brad's Experience

Howdy.

I received this scanner as a gift for Christmas, 2005. It was on my Amazon wish list.

I did a fair amount of research before deciding on this scanner, but I was negligent with regard to one simple fact: apparently some hardware makers are still cutting corners by using USB 1.1 rather than the years-old USB 2.0 standard.

For crying out loud, how could Canon leave USB 1.1 in this scanner? This thing is a new model as of summer 2005. USB 2.0 has been out for what, four years now? I doubt that I could find another device on the market that is USB 1.1 if I tried.

Obviously, with a scanner, a lot of data is transferred. Particularly with the higher resolutions of newer scanners. I'm certainly not an expert when it comes to specifications for resolution of images. I know more megapixels is better and I know a fair amount about digital cameras. But scanners are old school and I needed one pretty bad since my last scanner was obsolete for Apple OS X a couple years ago. I just find it absolutely ridiculous that Canon would put USB 1.1 into this thing. It's beyond ridiculous.

Probably compounding the problem is that it is USB-powered. This thing doesn't come with a power cord/adapter.

It is incredibly slow when scanning. My old scanner, an HP model from a few years ago, was also USB 1.1 but it was much faster than this thing. Geez this thing is slow.

I'll put up with it because I can't return it and I'm not going to pay for a new one since I don't scan a lot of images, but it's going to be painful.

Just because it is USB 1.1, I'm not going much further into the specs on this model because this issue alone is big enough to steer you to dozens of other models on the market, including others by Canon. Turns out, the next step up for Canon, from this thing, is USB 2.0. I tell ya.

For what it's worth, here is some other information that is helpful when considering buying this thing:

- 1200x2400 dpi (I don't know exactly what this means, but I do recognize that the numbers are much bigger than they used to be)

- a main reason for me selecting this model is the footprint. dimensions (WxDxH): 10.1" x 15.1" x 1.3"

- for those who do not have image-editing software, it does come with a couple of apps: Arcsoft PhotoStudio and Scansoft Omnipage. I have iPhoto and Photoshop Elements, so this stuff is useless to me.

- works on Windows all the way back to 98 SE and of course Mac OS X (minimum 10.2).

- installation was a cinch on OS X 10.4. simple installation guide with only a few steps. installation software worked without a hitch on first try.

The bottom line here for me is that it's getting the job done and with good results, at least in terms of quality. The images are outstanding. However, this is 2006 and this is a relatively new model for Canon and yet they put this thing on the market with an obsolete data-transfer standard: USB 1.1. This is just inexcusable. It didn't remotely occur to me that a company like Canon would do this and so I didn't dig into the specifications page. If you go to the product page at Canon, it loosely uses "USB." In other words, it never says that it is only USB 1.1. It just says "one simple cable provides both power and a USB connection." Nice. Thanks.

Don't buy this scanner. It's not that it is bad quality, just terrible engineering (if I can dump this on engineering). Move up a couple notches with Canon's line of scanners or look at the big lineups from HP or Epson.

Best, brad.