Mac Forum / General / Hardware / September 2004

It's time to get a new scanner.  I have an old HP SCSI scanner that I've
been using on a G3 running OS 8.6.  My main machine for several years has
been a G4 with OS X.  The only thing that hasn't made the transition is the
scanner, and given the age of the scanner and the grinding noises it's
started making, it makes more sense to buy a new scanner than a SCSI card
for the G4 to run it.

What I'd like is a flatbed scanner than can handle US legal size paper and
has an auto document feeder.  I don't do tons of scanning since almost
everything I do starts as digital.  I don't need the highest quality.  I do
need to scan photos and drawings from time to time.  I need to use it as a
photo copier sometimes.  I'd prefer firewire since I have that already, but
I can add a USB 2 card easily enough.  While I'm not too concerned about
speed, scanning at USB 1 speeds seems like it would be painfully slow.
(I'm assuming any PCI USB 2.0 card should work in a Quicksilver?)

When walking through Staples, I saw a Microtek ScanMaker 5950 for $150.
the price is right for what I want to spend.  The feature set seems to be
what I want.  I have not tried using it and have not seen samples scanned
with it.  But assuming the quality is good, the only problem with it is
that it says "PC only."  Is there scanner software for OS X that will
recognize that scanner?  Would I lose any features by going with other
software?  Obviously I wouldn't be able to use the OCR software that comes
in the package, but I can't recall the last time I had any desire to do
OCR.  Is there another scanner in the same price range with the same or
better features?

Thanks for any recommendations.