a review by Tom Piper
Being able to capture images from books, newspapers, magazines and other paper media has long been a challenge, particularly when you are always on the go. Now, there is a terrific solution which is handy and effective.
IRIS Products & Technologies recently produced the IRIScan Book 2 which scan everywhere without a computer. It will easily capture images from books, magazines, letters, receipts, bills, handwritten correspondence, photos, and so much more. This cool little device will scan anything, wherever you are and benefit from the best scanning quality (from 300 to 600 dpi, monochrome or color), which means you can forget your laborious retyping work.
Once an image is recorded, Readiris Pro 12 (powerful OCR software designed for businesses) will automatically convert your paper documents and image files into text files which you can edit and share. This will save an incredible amount of time when converting any paper document, PDF, or image files into digital files that you can edit, index and share using the SmartTasks buttons to scan, recognize, convert and archive all your documents in just a single click. You can automatically send the recognized document into your favorite application like Word, Excel, and Acrobat with supported formats of Word 2007 (DOCX), OpenOffice Document (ODT), and XML Paper Specification (XPS).
Readiris Pro opens the most popular images formats (JPEG, BMP, TIFF) and PDF files and supports the compression formats DjVu and JPEG 2000 and easily handles multi-page documents such as TIFF or PDF file. You can even automatically send them by email as attachments, as well as despeckle, text/picture deskew, automatic page orientation detection, cleanup the image noise, improve the image colors, use the unique handprinted notes recognition feature (to transform your notes into editable text) and more.
A Micro SD memory card is included to which you can export your scanned documents to your iPad (assuming you have an SD card reader), mobile phone, smartphone, notebook, and other devices. Using the more advanced IRIScan Book 2 Executive, your scans even be saved automatically and ready to be shared via Bluetooth.
Its easy enough to use . . . just hold down the SCAN button for two seconds to turn it on, click the DPI button for either 300 or 600 dpi (shown on LCD screen), click on C/BW for either color or black & white (presets may already be what you want), tap the SCAN button to start scan (green light turns on), slowly and steadily guide the unit across the scan area, and finally tap the SCAN button again to stop the process. Attach the USB cable to your computer (iPhoto will automatically pop-up, just like for a camera), then either save the file to your photo collection, drag into the folder of your choice, or use Readiris Pro to OCR and manipulate the image. In spite of its ease-of-use, I recommend that you use a firm and steady “drag” of the device across the paper to avoid any skidding (a problem on slick surfaces) which will distort the outcome. With a little practice, the results will be great.
The boxed package is very complete including the IRIScan Book 2 unit, Readiris Pro 12 software for the IRIScan Book 2, a free 2GB SD Card, a black flexible case, two AA alkaline batteries (IRIScan Book 2 only) or a 4.2 V rechargeable lithium polymer battery (IRIScan Book 2 Executive only), switching adaptor (CEE 7/16) European plug (IRIScan Book 2 Executive only), USB Cable, cleaning swab cloth, and a calibration sheet. Minimum system requirements for Mac OS are a USB Host port (USB 1.1 or 2.0), USB mass storage protocol, aMac computer with at least a G4 processor, 260 MB free disk space, a DVD-ROM drive and free USB port, and MAC OSX version 10.4 or higher.
I have acquired over the years many IRIS products including their IRIScan 2, IRIScan Anywhere 2, IRISPen, IRIScard, and CARDiris. Their scanning and optical character recognition software has always been excellent, and their products are very reliable.
IRIS have many scanning-related products which can be seen at http://www.irislink.com. This IRISscan Book 2 can be purchased online for $129, plus shipping of less than $10 (the Executive model with rechargeable battery and Bluetooth connectivity is $199).
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