Weekend of March 28th, 2008

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In the studio

Jerry McLean, Eastern Regional
Manager - CRU-Dataport

Dave holding hard drive enclosures

Product Spotlight with Rob

Fujitsu ScanSnap S300 - Fast-Speed Scanner

I was pretty excited testing the Fujitsu ScanSnap S300 scanner. I always have to scan many things, including: invoices, receipts for my expense report, articles for show material, and more. Another thing that gets out of hand is the amount of business cards I collect at tech conventions when we’re on the road. I'm glad I can use this fast scanner now!

To use the ScanSnap, you need to install its software first. I found that setup was a bit slow, but the subsequent scanning made up for that. One of the coolest features is that it’s a duplex scanner, meaning it scans both sides of a sheet at the same time. It auto-detects if there is something on the back side and simply deletes blank pages.

After installing the software and connecting the scanner to your computer, you’re all set. Just press the “SCAN” control here. It will detect the sheet and open up the program on your computer. You can set it to create searchable PDFs or plain PDFs. However, searchable PDFs take a little longer to scan. I stuck with the traditional scan form. You can scan up to 10 pages at once, but make sure the pages aren’t stuck to each other or it will jam.

After it scans, you have the option to save the document or image in the ScanSnap Organizer, Scan2Folder, Scan2Email, or Scan2Print. I’ve preferred doing the Scan2Folder and have set it to save the documents to a specific folder I named “SCANNED”.

The ScanSnap S300 can also scan business cards. Its software transfers the information on the card into a database. It’s pretty good at detecting and sorting the information on a card. I found that it has a bit of difficulty finding the company name when it’s inside a picture logo. However, once it transfers the information to the database, you can edit the info and then export it to Outlook or to Excel. You can scan a small stack of business cards at once to save some time.

The ScanSnap S300 is available under 300 bucks, depending on where you buy it. it made "Dave's Top Ten" List at CES this year..

- Submitted by Rob Almanza

ITTV Weekly Update

On this week’s ITTV update: Do you have a large pile of sheets or business cards to scan?
Tired of your old, slow scanner? Check out Fujitsu's ScanSnap S300 on this week's Product Spotlight
with Rob Almanza. Also, check out “This Week in Tech History” with Chris Graveline.

Additional Websites Mentioned