Scanning business cards? You better thimk again
Article Abstract:
Corex Technologies $300 Cardscan Plus business-card scanner provides inconsistent results and can be bested by human typists. The scanner and software combination needs to be plugged into a standard parallel port; users who want to connect both the scanner and a printer at the same time will need to use a switch box. Cardscan takes the cards in quick succession, but offers no feeding mechanism. The actual scanning lasts 8 to 30 seconds. Cardscan places the data in a Rolodex file format that includes name, company and address fields, among others. Cardscan's scanning actually provides little or no useful information, in part because of the varied nature of business cards. Even so, Cardscan provides uneven results with data using the same typeface. Cardscan reads numbers fairly well, although it occasionally translates an 8 into a 6. The software is particularly faulty when reading E-mail addresses. The data may be edited and exported into contact manager programs.
Publication Name: The New York Times
Subject: Business, general
ISSN: 0362-4331
Year: 1995
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Adding color scanners: get out enough aspirin
Article Abstract:
The HP Scanjet 4p and the Epson Actionscanner II color flatbed scanners are extremely difficult to install, but once installed, they are easy to use. While the scanners are well-designed, deliver excellent performance and are reasonably priced, the Scanjet is formidable in size and the Actionscanner, though somewhat smaller, cannot scan legal size documents. Both are exceptionally difficult to install since PCs require the installation of a special PC Card. Also, the Scanjet's installation instructions are incomplete. HP notes difficulties installing the necessary card in multimedia machines. Both scanners also require the installation of drivers. The Scanjet's software is easier to use, but significantly less flexible. However, Actionscanner's software may disable other drivers in a system.
Publication Name: The New York Times
Subject: Business, general
ISSN: 0362-4331
Year: 1996
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Brilliant scanning, dumb design
Article Abstract:
HP's $500 Photosmart scanner provides the type of high quality prints that have only been available from scanners priced over $1000. The picture quality that Photosmart provides is excellent but getting the scanner up and running can be rather tricky. The software has to be installed in a way that makes the program display automatically whenever a photo is inserted and then disappears again after every scan. The biggest problem is getting the plug an play card to work once it was in the computer. It requires a Interrupt Request Line (IRL); if an IRL is unavailable then each time the computer is rebooted it cannot see the scanner, and it will need to be reinstalled. The Photosmart will work better as a secondary device because it cannot handle typical text pages.
Publication Name: The New York Times
Subject: Business, general
ISSN: 0362-4331
Year: 1997
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