Customer Reviews

WizCom QuickLink Pen Handheld Scanner

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(10)

 

 

I just purchased this handheld scanner because, as a PhD student and full-time manager, I have tons of reading to do. Before I purchased QuickLink, I either had to hand write or type notes into my PC, spend hours at a copier, or spend lots of time using a full-sized scanner to save the quotes and important text that I needed. Now, this WizCom scanner allows me to easily and quickly scan articles, books and other text no matter where I am (on a plane, in a hotel room, at work, or by the

pool). Then I can quickly upload the text into Word or WordPerfect (or other software programs) when I have the chance. Or, if I want, I can scan directly into a specific file.

Though it takes a while to get used to the pen and its menus, a previous reviewer was right on the money when they offered this tip - "Put the pen in the "left-handed" mode, turn the material upside down and then scan from right to left. This lets the user "look ahead" along the desired pen track (printed line) and helps keep the scanning down the center of the line." THIS REALLY DOES WORK and makes scanning much faster and more precise. (I'm not sure, but if you are left-handed, the reverse directions might work for you.)

Now that I have the knack of using the QuickLink pen, I love it! It saves me tons of time and I can now scan only the text I want instead of copying the entire page. For the price and convenience, it's great.

I wanted to like this Pen so much. I loved the portability and the versatility that it offered. But, it just didn't perform well enough to be useful. It is extremely slow. If you scan with pen as fast as you would a highlighter, your accuracy can vary anywhere from 25-50%. The highest accuracy I was able to get was scanning at about 3 seconds a line. But then there's another 2 seconds for the Pen register the information that's been scanned. The accuracy issue is pretty ridiculous. I tried a lot of different techniques to try and improve the accuracy, i.e. using a ruler, scanning slow, adjusting the angle at which I held the pen. But in the end, I found that it was faster to type the line rather than scan with the pen.

If you're looking for a fast and accurate handheld scanner, I strongly recommend the IRIS II Executive (Not the Standard). I ended up returning my Quick Link Pen and getting the IRIS II Exec instead. It's incredibly fast and more importantly incredibly accurate. I can scan faster than I would with a highlighter and I rarely get mistakes. I'm a Biochem Grad Student and I scan a lot of words that wouldn't seem easily recognized, but the IRIS II works like a champ.

I rate this product 2-star because it wasn't easy to use. The shape was not correctly designed to scan text easily. The scanner was not as accurate as I would have expected. On the box, it claims that it is 97% accurate but I found that it was actually not that accurate. It has poor letter sensitivity. It also took a long time to read the text and process the text onto the screen. I expected it to work like a highliter but it wasn't true. I think that the price is exaggerated when you take all the reasons I listed. I think that this pen needs to have a few improvements to make it more accurate.

I use it every day and I am happily scanning references and notes. I then download the files via the serial port to the computer and insert the files into Word. No problems and a huge savings in time for me. It is a product I have wanted for years.

I have spent a load of time with this product and I know it pretty well. I want to warn you that at first you may have problems getting this device to work to its full capacity... But if you stick with it for a couple of days, you will eventually have a convenient hand held scanner that will work very well (so long as the text isn't poorly printed). But you do have to be persistent and practice makes perfect. Also, be sure to follow the instructions about how to hold the scanner and how to use it. Tech support seems fine...I called the company once and they were very helpful on the phone. So if you need to copy a lot of stuff from books and documents, it can save you a load of time.

This gadget is not very easy to use. Since I used Quicktionary (which has similar handling) before, it was much easier for me. If you are new to it and try it only a few times, you won't be able to get the best results. Technique makes all the difference here. Ideally, you should try it for a few days, patiently following the instructions. Besides that, I had previous OCR experience, meaning that after many tries to recognize pages of text using Optical Character Recognition software, I was somewhat used to reviewing and correcting many errors in it, but still preferred to do it instead of typing (many people don't). So when I get a good amount of errors to be corrected later in my computer, after the transfer, I am somewhat resigned. Do not expect miracles (not yet). But I have to tell you I am really happy with this product. I read a lot and I always felt the need to have summaries or notes from what I read. But I don't like to write, make notes or highlight sentences on my books, and I am not patient enough to write a summary after I have read it. I tried to do recorded summaries on tape, but I didn't like it either. Eventually, this is the best solution. If I like a sentence, I copy it, even if I am lying down in my bed. After reading a few pages, I download the text to my computer and, sure, I have to make a lot of corrections, but I haven't missed the main points and haven't destroyed my book. It works for me. Cons: hard to access characters to make corrections and/or type, it keeps scanning while you make corrections in text, you can't change the scanning idiom in the middle of a text (although it still reasonably recognizes other languages than the initially selected).

I've used both this and the C-Pen 600, and I found the C-Pen to be significantly better, mainly because the C-Pen has a much better user interface. As well as being more awkward to use than the C-Pen, the QuickLink is noticably larger. The QuickPen does have the advantage of having a serial port as well as the I/R interface. The QuickLink Pen is also a bit cheaper, as to get the equivalant functionality with a C-Pen you need a C-600, InfraRed adapter for your computer, and carrying case, all of which must be purchased separately.

I'm a PhD student. I have a lot of reading to do and need to take a lot of notes from scientific literature. I've had this scanner for all of 30 minutes and I'm already in love with it. I found the interface to be very intuitive and easy to use, and the pen hooked up to my desktop (running Windows 98 2cnd edition) without any trouble at all. Note: I first shut down the Microsoft ActiveSync I use to synchronize with my Pocket PC, and also told the QuickLink software that comes with the scanner to NOT run automatically on startup.

I thought the Quicklink Desktop software was very easy to use. I would have liked the ability to copy to the clipboard from the notes page on the desktop, but it's no big deal - you can save notes to ASCII text or a Microsoft Word document.

The "scan to PC" feature is very useful for when I sit down to read at my desk; it can copy stuff directly to Word or to a reference management program like Procite. Scanning quality is pretty good after only a couple of minutes of practice, about 1-2 errors per line. However, it feels like I can probably improve with some more practice.

Finally, the pen comes in an extremely convenient plastic case that can happily coexist with other stuff in a backpack. Highly recommended!

I just received my QuickLink pen and right out of the box I am getting about 99-100% accuracy. The QuickLink is 100% what I was expecting and I'm perfectly happy with this little gadget.

I bought this pen as an aid to writing research papers. It allows me to scan in the bits and pieces of reference articles and books which saves me a lot of time in re-reading and manual data-entry later on.

As I said before, I am currently getting 99-100% accuracy with this pen and I cannot understand why others are having so much trouble. However, there are a few points to keep in mind when using this pen:

(1) This is not for scanning entire pages of text. You will become very impatient and tired.

(2) Scanning one line of text takes about 3-4 seconds, plus another 3-4 seconds for text "processing"

(3) For best results keep the pen tip at a 90-degree angle to the page.

(4) Move the pen as smoothly as possible to avoid any jerking motion.

(5) Keep the text directly under the white guidelines printed on the pen's tip. When I went slightly above these lines, the text came out very badly.

(6) Try to avoid stylish or funny fonts. I found that this pen works GREAT on standard fonts such as Times New Roman. However, if you scan stylish 'e' and 's' characters, it often reads them as 'c' and '5'.

This pen can and will work great for you, if you take the time to use it correctly and patiently, which is why I suggest it's not for taking page after page of notes. It's perfect for taking highlights of bits and bobs.

And as a side note, it works perfectly with my Palm OS PDA. No extra software is needed to beam notes from my QuickLink to my Sony Clie and in no time I can be editing the text on a larger screen.

Hope this is useful to some of you out there!

(...)

I have found the QuickLink scanner most satisfactory. I suspect that the reviewers who have complained about accuracy have not tried very hard, but I have found this "twist" to be useful. Put the pen in the "left-handed" mode, turn the material upside down and then scan from right to left. This lets the user "look ahead" along the desired pen track (printed line) and helps keep the scanning down the center of the line. Of course, if you are left-handed or ambidextrous turning the page upside down would not be necessary.

I have to give them an A for effort, but this product is not ready for prime time. With a little practice you can get very good recognition, but it is *so* slow as to be unusable. I know, you're thinking "this is really cool, who cares if it's a bit slow - I just want to take a few notes here and there..." - that's what I thought, but *NO* don't do it... it's so painful to scan more than one line that a paragraph is just not worth it. I forced myself to use it for one book... I was really motivated and I did scan nearly everything I wanted at maybe 98% accuracy... but I wouldn't do it again... just too painful.

The user interface, while interesting, is also too limited... you either have to create a new "file" for every scanning session (hard to manage) or painfully scroll to the bottom of your text each time you turn it on (as one would do frequently when using it a lot).

I really think this will be a killer tool when it can scan with continuous recognition... and maybe multiple lines at a time so that you don't have to be as precise... (the OCR could sort it out).

I'm selling mine on ebay anc checking again in a year or two.

Pat Niemeyer