes only seconds, however, to make these adjustments. As mentioned above, scan quality for images is somewhat poor. The S500 is not the scanner to use if you want to scan primarily images or photos. Lastly, customer service support for this scanner leaves a lot to be desired.

In summary, the Fujitsu S500 scanner is a blazingly fast, compact, high-quality scanner that comes fully-equipped with excellent software including Adobe Acrobat standard. You will find yourself looking for documents to scan with it. The scanner is well worth its higher price. If you are searching for a fast, high-quality document scanner, you need look no further. However, if you are primarily wanting high-quality image or photo scans, you will probably prefer a good flatbed image scanner. Please also note the Fujitsu S500 is a Windows-only scanner, so you will want to purchase the S500M model for usage with a Mac.