IMSLP Forums

Hi All,
I would like to buy an a3 scanner (200-400 euros)
I saw several models by Mustek, Plustek, Mustang. I wonder how fast they are.
I also found very interesting this Cam Scanner by Mustek. It seems a good solution to scan large scores or books, even if i would like to see a scan before buying it.

http://www.mustek.de/cam-scanner-mcs-500-a3-pro/

Thanks for any suggestion, comments or hints

Ctesibius

I wouldn't trust that thing. Do keep in mind that even in your price range, your choices are severley limited and you shouldn't expect amazing quality. Most A3 scanners range in the thousands of dollars. That said, I've used the first generation of these: http://www.mustek.com/onlinestore/produ ... ucts_id/32 and the quality was pretty good. This upgrade might be better, but expect it to be fairly slow and the software to be garbage.

Thanks Daphnis.
so better to make a long term investment and take a good one.

Ctesibius

It depends what you want to scan and how much. I've scanned literally thousands of pages of my older A3 with little problems (occasionally I've had to open the device up and un-stick the belt drive) and no bulb replacement. One of the things in this world that is certain: You get what you pay for in scanners. The first thing to go out the door is the software. The software with that older scanner is an embarrassment. And even HP scanners have software issues--their behemoth-sized software packages are inflated beyond belief, shaming anything made by Microsoft of Adobe.

You get what you pay for in scanners

that's terribly true. Till now I scanned thousand pages with an multifunction Konica 7145 (30pages 600dpi per min) but unfortunately I will not have anymore access to it soon. I would like a good replacement with a reasonable speed and quality. For speed I mean at least 5pages per min
Ctesibius

ctesibius wrote:Hi All,
I would like to buy an a3 scanner (200-400 euros)
I saw several models by Mustek, Plustek, Mustang. I wonder how fast they are.
I also found very interesting this Cam Scanner by Mustek. It seems a good solution to scan large scores or books, even if i would like to see a scan before buying it.

http://www.mustek.de/cam-scanner-mcs-500-a3-pro/

Thanks for any suggestion, comments or hints

Ctesibius

Just bought the MCS and tried some different scans. The colour and grey images are rather good for sharpness and lightness. The automatic b/w converter software reduces the sharpness and therefore the final result isn't good, when compared with traditional 300 dpi or deeper scans. Problems can arise also when scanning during night hours (the upper light bulb creates some noises, concentrating the light in the middle of the page ...). The built-in software doesn't have any compensating feature that could allow to minimize the curvature effects on page borders, when using big volumes. However there are many positive aspects (speed, non impact and so on).

Thanks Caprotti,
yep 300dpi seem to low res. generally i scan at 600dpi.
Can you estimate the speed?

Thanks
Ctesibius

Yes, I'd also be interested to know the scan time for a single pass on letter size @ 600dpi. Could you also post a sample image file scanned in native 1-bit mode?

The speed is ... the equivalent of a photo shot, since there is no real scan, just a click.

how can I paste an image here?

Use some image hosting site like photobucket or picasa and paste the link or img tag into the body of your reply.

I'm not quite shure, if you bought an A3 scanner already.
I use a Brother MFC-6890CDW printer/scanner/fax combination since half a year and realy like it. At the beginning of this year it had also been extremly cheap in Germany (less than 200 Euro instead of the 600 Euro official Brother price).
The scan quality is quite good and it offers the extra A3 printer.
It usually takes about 30-40 seconds for an A3 page to scan in 600dpi monochrome and about the same for a 300dpi color scan.
I used it for nearly all my scans this year, so you can check the monochrome quality if you look at my scans.

I am a big Mustek fan.

Had one for 5 years, scanned 35,000 pages and it is still going strong.

Thal