*** UPDATED ***
I've been using the previous model, the ScanSnap S1500 for almost 4 years now. I liked it so much that I bought a second one. To me, it completely transformed the concept of going paperless: from painful and time consuming to cool and even fun. If you have used a regular flat-bed scanner trying to go paperless, you probably know what I mean. I feel your pain. And this is coming from a hardcore paperless guy since 2001. Back then there weren't that many options.
If you are reading these reviews, you probably already know that the S1500 is currently (January 2013) pretty much the gold standard in the automatic document feeder (ADF) scanner consumer market with excellent user friendly software, pretty fast, reliable, built like a tank, excellent optical quality and on top of that you get the standard version of Adobe Acrobat (worth alone >$100). Not that it is a cheap scanner but compared to other consumer-grade ADF scanners it is a good deal, and like most things in life, you get what you pay for. It is one of those rare pieces of electronics that *just work*. It makes something relatively complicated extremely easy. Also wanted to point out that those all-in-one scanner/copier/printers, etc. are just Ok in my honest opinion. Their relatively low price is very tempting however, from experience they are "jack of all trades, master of none". They are no competition for this scanner, not at all!
That said, I bought the iX500 as soon as I learned it was available on Amazon. It was hard to believe the S1500 could be improved but hey, even as a geek myself technology never cease to amaze me. Well, I've been playing with the scanner for two days so I will give you my first impressions.
Not that it matters but the first thing I noticed is that the box is now very plain and vanilla (pun intended) colored without even a handle as opposed to the fancy S1500 box. I can't care less but I just hope they put the savings in the scanner and not the profit margins because this one costs more. Upon unpacking, the iX500 has a nice sophisticated industrial look with matte/shiny black surfaces and blue LED lights. Unlike the S1500, it does not look like an old cheap plasticky silver colored ink-jet printer from the 90's. Overall the materials and quality of construction seem as good as the S1500. The paper rollers seem improved. Also new is a physical switch to turn on/off the WiFi radio and WPS button to automatically set up a secure WiFi connection.
Let's cut to the chase and explain the positives and negatives:
Pros:
-Faster feeding/scan. I don't think it makes a huge practical difference compared to the S1500 but it is undeniably faster. The higher the number of pages you are scanning, the more significant it will be to you.
-Faster processing. Here is where the difference is very noticeable. With the S1500 the processing can take some time and you will always see the processing progress bar. With the iX500 you barely see it or if you see it it goes way faster!
-USB 3.0 connection. Can't argue about the advantages of having a theoretically max speed of 5 Gbps (USB 3.0) vs 480 Mbps (USB 2.0). The provided cable is truly 6 feet long which is a plus. With USB 3.0 I wouldn't recommend using extension cables because the USB 3.0 protocol is very sensitive to increased cable lengths (>2m). If the cable is not long enough for you, get a powered USB 3.0 hub not an extension cable.
-Improved paper handling mechanism. Regular paper documents rarely jam or misfeed on the S1500. Only if you have stuck, very thin, bended, irregular or wrinkled sheets. I threw in different types of papers and it seems to take them in better! This is a real usability improvement.
-WiFi capability. Meh.. Honestly, this is not one of the main reasons I got the iX500. For me, for this specific task of scanning documents, speed, security and reliability are more important than going all wireless but that is just me. I have the scanner in my home office next to my desktop and scan a fairly regular amount of documents, some with personal, work and financial information that needs to be encrypted before storing, never online or on mobile devices.
It also has scan-to-the-cloud capability using DropBox, GDrive, EverNote, Salesforce, SugarSync (some with never heard before silly names) but seriously, would you trust a hardly profitable -except maybe Google- private online cloud company to store all your documents for the long term? Maybe temporarily until you download but that's it. I wouldn't trust them even for just a backup. Also, try downloading just 100 300-dpi full color scans online and you will realize how painfully slow it is. I do however, see some situations were this may be useful like online sharing of docs or as temporary storage of trivial stuff but only as an add-on capability and not as a main way of connectivity. I will try it with my Android phone and tablet, though but nothing serious.
Throughout the years I've learned that the most efficient way to go paperless without wasting time is to: 1)read the document once and decide if you need to scan or throw it away. 2)if its important enough to scan, do it and file the pdf right away in the corresponding computer folder. 3)shred the paper original right away otherwise later on you will waste time picking it up and reading it again. *Make sure you have backed up your files before you shred your originals; you can put the scanned sheets in a "to shred" bin until you backup your pdf files*. If I were to scan something without my PC I would eventually have to read that paper again online to decide where to put it so that would be 2 reads of the same damn document. Not too efficient if you have say 20+ docs. Also, keep in mind that with this scanner, it is very easy to scan lots of stuff so if you don't have your own paperless system/routine/strategy, you may end up with digital clutter rather than paper clutter. Develop a system that works best for you.
-I haven't replaced any "consumables" on my S1500 in almost 4 years so I wouldn't be worried about that with the iX500. Seems to me like a marketing ploy from Fujitsu to make more money. I have emptied two big 3-drawer file cabinets plus regular scans all these years without any problem. Just keep the rollers sticky clean and vacuum the paper dust that accumulates after a while and you should be fine.
-All the nice "minor" features on the S1500 that make it so great are also on the iX500: ultrasonic double paper feed sensor, automatic de-skew (alignment), double side scan, auto color detection, automatic paper orientation, scanning long papers (legal size), blank side auto deletion, etc. I'm sure they must have improved these.
BTW, you can easily scan hundreds of sheets per run not just the 50 pages they mention. Just keep loading the ADF top tray before it scans the last sheet and it will keep scanning!
Cons:
-The optical sensors on the iX500 are CIS and not CCD like in the S1500. Theoretically, CCD is better, especially for color reproduction. CIS is better for text and details however, honestly, I don't see any difference compared to my S1500 which basically uses 7-year old technology. This means that probably current CIS technology has caught up with the older CCD quality in the S1500. Of course this doesn't mean that current CCD quality is not better yet. Anyway, I use a Canon flat-bed for high-quality scans like paper photographs, cards and the likes so not really an issue for me.
-no Adobe Acrobat XI, just the same version X as before even though XI has been out for a while now. (Note that the provided Acrobat is Windows only. If you have a Mac, you can use Preview which comes with MacOS).
Regarding software, I will also mention that personally, having gone completely paperless for many years, I avoid like the plague using commercial "paperless office managing software" (read Rack2-Filer, ScanSnap Organizer, FileCenter, PaperPort, Sharepoint, etc). Nothing wrong with them at all, its just that many of these programs and their supporting software companies may not be around 10+ years from now so you don't want to depend too much on their proprietary file indexing system or formatting (a reason I wouldn't touch NeatDesk scanners not even with a 10-foot pole!) or deal with some compatibility issues that may arise in the future if say you switch to a new operating system. This is very important because the reason you are digitizing documents/photos, etc is for archiving and future use. I only trust the PDF format which is an open standard (many programs and platforms can open it) and plain hierarchical Windows folders for organizing the files, so I'm never more than 5-6 mouse clicks away from every single file I have (i.e.: Finances>credit cards>American Express>Statements>2013) This will guarantee that 20, 30 or 40 years from now your files will be as organized and readable as today.
-no TWAIN support. Even though not that important nowadays, it can be an issue for small business that rely on specific software for scanning. I mostly scan directly to PDF so in my case -and I'm sure for most people- it will not be an issue. TWAIN is a standard protocol that most scanners and imaging hardware use to communicate with software programs. This means that you cannot directly scan images from within some graphic or other type of software that require a TWAIN driver. You will have to scan and then open the image file.
In summary, I will say that coming from the S1500, other than the new wireless capability, the iX500's big overall improvement is in speed. The iX500 won't make your S1500 obsolete, not at all unless of course you must have the wireless connectivity. The improvements are more evolutionary than anything else because the S1500 is already very fast. We are talking about differences in seconds. If you add all the speed improvements: a faster feeding mechanism/optical scan + faster image processing due to the new "GI" dual microprocessor + USB 3.0 connection, you get a much faster experience, specially if you scan a lot. Few years ago, a scanner this good and fast would have cost thousand(s) of dollars like commercial grade Canon and Fujitsu doc scanners. I have recommended the ScanSnap series to friends and family who were interested and from their feedback I can say that the iX500 would also be perfect for both beginners and experienced users alike more so with all the improvements.
Few more things: 1)from personal experience, having a good file backup routine is as important -if not more- as having a good scanner. Going all digital is fantastic and very practical but it also makes it extremely easy to lose it all, so I wouldn't skimp on that side. Backup, backup and b a c k u p your files. I can't say this enough. 2)The scanner doesn't come with a paper manual -that would be ironic..ha ha!. You can download the 480-page PDF manual from Fujitsu.
Hope this was helpful.
**** UPDATE 02/11/13 ****
After almost a month of daily use, I've had no problems with the iX500 whatsoever. It definitely is as reliable as the S1500. I'm very happy with my purchase. My setup is a custom built PC i7-3770 w/Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bits. Haven't tried it yet on my Win 8 laptop.
I had the opportunity to play with the wireless function... Well, the WiFi wireless function does NOT replace the USB cable. In other words, it does NOT connect to your PC via WiFi only. In that sense it is not really wireless. It only connects the iX500 to your tablet or smartphone. And actually they say that clearly, I'll give them that. You cannot have both the USB cable and the WiFi mode active at the same time. Also, you *need* to turn on the ScanSnap App on your smart device for the iX500 to be able to start scanning (the Apps are free to download on the iTunes and Play Store). The "PC-less" wireless scanning does work as advertised, though. It is very cool and surprisingly fast. I tried it on my Google Nexus phone, tablet and iPod Touch and they all worked very well. Using a Google device you could also save files to the micro-SD memory card.
Also, it is not really standalone-connected-to-the cloud as one would think. It cannot send the scans directly to say DropBox without your intervention. Not even using the App. You must go through the Quick Menu while using your PC and choose one of the cloud services and then save "directly" to DropBox but only when connected via USB. It cannot be done just by pressing the "Scan" button on the iX500. You need a PC for that. That makes sense because you need a computer to do the log-in into a cloud file hosting service. The iX500 alone can't keep your login information. They should add that direct capability to the App, though. If you don't want a PC attached, you can still scan with your smartphone and then once in your smartphone, you can send the documents anywhere you want (Google Drive, Dropbox, text message, email, printer, SD memory card, etc).
Regarding the wireless setup process, as a first step your scanner needs to be connected to the computer via USB and run the "ScanSnap Wireless Network Setup" program. If your network is protected, you will also need the security password unless your router has a WPS button (Wireless Protected Setup). I don't like to read manuals (I'm a guy, ha ha) so I just followed the easy interactive steps. It will also tell you that your iX500 has a unique PIN number that you will need to enter in you ScanSnap App. This is in case you are in an office with more than one iX500s; it will only connect to yours. After that you can unhook the USB cable.
Again, in my specific case I don't care much for the wireless connectivity but I already can imagine interesting uses for it. BTW, I also tried to use my Google phone as a WiFi HotSpot and connect it directly to the iX500 but it doesn't work that way. Apparently the iX500 needs a common access point for both. My phone has WiFi-Direct but not the iX500.
**** UPDATE 08/11/13 ****
FYI, you can now scan directly to your PC WITHOUT the USB cable. Download the new software and firmware upgrade from within the ScanSnap Manager's 'Update' option. I don't really need this function but I can already imagine many useful applications...
BTW, after 7 months of regular use, my iX500 keeps scanning like a champ. I take it for granted and most of the times I'm not too aware I'm actually using it, which is something very good to say about the reliability and ergonomics of this machine!
Also, apparently new units are now shipping with Acrobat XI! I wish they could give early purchasers a software upgrade option since Acrobat XI was already available when the ix500 was introduced..
I'll start out by saying that I've been the proud owner of a Fujitsu S1300 scanner for the past two years. I have gone almost completely paperless at home through a combination of scanning to Evernote and Dropbox and haven't looked back since. The quality and convenience of my previous scanner was unmatched over the last couple years, but there had always been some items on my wish list.
Enter the iX500
I really believe this to be the end-all-be-all as far as scanners is concerned. I'll try to go through this review in a logical fashion.
Purchase/Install
I actually received this unit on the first day it was released due to a connection I had (always love to be one of the first to have something). Bringing it home and unpacking it was familiar as this is my 3rd Fujitsu scanner (s1300 and s1300i for my parents) and setup was straight-forward. The install file on my MacBook was large, as usual, but took little time and was up and running. One of the main features/draws for this product was the wireless ability which I'll go into more detail later, but was easy to get setup. Overall took less than 10 minutes to start scanning. Nothing exciting.
Initial Impressions
This thing is FAST. I never had a complaint about the speed of my s1300 or especially the s1300i, but holy cow, this thing scans documents like it's going out of style. Even at full resolution color on both sides it is hard to keep up with it.
Secondly, this is by far an improvement over the s1300 in the aesthetics category. It looks like a very high end piece of AV equipment or something. So far my wife has not even attempted to make me move it off the kitchen counter where it currently resides. When folded up it is very unobtrusive and is very unassuming.
I have to reiterate that I truly enjoy the fact that, now that this is 100% wireless, I don't have to keep it in my home office or attached to another computer (with 2 USB ports like the s1300s).
Build quality is similar to the previous generations of Fujitsu scanners - superb.
Testing
Speed - I was easily able to get the 25 pages per minute claim and even hit 32 pages while doing my latest mortgage refinance documents.
Reliability - I put several documents through that either had a business card taped to them or a post-it note to see how it would handle them. All fed through perfectly fine and showed up as desired.
Wireless - This is honestly the main reason for my upgrade. Having the ability to detach this device from any and all computers and allow for the scanning of incoming mail directly to Evernote is a godsend. The iOS app worked flawlessly to get the scanner to do whichever type of scan I wanted and instantly made available my documents. This means not having to pile up my mail on a weekly basis and batch scan it when I take everything up to the office. It also means I'm far more likely to scan a document before trashing it, ensuring that nothing is overlooked. In the past I've shied away from wireless peripherals like printers as I've had bad luck with them, but with the rigorous testing I've done this far I have yet to break this.
Quality - As good as the S1300/S1300i as far as quality and OCR accuracy. This is somewhat secondary to main my needs but works well.
Overall Thoughts
This isn't the cheapest scanner you can buy but I honestly believe it to be the most convenient and well equipped. Aside from the cost savings of having to purchase filing cabinets, the psychological benefits of nothing have paper-clutter around the house and being able to find any document you need in an instant are huge. The iX500 has lived up to all my expectations and more so far.
Future Updates
I do plan on updating this review in the future with a few items. First, I am trying to get a video of the insane speed of this device uploaded. Secondly, I'd like to give some more insight into the reliability/long-term build quality of it. Perhaps in 3-6 months the latter will come. Please comment with any questions and I'll respond ASAP.
Thanks
I bought this ScanSnap iX500 almost a year ago in December of 2013 and have put in through its paces over the past year and I want to share my findings with you as I believe this is THE BEST automatic document feed (ADF) scanner on the market right now... not just because of how it functions, but the included software as well which makes sorting and organizing a breeze!
BACK STORY:
Suffering from a disability that causes me not to think clearly at times, having everything in paper format was an absolute mess. When my disability started in 2006, I started a company and worked for another company and the paper started piling up. It was a mess and I was completely disorganized. I accidentally threw away or shredded thousands of documents I needed... receipts, important paperwork, documentation, etc. It was a mess and I'm still trying to find those documents to this day.
After finally starting to get my disability under control in 2013, I made the decision to purchase this scanner and go paperless. The company I was working for needed a couple thousand documents scanned organized and this is the scanner I recommended and purchased. Now, towards the end of 2014, I have scanned at least 15,000 pages of documents with this scanner without a single problem whatsoever. Seem too good to be true? That's what I thought until I saw the end result. Files cabinets, empty. Stacks of papers, gone. In fact, any piece of mail, receipt, or document that made its way into my hands is immediately scanned and stored in digital format.
HOW IT HAS WORKED:
Well like I said, I've got about 15,000 documents through this thing and haven't had a single problem with it feeding documents, jamming, or anything. I've used scanners almost twice the price of the iX500 that had more problems.
The software is extremely user-friendly with a few quirks you'll have to get used to... nothing severe enough worth mentioning. What I like most about it is I use Google Drive to store my paperwork and with the ScanSnap software, when a document is sent through the scanner, I can have it automatically save to the Google Drive folder on my home computer which automatically syncs it with the cloud, making it available on all of my computers, my cell phone, my Chromebook, etc. I don't know of any other scanner that lets you do this right within the software. That feature alone pushes this scanner to the front of the line for me and many others.
It's built extremely durable and has a small footprint on your desk, folding up when not in use. It's also black in color versus the typical beige ADF scanner colors that stick out like a sore thumb.
You get what you pay for with this scanner, 100%. Fujitsu could probably charge a lot more money for this scanner if they wanted to because it works better than scanners twice its price.
SOFTWARE:
As I mentioned above, the ScanSnap software controls the scanner with ease. You can quickly change settings from single-sided scanning to double-sided, color scanning to black and white, grey scale, or even auto-detect where the scanner will be able to tell how it should scan the document. If the document is a black and white report, it'll scan it in black and white. If it notices grey-tone, it will scan it accordingly. If it sees color, it scans it in color. Absolutely amazing.
You can also change the resolution settings depending on how crisp you need the document. The higher the resolution, the higher the file size, although I've noticed, even at 150dpi, the images are crisp and easy to read. I can't see much difference between 150dpi and 300dpi besides the increased file size with 300dpi.
The software gives you the option to scan right to email, to a specific folder, to Google Drive, and several other services. This in itself is an amazing feature that has come in handy on numerous occasions. Also worth mentioning is the WiFi capability. I can scan a document and have it sent right to a folder on my cell phone simply by using the free Android or iPhone app. This has come in handy when I'm on the go and need to bring the document with me for a business trip, doctor's visit, etc.
Since we're mentioning software, keep in mind, this scanner comes with a full version of Adobe Acrobat, worth over $100. This lets you use all of the features Acrobat offers when scanning your documents. You can also tell the scanner to use OCR (optical character recognition) to make your documents fully searchable!
Now that we've gone over a brief history of the iX500, let's get down to the pros and cons:
PROS:
* Very quick and accurate scanning speed. Whether in simplex (one-sided) or duplex mode, the scanner is fast and accurate.
* Processing speed is very quick with very minor lag, if any at all.
* USB 3.0 connection. This is HUGE as it allows for a very fast file transfer speed from the scanner to your computer. Many ADF scanners still use a standard USB 2.0 connector and the speed difference is very noticeable. With USB 3.0, you're getting up to 5 GB/second compared to UISB 2.0's speed of only 480 MB/second. No comparison there... USB 3.0 wins.The provided USB cable is 6 feet long giving you plenty of length to set the scanner up on your desk where you want it, not necessarily right next to the computer.
* The paper handling mechanism is greatly improved over previous generations and light years beyond the current competition. Like I said, I've put at least 15,000 documents through this scanner in under a year and it continues to feed documents the same as the day I bought it. Go ahead and scan a tiny receipt or business card, throw in some odd shaped papers, legal sized sheets, or long receipts... it doesn't matter... the iX500 handles them all with ease.
* The rollers (consumables according to Fujitsu) last forever! I've heard some people going 4+ years of scanning file cabinet after file cabinet of documents with no problems. Just keep the rollers sticky cleand, vacuum and paper dust particles from inside the scanner and you should be good to go.
CONS:
* Recently brought to my attention is the sensors on the iX500 are CIS and not CCD like they are on the similar model, the S1500. Historically, people have preferred the CCD sensors as they have typically scanned color documents better, although the CIS sensors have historically scanned text and grey-scale documents better. Fast forward to 2014 and quite honestly, I've used both and they perform identically... I cannot notice a difference really... in fact, I think the CIS sensors have finally caught up and surpassed the CCD sensors. The thing to remember is this is an ADF scanner, not a flat-bed scanner. If you need to scan high-resolution photos, you're looking at the wrong scanner as this scanner is designed for low to high volume document scanning.
* The Acrobat software included is Version 10, not Version 11 which is the most current version. This isn't a huge deal but I felt it was worth mentioning. Also, the Acrobat software will only work with Windows based machines so you'll need to use the Preview software that comes standard on a Mac.
* No TWAIN support. This really isn't a huge deal anymore as nowadays we're mostly scanning right to PDF and storing our documents in local folder versus running them through separate proprietary software. If you absolutely need TWAIN support, unfortunately this scanner is not going to work for you in that regard.
SUMMARY:
I can't stress enough how much I recommend this product. I have written hundreds of reviews here on Amazon and out of all of them, this is probably the one I am the most passionate about because this scanner has changed my life and is changing the lives of others, too. If you want to go paperless and finally ditch those file cabinets full of paper, buy this scanner! Having papers in file cabinets isn't safe anymore as they can be lost or destroyed in a fire, through water damage, theft, misfiling, etc.
As I said earlier, I scan directly to the Google Drive folder on my computer. So far that process has been working great but I will keep you updated if I notice any glitches. Right now, it's an awesome method! Scanning some important documents in and being able to pull them up on my Chromebook months later while sitting in a coffee shop is amazing. This is the era of going paperless and I hope you take the plunge, buy this scanner and get scanning! :-)
*** If this review was helpful to you, please let me know! It means a lot to me when I know I've helped someone make a decision on whether or not to buy something. I either own or have tested EVERY product I review, and I appreciate reading other people's reviews because they always help me make an informed decision. These things are what make Amazon great: the prices and the reviews! If you have a specific question about a review, please contact me through my profile page. I'm more than happy to chat with you about it. Thanks! ***
This is the most effusive review I've ever written. This product will blow you away.
I've had it only one week. So far I've cleaned out over 250 pounds of paper files from my once-clogged office. Everything is now filed in Evernote. It's backed up locally and in the cloud - and instantly searchable and accessible.
I've had Neat Receipts for years. Gave it up after losing 5 months of receipts (poof - gone). When looking for another solution I stumbled into the Fujitsu S1500 and it's rabid following (they are like groupies - and now I see why). After a ton of additional research (check out the many YouTube videos and reviews here on Amazon), I was about to order the 1500....then...
As I was about to buy it, Fujitsu announced this new machine; the iX500. It's not inexpensive, but based on the strong recommendations for its predecessors, I took the plunge. Amazon did not even have a picture of it up yet - but they took the order and shipped a few days later.
The product LOOKS great. It's small - amazingly small - about the same footprint as an old personal fax machine. It's sleek and it's almost silent. Most all - it's FAST. Blazing. 25 page per minute.
Look at that shelf behind you. The one will all those binders from those conferences you attended. You know you'll never read those things...but you can't throw them out, can you? I scanned over 3,000 pages of journals and binders. Throwing them out felt GREAT. I have the space back, and now can search through any of those once-dusty tomes instantly.
Receipts. What receipts? That huge box of them that was getting bigger by the day...All gone. Scanned into the system. Tagged, sorted, filed and ready for tax season.
Staples are EVIL. Make sure there are none in your docs. One week in and nearly paperless.
Look. I'll make it easy for you. Just buy it. If I'm wrong, Amazon will take it back -- but once you have it you won't let it go.
Lastly - I believe I'd give up my iPad before I'd let this thing go.
Enjoy.
The iX500 is fast and easy to use. The single pass duplex means less paper jams. The lack of a TWAIN driver means you won't be importing into Photoshop, but you can push it into Photoshop using the ScanSnap software, so not much is lost.
The biggest drawback is due to the kind of sensor used. CIS scanners have limited color abilities. My 12 year old CCD scanner is much better at color pickup (see photo). One is a flatbed and the others are document scanners, but the difference is in the sensor.
There are many color documents to be scanned and not everyone knows or admits just how bad a CIS scanner is at color pickup. There's a mass self-deception out there, like how everyone taught themselves to believe artificial sweeteners taste OK.
After years of searching, I can not find a form-feed CCD based scanner for any price. This means that any memorabilia-class material to be scanned still has to be done page-by-page on a flatbed. It would be great if anyone could point one out.
Pros:
- Scans quickly
- Single pass duplex eliminates messy jams compared to scanners that have to re-route paper to scan the other side
- Nice industrial design. (though it could use a separate button for single vs duplex mode - going back to the software each time isn't great).
- Wireless scan to mobile worked well and was fun to show off though not particularly useful for me.
Cons:
- Color detection is weak
- Achieving organization with the ScanSnap iX500 starts with the touch of a single button and ends with a host of productivity features that keep you ahead of the stack
Scan snap ix500 desktop Scanner for PC and Mac. Blazing 25ppm color scanning. Two sided scanning. Usb or Wi-Fi connection to a computer.
I don’t usually write reviews in fact the only previous reviews have been to complain when a product was obviously substandard. I am writing this one because when I bought the scanner I could not find reviews that dealt with photo scanning.
I purchased the Fujitsu iX500 ScanSnap on 12/21/2013. I already have 2 scanners but neither was doing a good job of scanning my pictures. The IX500 has exceeded my expectations.
Background: I have 22,000 photographs from the 70’s, 80’s, & 90’s which are just the usual family snapshots. They are in photo albums stored in the top of a closet and have not been looked at for 15 years. I wanted digital copies to preserve my photos and the only way they get looked at these days is on an electronic device. Because of the large quantity of pictures a scanner with an automatic feeder was a requirement. I started several years ago with an EPSON Workforce 310 all in 1. I scanned a few hundred but the feeder did not like the small pictures. A few years later I purchased an EPSON Perfection V500 with the EU73 Automatic Document Feeder. The document feeder was better but many issues. The paper guides had to be set for each change of size and the software was really bad. I had to manually set the cropping and after many attempts to use the color correction features it proved best to just turn it off. I had to disassemble the automatic document feeder to clean it and little flecks of dust easily were trapped and it needed cleaning about every 50 pictures. All in all I scanned about 7,000 pictures (in 2 and ½ years) before the feeder began to slip on the glossy photos. Matte finish still fed OK but not great. We have several ScanSnaps at work and everyone was pleased so I purchased the IX500 to scan my pictures.
I have scanned around 13,000 photos with the iX500 in 5 weeks. I was worried that it is a ‘document’ scanner not a picture scanner. Well it is the best scanner I have found for photographs. The scanner gets the cropping right every time and scans just the picture. The resolution maximum is 600 x 600 which is what I was using on my previous high resolution scanner because higher resolution made the file sizes too large. The software does not have any color correction options but the scans are very true to the colors on the photo being scanned. It is fast – 3.6 secs for a 3.5” x 5” photo. I can mix sizes (usually 3.5” x 5” and 4” x 6”) and the feeder does not care. I have scanned several sixes up to 8” x 10”. My albums have 10 pictures to a sleeve page so I remove 30 photos at a time and put 30 in the feeder. About every 500 pictures or so I get an error warning but it has always been correct and I just hit the ‘continue scanning’ button. Dust and dirt from the photos does get dragged into the scanner but they tend to clear in a picture or 2 without any cleaning and when necessary the cleaning is really easy – just open and wipe the window with windex. Even then do check your scans every few hundred photos – I scanned 1,000 with dirt resulting in streaks on the scan but cleaned the scanner and re-scanned them in a couple of hours. I now check the scanned pictures more often. I have scanned maybe 20 Polaroid photos. I get an error that says 2 pages were picked up and it tends to foul the scanner and need cleaning afterwards. I am going to do additional Polaroid on my flatbed scanner. In 13,000 scans I have not had a single damaged photo.
This is the best solution I have found to scanning a large number of photos. I have just completed my albums and am moving on to photos from my parents and grandparents. Several of the photos date back to the 1920’s but with the experience I have had I am confident that the straight through path will do well even on old pictures.
I typically dislike when people review products before giving them some time to prove their longevity and lack of hidden quirks. However, I just got this the other day and have been very impressed. So, sorry but impulsivity wins the day with something this awesome!!
As I bought is primarily for scanning receipts, that is what this review will cover.
It handles my fairly crumpled and creased receipts with utter finesse, and speed. Only twice have the receipts have gotten outside the guides resulting in a skewed scan, but this seems an understandable consequence of putting many crumpled and creased receipts in at once as the lack of flatness creates a tendency for them to be pushed over the guides. The simple solution I found was to simply use a finger as a brace to keep them from flopping forward during the scan. The most receipts of varying crumpledness that I've tried to scan at once so far is 46, which the scansnap handled with ease.
I love the smart receipt program that comes with the software. For one, my hundreds of crumpled receipts are now digitized and therefore are no longer overflowing the filing cabinet. But even cooler, the software reads the date, store, expense and method of payment off the receipt with impressive accuracy. Some of my receipts have become worn from time spent in my wallet that they are nearly illegible, but I've found that even for the decently readable receipts it's a good idea to check that the software was able to correctly read the scan (e.g., some of the worn 8's were read as 3's, sometimes dates were off, once or twice the total was incorrect).
The smart receipt software also learns. At first it will not correctly read a majority of store logos, but after correcting the reader 1-3 times it generally learned to read those logos correctly in the future. I think that is the only real negative I've found so far- that you have to double-check that it correctly interpreted the receipts' store logos. However, the inconvenience of double-checking is eased by the fact that the scanned image of each receipt is shown right next to each line of receipt data.
Overall, the inconvenience of double-checking the store, total and date is outweighed by all the conveniences this scanner does provide.
Moreover, the machine is sleek and sexy, has a fairly small footprint, and feels well put together.
April 2019 UPDATE: still working great! The learning/smart of the OCR can be frustrating at times as it doesn’t always “learn.” Also, I believe the newest version of the software no longer supports the special receipt-reader program. So I gave decided to not update in the last year in order to keep this software.
Fujitsu ScanSnap iX500 - The Best for Paperless Office and Document Archiving
I have purchased the Scan Snap iX500 two weeks ago and since then got rid of a massive amount of paper documents, archived old family documents in the cloud, and scanned tons of old photos in shoe boxes.
As you can see from my feedback, I can only report positive experience working with this scanner:
1. Installation was easy with the USB connection, which I switched to my wireless network. The setup was self-explanatory and there were no hiccups in the process.
2. Automatic document feeder scanned both sides of the paper at once. A stack of 30 pages where processed without any issue.
3. I usually scan to Adobe Acrobat and make the PDF documents searchable with text recognition. See below how to get the latest Acrobat version.
Adobe Acrobat Standard included
• The scanner came bundled with Adobe Acrobat XI Standard even Fujitsu states on their website to ship version DC (12) with the scanner (after April 2015).
• Sure I wanted the new version instead of the three years old version 11: They explained that there is extensive inventory with dealers having the old version in the box and there is no problem to send me a free upgrade.
• Anthony from Full Color Copier was very helpful and Michael from Fujitsu even topped the great customer experience. Within a few days, Fujitsu sent me an Adobe Redemption Code to download the brand-new Adobe Acrobat DC (12) version and I was even able to keep the old software.
• So make sure you call Fujitsu (1-800-626-4686) and request the upgrade if purchased after April 2015. They are very helpful and you talk to someone in America. Big THANK YOU!!!
Document Storage - It’s as easy as 1-2-3:
For document archiving I use Google Drive with its free 15GB of data storage and encrypt all files with Boxcryptor to avoid anyone snooping around. The last part is especially important if you like to keep your personal information safe.
1. After you install Google Drive on your PC you have a dedicated folder which is synchronized with the Google Cloud. When scanning directly into that folder, all scans are uploaded safe to the Cloud and also remain local on your PC in this dedicated folder.
2. Now the important part: Install Boxcryptor on your PC and tell it to encrypt the Google Drive folder. All files are automatically “scrambled” before upload to the Cloud and only you are able to read them.
3. Done! This way you always have two copies: One local copy on your PC and one in the Google Cloud. The best: All for free.
This is my take on the ScanSnap iX500 used in a home office. I am not affiliated with Fujitsu or any seller on Amazon.
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There are already many reviews so I am just going to go straight into the details.
I bought this for two reasons: 1) to convert some books into Microsoft Word format and 2) to convert my old photograph collection into JPGs. So, that is what I am rating this device on. (Not other stuff that you can do with it like receipt-scanning, business card scanning, etc.)
If I was just rating the Fujitsu iX500 based on the first project, digitizing my books, it would be 5 stars.
I slice off the spine into a stack of sheets, then feed them through the iX500 lickety split.
The OCR feature works really, really well. And the bundled ABBYY software allows you to get it out of PDF which is a very limited format. For example, a PDF has a carriage return at the end of each line. So even if you OCR'ed the doc into PDF, when you copy the text from the PDF to an email or word, you get all these carriage returns where they are not supposed to be. The nice thing about ABBYY is that it somehow figures out the actual formatting of the book and only puts a carriage return where it is supposed to be. Without the ABBYY software it would have been 4 stars.
As for the photograph scanning, I was able to scan several large boxes of photographs that I had been worrying about backing up for years. I did all of it in two marathon sessions over two days and I can't tell you how great it feels to get rid of that clutter and have them backed up in the cloud on OneDrive now. So, yes, it scans a stack of photographs very quickly. However, the quality is only so-so, depending on how picky you are. I didn't think I was very picky but when I compared to a scan from an old flatbed scanner or, better, from the negative (I used Costco's services) I was able to can see a noticeable, and disappointing, difference. The colors of the iX500 scans are more muted, the resolution is not as good, it is generally darker, there can be smudge lines (my fault I think, I let the iX500 lens get dirty) and it crops a small amount around the edge of the picture. I attached some pictures that allows you to compare the differences for yourself. The left half is the reference scan that was professionally done at Costco and the right half is the same picture from the iX500. I thought I might be able to correct the color of the iX500 image myself and I tried (I am definitely not a pro at color correction) but I just couldn't correct very well. You can see for yourself the result in the other comparison-image. I also included the originals.
So, for photograph scanning I can only give the iX500 a 4 star. I thought about giving it a 3 star for photograph scanning but the device is so fast and so reliable that I decided that is the real reason you buy it, not for high quality image scans.
In the end, I decided that I was okay with the quality of the photograph scans from the iX500. For those really special photos, I will have those professionally scanned, maybe from negatives.
SUMMARY
Document scanning and digitizing books: 5 stars.
Photograph scanning: 4 stars, almost 3 stars because of mediocre image-quality.
Overall speed and ADF reliability: 5+ stars. Thrilled actually.
Software: The software is absolutely needed, very good, but a confusing hodge-podge. Could be better. So, 4 stars for that.
Overall rating: 4 stars, not 5.
Update after 1.5 years of use: After returning 2 scanners I finally had one in working order. I desperately wanted a fast scanner or else I wouldn't have gone through the trouble of a third one. For reference, I always scan papers that are equal size in bunches. This is a fast scanner, especially compared to using a flatbed scanner. Hours of scanning is now done it minutes. The inside has a tendency to get dirty and the dirt (pieces of brittle, old paper) will create lines on your scan, but if you get a microfiber cloth and wipe it out frequently you should be fine. Every once in a while it will absolutely destroy a sheet that I then have to flatten out and take over to my flatbed scanner, but the speed is worth it to me. From day one every scan was tilted slightly. It's not so bad that the text on the documents I scan gets cut off, but depending on what you scan, it may matter. Overall, I would recommend this scanner if you scan a lot of documents and you're not picky about the final image being tilted.