Just got it - Just love it!
Written: Dec 21 '01
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Easy setup, simple to use, sleek and stylish.
Cons: Pricey!
The Bottom Line: Expensive, but so far it has been a breeze! Wait for the prices to come down a bit, don't buy the "Photo" feature if you don't need it.
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| jericho's Full Review: Epson Perfection® 1650 PHOTO Flatbed Scanner |
I feel kinda awkward writing this review having done so little with the scanner so far - but I wanted to give my impressions of my "out of the box" experience.
I own an older Mac G3 and a Umax Astra scanner. I do not have that scanner hooked up, mostly due to the lack of room around my G3 and the fact that the Astra is pretty large. I don't have a SCSI card on my newer Mac G4, so I haven't hooked up the Astra to that either. The Astra is sitting in a closet, out of the way.
However, my wife and I just got married. We have a ton of pictures and we want to share them with friends. What a better time than Christmas! We decided to send out a picture with our Christmas cards. We investigated several options, including going through the heck of setting up the Astra. Nothing seemed satisfactory. We ended up scanning the photo at Kinko's for a few bucks and printing out 60 cheap copies at home on my Epson inkjet printer. This worked out pretty well and it whet my wife's appetite for more.
She now wants to do two major projects to share these pictures. We again looked at our options and settled on buying a new scanner instead of lugging the Astra out and putting up with its problems. After some research and bargain hunting, we found the 1650 Photo at Costco for $230.
This was a little high for our price range, but the alternatives were not desirable. We would have went with the $200 1650, without the additional "Photo" feature - which is basically a back-light built into the lid for scanning slides and negatives. But, we do have the possibility of scanning negatives and the extra $30 seemed reasonable - we now have the "whole enchilada" for sure! Do yourself a favor, the price is sure to fall on this one after Christmas - if you can wait, do so. Don't pay more than $230! We'll be kicking ourselves in a month, I'm sure.
Right out of the box this device has been a dream. First thing I noticed was the size and weight of the device. Compared to my Astra, which is only a few years old, it is very light and small.
The USB connection is so much easier than SCSI. Right after I installed my Astra on my G3, I had a heck of a time getting the SCSI addressing correct. It took two computer professionals, one a Mac expert who works for Microsoft, three hours and one broken tool to get the darned thing to work! I plugged in the Epson's power, installed the software, which only took ten minutes, plugged in the USB and it was ready to go. I fired up Photoshop, File/Import/TWAIN Acquire and the scanner and software went to work. I got back a crisp and clean scan a mere 30 seconds later with zero hassle. Compared to the work I went through with the Astra, this was beyond easy!
So far I have only scanned that single picture. I showed my wife how to do this earlier today and she was very impressed. I plan to go through the documentation and have a closer look at the software soon - but considering that it was about half an hour from sealed box to perfect scan, I'm extremely pleased.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 230.00
Interface: USB
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Epinions.com ID:
jericho
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Member: Jason Brown
Location: Tukwila, WA.
Reviews written: 20
Trusted by: 10 members
About Me:
A writer, reader and watcher of Science Fiction.
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