Customer Reviews

Scansnap S500M Clr Dupl Scanner (Mac Version)

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I have every friend amazed with the capability of this scanner. In a matter of seconds I plug the USB to my MacBook Pro and just press a button in the scanner and it starts immediately. No waiting, no heating up lamp, etc. It scans all documents no matter the side you place it, Adobe PDF Software (included) automatically flips the page if you placed it in the wrong side and in a few seconds it does the job. You can get character recognition in the PDF so you can search words inside the PDF, even with OSX Spotlight, you will find everything! Both sides of the page in one pass. I'm very happy with this new hardware... Ive had it for 3 weeks and I have scanned and shredded about 500 pages. 500 pages in a few hours of work and no more storage in my office! All the sizes of papers accepted, I scan every voucher of my credit card I get from my shopping, invoices, mail... everything! I believe that every office will find it extremely helpful and you will be happy you got it. I forgot about the price once I was enjoying the great uses it has. Welcome to the future of every office.
TIP: It takes some patience to get this from Amazon. They get it and sells out of stock in a matter of hours. Check frequently and you will get it.

This is the scanner you've been looking for -- fast, silent, and a warhorse. Sure, it costs more than the others, but it is just wonderful, and I have already scanned over 1000 pages in less than a week. Couple it with Document Wallet (see versiontracker.com) and you have an "iPhoto" system for your documents -- just amazing. Don't even bother looking at the other scanners. This is it.

For the most part, this scanner works great. It will occasionally jam on a receipt that is not smooth on the edges, and sometimes does pull in more than one page if scanning multiple pages, but these are minor problems that will happen on any sheetfed machine. I love how QUICKLY it scans everything, and how compact it is when closed. You don't have to wait for it to warm up, you open it up and it is ready to use. I've been using it in combination with ReceiptWallet and DocumentWallet for the Mac, and I am finally rid of all of my paper clutter.

I just purchased the newer version of this scanner, the S5210M. I did so reluctantly because I have switched to a Mac and my wonderful Canon DR-5380c scanner isn't supported. It won't even work with Windows running under Fusion.

The S510M is very nice mechanically. It's small (though not particularly attractive) and its scanning operation is smooth, quiet, fast and accurate. The problem is that the OCR is done as a separate pass in software, using the ABBYY Finescan software included. The OCR process takes approximately six times as long as scanning the document! A 28 page document scans in about 45 seconds, but takes five additional minutes to OCR. And if you're not careful with the settings, the resulting OCR file will be several times the size of the original (The documentation is very vague about the settings, so you have to set them by trial and error). I just scanned a 100 page document in under 4 minutes, but it required an additional 20 minutes to run through the OCR engine. The Canon scanner performs OCR in hardware in a single pass that is as fast or faster than the Fujitsu's scan only.

If you, like I, plan to scan stacks of documents into searchable archives, it would be an incredibly slow process. You can drag files to the OCR engine later, but there doesn't seem to be any way to batch them and let them run overnight, for example. Mine may be going up on ebay soon.

This scanner is a great addition to my Mac. It's compact on the desktop, very fast, easy to use, and provides handy software. It turns on when you open the cover. Simply load the paper in the correct way and press the Scan button. In seconds the PDF page or pages appear on the computer screen.

I particularly like being able to do two-sided scanning in a single pass, or to be able to change the setting to single-sided, as needed.

Only improvement needed is more convenient naming of files.

This scanner works just as advertised. It is very fast, and wakes from sleep in an instant. Although expensive, I heartily recommend it.

This product was something that I had wanted to try and that I had really believed in, but was unsure of. It was expensive, and I wasn't convinced I would use it enough, or that it would do all it said. I bought it after installing Devon Think Pro, and the two products work wonderfully well together.

Other reviews mention slow OCR, but I have frankly had great luck with the OCR. We recently got married and I took all contracts, pictures, diagrams, napkins, ideas, etc. and scanned them in. When I needed to reference something, I just typed in a quick search term and jumped right to all of the places it occurred in my docs. Now all of my bills, invoices, receipts, ideas, etc. wind up in there. Devon Think allows you to also create your own notes, docs, and link to other files of many different formats, so that you can easily bridge the electronic and printed world.

It is easily the best money I have spent on organizing my life; as essential as a hard drive.

Back in the PC days, there was a product called a Visioneer scanner. It's come back now, but alas, it still does not work with a Mac. That is why I was interested in this product, even though the price is much higher than the original Visioneer.

The Scansnap turned out to be worth every penny. It is fast and accurate, and the included Adobe Acrobat works extremely well with it. The ability to scan both sides simultaneously really is an advantage.

There is an occasional glitch when it feeds 2 pages at a time, but the software allows easy recovery, either during or after the scan. This product is highly recommended!

Great scanner. Small footprint. It has jammed a couple of times but resets easily. Easy to use. Scanner rocks.

Hi all,
Like yourself, I like reading reviews to help me make my purchasing decisions. Well, I recently switched from XP/Vista (bye bye Microsoft) to Apple and i'll never go back. I was looking for cool gadgets/apps that would make my transition easier, more fun, etc. and I came across this little scanner (and it's pretty little). I've always hated receiving and filing all those bills, credit card statement, misc. docs, etc. so I thought I'd give the 'digital office' a try. Well, let me tell you that this thing is very nice. It's super fast and also scans in duplex (meaning gets both sides in one quick pass). I had an ~80 page document that I scanned in minutes and now have that entire document on my hard drive. No more paper filling up my (already cluttered) desk and cabinets. I was able to get a rebate as well as some OCR software, but the provide software (adobe) is good. I've also started using some shareware (YEP) that helps me organize all these scans.

Overall, i'm very satisfied with this purchase and I'd buy one again if something happened to this one. Now go add it you cart :-)

Ps. you should also set up a back up system so al these docs aren't lost.
Good Luck all!