[ Followup set to comp.periphs.scanners ]

I'm finally going to buy a scanner, and would like some opinions on what
might work.  My requirements are modest; 600 DPI, 8-bit color, and <=
$200 would be just fine.

The real problem is that I *don't* want to buy a scanner that isn't
supported by Free software.  According to the lists at
http://www.sane-project.org/ , the current low-end offerings from Epson
and Canon are not supported by SANE yet.  I can probably run USBSnoopy
on 'Doze, figure out part of the protocol on a LiDE 35 or Perfection
3490, and write a partial backend--but that's too much like work and it
takes a long time.  So:  Does anyone have any horror stories about the
Plustek OpticPro UT24 ?  That one's marked as "complete" in SANE's
lists, and Googling for problems didn't turn up much.  If anyone has
other suggestions, please post them to the newsfroup.  TIA,

-- 
Matt G|There is no Darkness in eternity/But only Light too dim for us to see
Frustration is annoying, but the *real* disasters in life begin when you
get exactly what you want.

On 11/19/05 16:06, Dances With Crows wrote:
> [ Followup set to comp.periphs.scanners ]
> 
> I'm finally going to buy a scanner, and would like some opinions on what
> might work.  My requirements are modest; 600 DPI, 8-bit color, and <=
> $200 would be just fine.
> 
> The real problem is that I *don't* want to buy a scanner that isn't
> supported by Free software.  According to the lists at
> http://www.sane-project.org/ , the current low-end offerings from Epson
> and Canon are not supported by SANE yet.  I can probably run USBSnoopy
> on 'Doze, figure out part of the protocol on a LiDE 35 or Perfection
> 3490, and write a partial backend--but that's too much like work and it
> takes a long time.  So:  Does anyone have any horror stories about the
> Plustek OpticPro UT24 ?  That one's marked as "complete" in SANE's
> lists, and Googling for problems didn't turn up much.  If anyone has
> other suggestions, please post them to the newsfroup.  TIA,
> 

Canonscan LiDE 20 from canon works perfectly on Linux.  And I paid for 
it less than 60 euro 6 months ago.

I just plugged it (USB1.1), started xsane and it was working.
My distribution didn't have an OCR program so I downloaded gocr, 
compiled, installed and also OCR was available.

Ciao
Giovanni
-- 
   A computer is like an air conditioner,
   it stops working when you open Windows.
   Registered Linux user #337974  <http://counter.li.org/>

["Followup-To:" header set to comp.periphs.scanners.]
On Sat, 19 Nov 2005 17:09:46 +0100, Giovanni staggered into the Black
Sun and said:
> On 11/19/05 16:06, Dances With Crows wrote:
>> I'm finally going to buy a scanner, and would like some opinions on
>> what might work.  My requirements are modest; 600 DPI, 8-bit color,
>> and <= $200 would be just fine.
>> 
>> The real problem is that I *don't* want to buy a scanner that isn't
>> supported by Free software.  According to the lists at
>> http://www.sane-project.org/ , the current low-end offerings from
>> Epson and Canon are not supported by SANE yet.
> Canonscan LiDE 20 from canon works perfectly on Linux.

....and it's been discontinued, is not listed on pricewatch/newegg, and
of the first 5 webstores I found/checked via Google, 4 list it as "out
of stock".  The one that didn't list it as out of stock was in Malaysia.
Not very encouraging to my mind.  That's sort of why I mentioned the
Plustek UT24, because it's in-stock at a USA company and listed as
"complete" in SANE.

> My distribution didn't have an OCR program so I downloaded gocr,
> compiled, installed and also OCR was available.

The "gtk-ocr" frontend for it is pitiful.  Fortunately, kooka can use
gocr as well.  gocr worked better than OCRad on a very clean test image,
but it's still inferior to what a 4-year-old Omnipage and Typereader
came up with.  OCR is one area where Free stuff is seriously lagging.
Fortunately, I won't be doing much if any OCR on the things I'm
scanning.

-- 
Matt G|There is no Darkness in eternity/But only Light too dim for us to see
The early bird who catches the worm works for someone who comes in late
and owns the worm farm.  --Travis McGee