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spinedoc77

macrumors G4
Original poster
Jun 11, 2009
11,374
5,222
Just to check back I received my scansnap and it's freakin AMAZING. I'm currently scanning a 700 page kinesiology book to test it out. This little unit is very fast, it scans 50 pages both sides in less than a minute. Converting it to searchable text is longer, but that can just be set and left alone.

I'm going to upload them to my ipad and try them on Goodreader, and I'll also convert them to epub with calibre and see how that looks as well. I'm so excited, I can scan all my textbooks and have them with me on the road.
 

kallyq

macrumors 6502
Apr 12, 2010
270
77
I'm so glad you are enjoying the scanner! Who knew a scanner could be so cool, hey???
 

iamb4

macrumors newbie
Jun 10, 2010
7
0
Just to check back I received my scansnap and it's freakin AMAZING. I'm currently scanning a 700 page kinesiology book to test it out. This little unit is very fast, it scans 50 pages both sides in less than a minute. Converting it to searchable text is longer, but that can just be set and left alone.

I'm going to upload them to my ipad and try them on Goodreader, and I'll also convert them to epub with calibre and see how that looks as well. I'm so excited, I can scan all my textbooks and have them with me on the road.


How do you get the pages into the machine? Did you have to take it to someone to unbind it professionally?
 

danpass

macrumors 68030
Jun 27, 2009
2,689
475
Glory
Ha, I was just thinking about this earlier today. I found an article online awhile back and printed it out.

After not finding it online again today I figured I would have to scan it in.


Then I started thinking about what else I wanted to scan in :D
 

craiglud

macrumors newbie
Jan 14, 2006
6
0
I just started doing this and am using my work copier to get into PDF then post processing at home with Acrobat. What settings are you using for searchable PDF. I have tried one with 600dpi for downsample and am converting one to 300dpi now to test it out too. The search is really nice and I just took about 8 inches of printed material out of my bag! And I can search it now! Sweet!
 

holyjohn

macrumors regular
Jun 21, 2010
102
57
some scanning tips

I already scanned some of my books and put them on my iBook.


1. If you dont' mind low-resolution scan
(ie. you only need to glance at the document without zooming in)
I find that taking pictures at the books with a camera and resizing the pictures and converting them into epub or pdf format will work.

2. If you need high-res scan with zooming in with clarity,
scan your documents with scanners and convert it to epub or pdf format.


Either way, I find it a high volume of workload... Too many things to do.

------------

Oh my God, I just joined MacRumors after 3 years of just surfing just to answer this post...!!
 

spinedoc77

macrumors G4
Original poster
Jun 11, 2009
11,374
5,222
How do you get the pages into the machine? Did you have to take it to someone to unbind it professionally?

First I carefully pull the cover off, I've gotten pretty good so I can pull it off without hurting it. Then I pay Staples $2 to cut off the glued part of the binding, maybe 1/8" so I have a stack of paper (they can rebind the book for another $3 and then I can reapply the cover). After that I just pop it into the scanner and let it rip, I can usually fit 100 or so pages in per scan. It's so insanely easy, I usually just do it while I'm in front of the PC doing reports.

I forget which DPI I'm using, I think somewhere in the middle. The files can get pretty big, but I have the 64gb ipad. I think a 800 page radiology textbook with a ton of pictures at a middle to higher resolution might run 200mb or so, but the pictures look nice and crisp in iannotate.
 

adisquare

macrumors newbie
Jun 13, 2010
12
0
Just to check back I received my scansnap and it's freakin AMAZING. I'm currently scanning a 700 page kinesiology book to test it out. This little unit is very fast, it scans 50 pages both sides in less than a minute. Converting it to searchable text is longer, but that can just be set and left alone.

I'm going to upload them to my ipad and try them on Goodreader, and I'll also convert them to epub with calibre and see how that looks as well. I'm so excited, I can scan all my textbooks and have them with me on the road.

I know this post has been up for a while, but I was just wondering about the quality of the ePub.
Did Calibre do a nice job converting to ePub?
And, were you able to use it in iBooks?
For a thick-page textbook (your ePub in iBooks), is there any delay when you're flipping over the pages?

Assessing on the date of this post, so I assume you got your S1500M back in May 2010? Do you happen to know if the current (2011) S1500M is any different than the older version?
 

palpatine

macrumors 68040
May 3, 2011
3,130
45
I know this post has been up for a while, but I was just wondering about the quality of the ePub.
Did Calibre do a nice job converting to ePub?
And, were you able to use it in iBooks?
For a thick-page textbook (your ePub in iBooks), is there any delay when you're flipping over the pages?

Assessing on the date of this post, so I assume you got your S1500M back in May 2010? Do you happen to know if the current (2011) S1500M is any different than the older version?

I haven't converted anything to ePub, and I am not sure why you would when there are programs like GoodReader out there to read regular PDFs. GoodReader is head and shoulders above iBooks in terms of functionality.
 

spinedoc77

macrumors G4
Original poster
Jun 11, 2009
11,374
5,222
I know this post has been up for a while, but I was just wondering about the quality of the ePub.
Did Calibre do a nice job converting to ePub?
And, were you able to use it in iBooks?
For a thick-page textbook (your ePub in iBooks), is there any delay when you're flipping over the pages?

Assessing on the date of this post, so I assume you got your S1500M back in May 2010? Do you happen to know if the current (2011) S1500M is any different than the older version?

I did try to convert and run them in iBooks and they ran horribly slow for some reason, a ton of checkerboarding and very slow to load pages, this is before it had PDF support as now it's not an issue, just run them as PDF's. In GOodreader and iannotate they run very smoothly, but for some reason even as PDF's they still run quite slowly in iBooks. I have been playing around with the settings and lowered the quality quite a bit to get a smaller but faster file and the pictures still look great.

As for the newer model, I'm not sure. I'm thinking of buying another one for use at home so that gives me an excuse to get the newer model. I'll take a peek and see if anything is drastically different.
 

xraytech

macrumors 68030
Mar 24, 2010
2,518
214
I highly recommend it. It is very fast and does both sides at the same time. Also, it is very small and only takes up a small corner of my desk! Someone on a review somewhere said it is the size of a loaf of bread and I would agree. :) I hope you enjoy it! I love mine!

IT'S A DUPLEX SCANNER?!?

AWESOME!!!

There's your answer OP.
 

palpatine

macrumors 68040
May 3, 2011
3,130
45
IT'S A DUPLEX SCANNER?!?

AWESOME!!!

There's your answer OP.

as far as i know, all of the scansnap scanners can do both sides at once. the newest version is no longer a loaf of bread, but two snickers bars. that might be an exaggeration, but it is pretty small.
 

iamb4

macrumors newbie
Jun 10, 2010
7
0
Anyone feel like doing some consulting?

I have about 30 textbooks already cut and ready to rock, which I'd like to be able to save and view on my iPad 1. I don't really care how it happens. I have a Fujitsu Snapscan 1500, Adobe Acrobat and ABBYY. The books are up to 1,300 pages, with the current file sizes up to about 1.5 GB. If someone can guide me how to scan and OCR the books so that they won't make massive files that crash my iPad I would be willing to pay a reasonable consulting fee. Right now any file over 100MB will crash the iPad using Goodreader or iAnnotate. Also textbooks with a lot of pictures will crash it too? Anyone up to the task? PM me.
 

palpatine

macrumors 68040
May 3, 2011
3,130
45
I have about 30 textbooks already cut and ready to rock, which I'd like to be able to save and view on my iPad 1. I don't really care how it happens. I have a Fujitsu Snapscan 1500, Adobe Acrobat and ABBYY. The books are up to 1,300 pages, with the current file sizes up to about 1.5 GB. If someone can guide me how to scan and OCR the books so that they won't make massive files that crash my iPad I would be willing to pay a reasonable consulting fee. Right now any file over 100MB will crash the iPad using Goodreader or iAnnotate. Also textbooks with a lot of pictures will crash it too? Anyone up to the task? PM me.

i've got an ipad 1 and it suffers (so people tellme) froma lack of ram. the problem, though, doesn't seem to be so much with file size, but with certain elements that get into it, especially images. so far, i've found that any file will open just fine if you optimize it (easily done with adobe acrobat pro). it seems to get rid of the offending elements. it also has the pleasant side effect of making files smaller. i will try a large file out and see how big i can go.
 

Dobbs2

macrumors 6502
Jun 5, 2008
378
74
Ok maybe some of you can help me. I have one of my text books in PDF format. It is 14mb file. I have iannontate and have tried to transfer them over through the aji (sp?) app like I always do and it won't. I tried a program calibre to change it to ePub and it is horrible in ibooks slow and unresponsive. Any ideas on what I'm doing wrong? This would be nice because the actual book is huge and it's nice just to take my iPad.
 

bluedog3401

macrumors regular
Sep 4, 2008
178
0
DIY book scanner

http://www.diybookscanner.org/

A fairly good resource on how to do it yourself. Acrobat professional has good OCR. The Pro version isn't cheap. If you can do without searchable text, compositing your scans can be done in the Preview app built in to OSX.
 

palpatine

macrumors 68040
May 3, 2011
3,130
45
http://www.diybookscanner.org/

A fairly good resource on how to do it yourself. Acrobat professional has good OCR. The Pro version isn't cheap. If you can do without searchable text, compositing your scans can be done in the Preview app built in to OSX.

they are a little hardcore at that site. very cool, and that is how professionals do it, but you can get quite good results from tripod+digital camera. see this site:
http://www.subchaser.org/photographing-documents

as for the problem transferring that 14mb file, i am afraid i have never had problems transferring. that sounds odd. i use goodreader with itunes or goodreader usb to move files. perhaps it is the app? at any rate, it may not be the size of the file. try a different 14mb file and see.
 
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