Document Scanner

[Not that Bob]

I need to save a bunch of records. I'm talking about a bunch...about 30 boxes at present with more every month. I'm looking for dependable, autofeed, and easy organizational software so I can actually find the stuff once it is scanned. Any ideas?

 

[pmg]

By "autofeed" you mean a document feeder? That will add significant cost to a scanner. If all you have is a fixed number of docs, you may want to consider farming it out; they'll do the scanning, Q/A, and indexing for you.

Oh, just noticed you want to add more every month.
How much do you want to spend?
Do you want to OCR/ICR the docs?

 

[Not that Bob]

Thanks pmg. I don't know what "OCR/ICR" means. Last time I checked in to it, farming it out was close to what just buying a machine would cost me. Like I say, there's 30 boxes now, with more every month. I'd like to load a stack of 20-30 sheets and let the machine "autofeed". Probably the wrong term, but that's all I know to call it. Pretty much the limit of my computer skills is posting on HornFans, so I need simple. I think I could justify spending $1500 or thereabouts. The old records from my wife's business are taking up storage I need for more important stuff...like more guitars.

 

[uhlaw2k1]

Fujitsu ScanSnap S510...
The Link

 

[pasotex]

OCR means optical character recognition whereas ICR means image (I am not sure about the cr because it does not make sense to me)

there are two different ways of storing the information

when you scan, you can store the file as an image file (pdf, jpeg, tiff) or you can convert it to readable text

I would suggest not converting it because the technology is far from perfect

I am not really all that impressed with either Scansoft or Paperport which are the two consumer programs used for storing the information, but this may be because I have a commercial copy program at work

I tend to manage the scans by renaming them and placing them in windows folders - this takes longer but I am an organization freak

it sounds like you want to store the items as images in pdfs

you can title the scans by box or however you want to do it with either Scansoft or Paperport

for a size as large as you have, I suggest getting a scanner that does at least 50 ppm at 400 dpi

most business copiers have modules that scan at sufficient speeds (the one we have at my office does 50 ppm at 400 dpi)

many stand-alone consumer type scanners are slower like the Fujitsu linked above and they also take time to process on your computer

I would look at something a little more expensive like this Xerox scanner


The Link

 

[pmg]

icr==intelligent character recognition

 

[CO Horn]

I would highly recommend the Fujitsu Scan Snap S510. Based on your budget, you may want to upgrade to the Fujitsu 5120c or 5220c (if you need a flatbed scanner).

 

[pasotex]

his budget is $1,500 not $500 and the Fujitsu is too slow for a job that large (you need something that will do 50 ppm for a job that large)

so ocr and icr are two ways of saying the same thing?

I typically scan to pdfs if I just want to store the information

if I am going to convert the information to text, I scan to tiffs because I have an old but very good program that converts the scan to text

 

[Not that Bob]

Will this job eat up all my computer space, in other words, is it a good idea to have a dedicated computer for this type of thing?

Edit to add: I know I will not store the docs on the computer, but transfer to disc (cdrom? dvd?), however, will the programs used to execute this task add so much to the computer as to make it slower for other tasks?

 

[pmg]

In reply to:

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[pasotex]

I have used various entry level Xerox scanners for about 10 years and I have been happy with them. In the legal trade magazines, Fujitsu seems to get good press for similar products. For large jobs, our Lanier copier works great but it cost something like $10,000. For the size of job he has, I would think a more expensive and faster scanner is needed. Based on my experience, I would stay away from HP. I have had good luck with Xerox scanners and I do not know anything bad about Fuitsu scanners other than the rated speed concerns me. I do not specifically know anything about the mid-level scanners but I think Xerox or Fujitsu would have good products.

As far as a computer goes, I would have a dedicated computer for the task. Any decent computer that is less than two or three years old should suffice. I use my almost two year old laptop for my stand-alone scanner.

 

[uhlaw2k1]

FWIW - the Xerox is rated at 50 *images* per minute at 200dpi B&W, so that would only be 25 two-sided (duplex) pages per minute. The Fujitsu is rated at 18 duplex pages per minute at 300dpi B&W. Probably not a big difference if you crank the Xerox up to 300dpi.

Also, the Fujitsu comes with a full version of Adobe Acrobat Standard 8, while the Xerox only comes with cheapo PaperPort. I'm just not sure it's worth over twice the price, in my opinion. You have to get up near the $2k range to get the kind of speed Paso's talking about.