Recommend scanning software?

[PCLearner]

I'm not satisfied with the scanning software that came with Canon Scanner LiDE 210; is there any better software available that won't break the bank? Thanks.

[Tinto Tech]

A few freeware options to look at: Snapfiles and FreewareFiles.

Depending on what you find dissatisfying in the Cannon software, these may or may not be any better; but perhaps worth a browse?

[CLiNT]

I agree, CanoScan's MP navigator does leave much to be desired.
Please post back if you have found and tested a worthy candidate, as I would be interested in a replacement too.

[RetiredGeek]

PaperPort was pretty good software when my wife & I used to use it.
See the link as it is now $99.00 used to come bundled with Visioneer scanners.

[Banyarola]

I have had Paperport for years...
I don't use it much anymore but it is s good program with a lot of features.

[DrWho]

Price? Price? Who ever buys software?
The best software in the world is FREE.
"Ve don' buy no stinkin' software!" Author, Old Serbian


I use only Epson scanners (I have three) but I never use the software that comes with any scanner.
I think it actually did install with the printer drivers.

If I want to scan a document, I can use my Word Processor to 'Acquire the image' and if it's a graphic image, photograph, etc., I use my Graphics program (Photo Filtre) to 'Acquire' the image from the scanner. Voila!---no need to ever run scanner software.

I've shown many of my customers how to do that and they mostly LOVE it.
I also share the free program, "Photo Filtre" with them and they love that one too.
Doing a screen save or screen print is as easy as 1,2,3.

Happy Holidays Everyone!
The Doctor

[Doc Brown]

Hamrick Software has the best scanner software on the market. While DrWho is also making a good recommendation for the average user, VueScan is the defacto standard in graphics shops that have to do lots of high resolution photo scanning. For example the Professional edition can write RAW DNG files. Personally I don't use it because my scanning needs are are light and are handled fine by the software that came with my scanner. But I have played with the eval and its excellent.

[PCLearner]

Since I posted the question I have read that acquiring software other than what came with the scanner will not improve the quality of the scan. True or false?
The OCR software with Canon LiDE 210 is wretched. Any suggestions for software compatible with the 210 that might do a better job?

[Roken]

As much as I hate to admit it on a Windows forum, but xsane on Linux is about as fully featured and controllable scanning application that you could want, including gamma, HSV and colour correction, full control over quality etc. If only Windows had something that came even close for all scanners.

[Calhob]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Scannito Pro. This is lovely software and does everything you could want it to.

I also found the software that came with my Canon scanner was hopeless. I like to be able to preview a scan, crop it and then scan into a specified folder. I looked around for freeware that would let me do this without hassles but couldn't find any. So I tried three commercial programs and settled on Scannito Pro, which is brilliant: it loads quickly, is easy to use and has some nice features. And it's not costly, only about $25 for a full licence.

I would recommend it to anyone.

[DancingFool]

Since I posted the question I have read that acquiring software other than what came with the scanner will not improve the quality of the scan. True or false?

Depends on what you actually mean when you say "the scan". The scan process itself is hardware - if it's no good, it's no good, nothing you can do about it. Some scanners have settings that can be tweaked to change the scan process for different subject types, some software will know how to do this, some won't, but the actual scan itself is pretty fixed, true. Most scanning software actually gets the scan exactly the same way using the same drivers as the "acquire image" options talked about above do, there's no difference.

However, some "scanning software" is actually doing after scan processing to the image as well. If that's what you mean, then that part is software dependent, and the software you use will affect the result.

[mandarin]

When I moved to W7 my old scanning software wouldn't work and there wasn't an obvious replacement.

As I generally just scan documents for storage I tried the Windows Fax and Scan built in software. Works fine for basic print scanning and offers basic stuff to adjust settings etc with the Preview command.

Not sure if anything similar is in older Windows versions.

[E Pericoloso Sporgersi]

I'm not satisfied with the scanning software that came with Canon Scanner LiDE 210; is there any better software available that won't break the bank? Thanks.

There is no scanning software.

There's just:
1. scanner hardware drivers
2. a TWAIN interface

Then there are applications - graphics software, OCR tools, word processors, graphics to pdf converters, etc. - that can communicate with the TWAIN interface and thus use the scanner.

The quality of scanning jobs depends on the instructions you gave to the TWAIN interface. For best results you need to address the TWAIN interface in "advanced mode" to fine-tune the commands sent to the scanner.

You need to know the correct TWAIN settings to reach the optimal result you're aiming for. And there is the rub. Every different kind of scan job requires different settings.

Cornell University in Ithaca, NY, publishes the best and most exhaustive free tutorial I've ever seen.

There is a 'tutorial_English.pdf' downloadable, but the online version is better because of the interactive nature of the reality checks.

[charlieb]

I use ABBYY FineReader 9.0 Sprint as the OCR software on my Epson scanner and found it very good. It came bundled with the scanner so I don't know what it would cost. Years ago I got ABBYY FineReader 4.0 on the free CD with PC Pro magazine which I have also used with Win 7 and it still works OK so you might be able to still get it for free

[jmain6]

I am surprised no one has mentioned a totally free program for personal use called Irfan View. I have a Brother multifunction printer with scanner and I decided I did not like the included scanner software, including the cumbersome Paperport, so I went to Irfan View. Just clicking on the icon opens a blank window, go to the end of the file drop down and click on acquire batch scanning, and click on ok on the next small window. From there you can set whatever properties you want (or just use the default properties) and do a pre-scan to change your image boundaries and then run a scan. Save it wherever you want by using file - save as ... , and you are done.