RE: Epson Perfection 2450 Photo scanner

[Markus Berheide <berheide@ridgefield.sdr.slb.com>]

Bill,

         I just bought one a couple of days ago. I have just scanned a few 
negs and slides, but my first impression was fairly positive on the way its 
built and not so positive as far as speed goes. The scanner has a metal 
base-plate in contrast to many cheap scanners. It does have a large 
(supposedly 4"X9") evenly illuminated light source for scanning 
transparencies. However, it is very slow with my setup scanning 
transparencies: USB, 450MHz Pentium II, 96MB RAM using SilverFast SE into 
Photoshop LE.  One negative - not a whole strip - at 2400 dpi resolution 
took 10 minutes to scan. I have yet to find out if it is the hardware or 
just some software/filtering that slows it down so much. My dedicated film 
scanner (HP-S20) is certainly a bit faster. I could be that it is the 
extended, but fairly dim light source in a flatbed in contrast to a much 
more focused light source in a film scanner. The results of the scan were 
acceptable and almost better than I expected from a flatbed scanner. 
However, I cannot really comment on the resolution yet, but I think the 
2400 dpi are exaggerated. I have yet to scan the same slide on both the 
Epson and my HP-S20 to compare. However, if you see that Epson also sells 
flatbed scanners for 5-10 times the price with less resolution than the 
Perfection2450 you start wondering how they come up with the resolution 
numbers.

If you want to buy it to make quick contact sheets from your negatives, I 
am not sure if this is the solution. If you buy it to do the occasional 
scan of a medium or large format neg and don't want to spend more money for 
a multiformat film scanner I think this is o.k.. For the price you cannot 
expect to much, since it is still cheaper than almost any film scanner and 
gives the additional options of scanning larger formats and photos. It also 
comes with Silverfast SE (~$45 list) and Photoshop Elements (~$99 list). 
Furthermore, it came with the option to buy PhotoShop 6.0 for $299 if you 
return Elements.

I will keep it because it allows me to scan some larger format negatives I 
have and it can at the same time replace my older flatbed scanner so I can 
finally get rid of the SCSI card in my computer.

Greetings,
Markus

At 02:27 AM 11/18/2001 -0600, you wrote:
>From: "Bill Jackson" <billjacksondesign@earthlink.net>
>
>Does anyone have any experience with this scanner? Any reviews yet?
>The Epson site spec sheet claims-
>48bit- 2400 x 4800dpi- with "micro drive Technology"
>"color maxtrix ccd line sensor"-3.3 dmax
>8.5 x 11.7 scanning area with 4 x 9 transparency adapter-
>(I suspect it's a dual lens setup with 2400 x 4800 in the 4 x 9 area)
>firewire and usb
>Silverfast SE
>List-$399.00
>Could this be any good?
>
>Bill Jackson

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