We have many thousands of
slides and negatives from our
years of film camera use. When we first went digital it was with the
idea that we would continue to use film camera's and scan in the
film to produce digital files. So the first task we faced was to
find a decent film scanner. At the time, early 2000, consumer flatbed
scanners were used purely for reflective scanning - paper/prints -
and their scanning resolutions were quite low, 600dpi was classed as
good, 1200dpi as fantastic. To scan film dedicated film scanners
were required to stand any chance of producing decent files, but the
problem was they were very expensive, and few seemed able to cope
with batch scanning. If you have a lot of film to scan the task of
scanning in each frame individually becomes quite daunting.
Eventually, by going around and trying out film
scanners where we could find them - many photographic outlets have them for sale
but few if any have them hooked up to a system for you to try out -
we discovered the Scanwit 2720s produced by Acer, who now sell
computer peripherals under the Benq name - www.benq.com
. Capable of batch scanning with a
top resolution of 2700dpi, matching the resolution of scanners
from the likes of Nikon, Canon
and Minolta at that time, with image output that was better than most, it seemed
a good buy at £299, when the others were in the £400-£600 price
range. It has worked reliably and very well over the years. Acer
later updated it to the 2740s by including the 'ICE' software. A
later version used a USB interface instead of SCSI. The SCSI versions were
supplied with an Acard PCI SCSI card. It's quite big and bulky
compared to more recent designs, being 340mm long, 165mm wide
and 145mm tall.
Acer Scanwit 2720s
Later in 2000 we discovered that the output from
the top digital camera's could match scanned film output, and were
quicker and easier to use, so we ended up going down the digital camera
route. However using digital camera's didn't get over the
problem of scanning in all our current slides and negatives, which we
admit we have tended to put off starting simply because of the huge
number we have, and the time and
effort required seems so great in comparison to digital cameras, or it did
until recently. Let's explain.
It all started quite recently when our son came home
to visit us from Australia where he now lives. He bought with him a
boxful of negatives from his past trips around the Middle East and
Africa with the request 'any chance of scanning these in for me and popping
them on CD/DVD'. So simple and easy when it's said quickly isn't it
?
As we have three computers, a desktop and and two
laptops,
and as the desktop and one laptop are needed all the time, it seemed a good idea to
use the second laptop to carry out this task, which we realized would not
be quick or easy, but might encourage us to make a start on our own
film archive, or put us off for good!
Computer Interfaces
In the early years of computer's the connections
that were mainly used to connect peripheral equipment provided
rather slow transfer rates of information, parallel, serial etc. When a
connection was needed that allowed faster transfer rates the SCSI
[small computer system interface] interface was used. The two
devices that benefited most from the use of this were hard drives -
using an internal interface SCSI hard drives are quicker than IDE
drives - and scanners using an external one. IE1394 [also called
firewire/i-link etc] and USB1/2 have since be developed to provide fast
transfer rates and in addition 'plug and play' capabilities, and in
most cases are now used instead for external connections.
The problems arise when you have older equipment
which you want to use with newer computers which don't feature or
can't accept the older interfaces. This is the situation we faced
when we wanted to use the Scanwit with our Laptops as well as our
Desktop. The Desktop has the PCI card fitted so no problem there.
The laptops have USB2 and Firewire ports but no way of accepting a
SCSI interface.
At first we considered buying a new replacement film
scanner, and although this seemed wasteful when we already had a unit
that worked perfectly okay, we tested the latest film and flatbed
models available. They do offer much higher scan resolutions
and more features, but the tests revealed that
none provided any better basic scans, image quality
wise, than that we could already
achieve with the Scanwit. Many were much poorer.
There is no doubt a dedicated film scanner still
provides better scans than a flatbed, even those with dedicated film
scanning abilities, and higher resolutions are fine if you want
massive file sizes, but no advantage otherwise. A 2700dpi scan of a
35mm frame - optical not interpolated - produces on average a
28mb size file, which we feel is quite big enough for normal
use. It's the equivalent to the output from a 9mp sensor
camera, resolution wise.
We were unsure what to do. For operational reasons we
needed to be able to use a film scanner with the laptop.
Finding
the solution
USB to SCSI adapter
Fortunately we
then discovered by searching around that Adaptec make some USB to
SCSI interface adapters, called USBXchange and USB2Xchange, to
enable SCSI devices to be connected up via USB ports. USBXchange is
PC and Mac compatible and runs at USB 1.1. USB2Xchange is PC only
and can run at USB1.1 or USB2. These small devices use a 50pin high
density connection. As most external SCSI devices use the SCSI-2 25
pin connection - the Scanwit does - you need a 50pin female to 25pin
male connecter which Adaptec supply with the USBXchange, but which doesn't
come with the USB2Xchange and which you need to buy separately as
well. We bought the USB2Xchange and 50pin to 25pin connecter.
Total cost including delivery was £77.10p [May 2005] which although not cheap
we thought good value if it saved us spending £400 upwards on a new
scanner. Ordered online -www.adaptec-uk.com
- for UK or - www.adaptec.com
- for worldwide - delivery was within 48hours. They are listed under USB
devices - not SCSI.
top left - USB2Xchange. top right - connected to
scanner using connecter adapter.
bottom right - 50pin to 25pin connecter. bottom
right - SCSI in connection on left, out on right.
No terminator plug is fitted on the out plug. It's
not needed as the scanner has it's own internal terminator.
Scanner not found!
Installing the USB2Xchange was no problem following
the instructions, and the driver for the scanner installed okay as
well, or so it seemed. Then we discovered that the supplied software
driver twain interface - Miraview - just couldn't find the scanner no matter what we did. So we tried
installing the USB2Xchange on the desktop just to see if we could
get it to work, and guess what, it all worked fine without the
slightest hitch! The only difference is the desktop is old,
1999, and runs W98se and USB1.1. Whereas the laptops are rather newer
- 3yrs/1yr old - and run XPsp2 and USB2. So we contacted Adaptec
support via e-mail. Now we don't know about you but we haven't had much luck with support from various firms and we weren't
expecting too much.
So we got a very pleasant surprise. A return e-mail
confirming our query, with advice that it had been sent on for a
reply. This followed within 12 hours, with a full reply offering clear
concise advice on some things to try. Making sure the scanner
drivers were XP compatible. Instructions on re-installing both the
USB2Xchange software and the scanner drivers in a different manner.
Advice on downloading and installing from the Adaptec site some
updated drivers for the windows ASPI layer in case this didn't work.
And finally if still nothing worked, downloading and trying some independent
scanner software, VueScan, which could be tried for free, because this software
had often be found to be able to find/detect/drive scanners when no
other software would, with details on how to contact them for
further help should it be needed.
We tried it all and nothing worked, or rather we
still got the 'scanner not found' dialog from the Miraview software.
VueScan
scanner software
So we visited the VueScan
website www.hamrick.com
and downloaded the software which is available for both Mac and PC.
We also took a look at some of the review comments on several sites,
which were very positive. This software is not a time limited trial
version, which we dislike intensely as they often cause system
problems, but a fully working version. The only drawback is that any
saved scans have a prominent watermark to encourage you to purchase
the product. The download is very small, about 4mb. Subsequent purchase
of the software online - the only method of purchase - gives you an
unlock code. The watermark does not impair in any way viewing the
saved scan image to assess image quality so you can take as long as
you want to make up your mind as to whether you want to buy VueScan.
The software installed without problem and found the
scanner at once. A few trial scans later and we were soon convinced
that purchase was both necessary and convenient. The scanner
wouldn't work on the laptops without it, and as we worked with the
software we realized that once set up, batch scanning would be both
quicker and easier than even the Miraview twain software . We would also say that
trial scans using it on the desktop showed it produced better scans
than Miraview, so even if we could get it to work on the
laptop there didn't seem much point.
Another benefit of VueScan is that the application
window can be resized to whatever you want. Full screen is no
problem. This is much better than any twain software we have used,
where you rarely get a decent sized image view. Two versions are available.
Standard at [May 2005] $49, and professional at $89. The big
difference seems to be unlimited upgrades with the pro version,
which we bought, as opposed to the normal 1 year. As the software is
continually upgraded to work with the latest scanners as
they are released, and to incorporate new features, we thought the
pro version a better bet.
Just to finish, we have
batch scanned a film -
36 frames - in little over an hour, at 4 frames a time. 2mins a
frame to focus/preview/scan/save to file. Once set up the software
automatically names and saves scans, as Raw, Tiff or Jpeg, as scans
are completed. All you have to do is set the name and the location
to save to. Great!
Although the purchase of the VueScan software added
considerably to the cost of being able to use the scanner with the
laptops - total cost including Adaptec bits £123.90p - [assuming
current dollar/pound
exchange rate of 1.9] it seems worth it as the software is better
than twain and can be used with virtually any scanner. It works
equally well with our Epson 1640su flatbed, with both reflective and
film scanning.
The only slight concern we have is that it seems
biased towards Negative scanning. There are a lot of Negative film
settings available, but few slide. It's limited to E6/Ektachrome or Kodachrome.
As we have lots of Kodachrome slides that's good for us, not much
scanning software has a setting for it, but if you have a lot of
Fuji it may be a problem. We haven't had a chance to scan any Sensia
or Velvia slides yet, just some old Agfa 200 which scanned
fine on the generic E6 setting.
A warning
If you have a SCSI product that
you want to run via USB using the Adaptec USBXchange/USB2Xchange
products, please be aware that they must be powered up whilst
connected to the USBXchange, and the USBXchange plugged in to a USB
port, before you power up the computer. You must also switch off the
computer before disconnecting the USBXchange/shutting down the SCSI
device. If you don't carry out start up and shut down in this order,
the computer won't find the USBXchange when you connect it and won't
shut down if you disconnect first.
update
We
have recently discovered that the above information may only
apply to the Acer Scanwit when using it via the provided Acer
drivers. Please see below for more information.
October
2006 - updated information
If
you're using Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 2000 or
Windows XP x64.
One
bugbear to our minds has always been that you have to connect
up everything before booting the computer, and shutting
down before disconnecting. Recently, we
have discovered a new way of installing and running SCSI
scanners via the USB2Xchange, by using the drivers provided in
Vuescan rather than those of the scanner makers. This can make
a big difference as we have discovered. It no longer becomes necessary
to follow the above procedure and keep
shutting down and booting up the computer to connect and
disconnect the SCSI scanner you are using. This
discovery was made by way of the need to re-install the
Laptop's Windows XPsp2 installation that
the Scanwit
is used with.
All
it seems you have to do is to use the scanner drivers that
are in Vuescan by choosing the folder where the Vuescan
files are when installing the scanner. You don't need to
install the drivers that came with it or the updated XP
drivers Acer/Benq supply.
What
we did was this, starting from scratch with nothing
installed.
1.
Connected the USB2Xchange on each USB2 port in turn and
installed the drivers by running the Adaptec install CD.
2.
Disconnected the USB2Xchange, connected it to the scanner,
turned it on, and when it was ready, connected the
USB2Xchange again to each USB port in turn.
3.
When the computer 'found' the scanner each time as new
hardware and asked for drivers, we pointed it at the Vuescan
folder.
It
was as simple as that. Now
we find that we can connect up and disconnect with the
computer still running.
All
you do is connect the scanner to the USB2Xchange and power
it up, and then plug the USB2Xchange into a USB2 port.
Disconnect the USB2Xchange via the right hand task bar link
before turning the scanner off.
Whether
it is possible to set this up simply by changing the
Scanwit's drivers to those in the Vuescan folder if you have
everything already installed we don't know, but it might be
worth a try. Otherwise un-installing and re-installing from
scratch might be worthwhile.
January
2008 - Updated Information
When
Microsoft Windows Vista arrived in early 2007 it became
apparent that updated drivers to run current peripherals with
it would be few and far between, and to date this has proved
to be so, users of Vista being forced to buy new equipment to
use with it. Many products have additionally been withdrawn.
The
Adaptec USB2Xchange falls into both these categories. Not only
have we discovered recently that it is no longer made, but
drivers for Vista have not been released either.
However
there are still supplies of the USB2Xchange available along
with the 50pin to 25pin converters. And so for anyone still
running any other version of Windows except Vista, this page
and it's contents are still relevant and useful.
Anyone
who has a normal PCI SCSI interface connection should still be able to
run the Acer Scanwit under Vista, using the drivers in VueScan
to drive it.
