Epson Perfection 1640SU Photo Scanner

Rating:
Summary: Surprising
Review: After bad luck with a previous scanner (that was highly rated in a computer magazine for it's ability to scan negatives) and not wanting to spend $1000 for a scanner, I tried the 1640SU Photo, based on the great success I have had with Epson products the last 10 years. I was not disappointed.
It is set up for home use; my son does a lot of flatbed scanning of art and graphics work. I use it as an enlarger for the computer, and the results are fantastic. Black & white negatives, brand new or 50 years old; colour negatives, or odd size negatives from the old style films. The colour balance is great. Slides, which are hard for most scanners at this level, come out very well.
The machine and software are easy to use, I have had it interfaced with Windows 95, 98, and now a Mac G-4 with only one problem, which Epson support fixed fairly quickly for us with one phone call.
I just bought a second one for my son to take to college, got it at the Epson web site in the clearance section, refurbished by Epson factory with a guarantee.
Using Photoshop software, a Espon Stylus Photo 780 colour printer, this scanner, and I was amazed at the colour quality and clarity I produce on 8x14 prints. Viva Epson.

Rating:
Summary: Epson Perfection Applies to Epson Printers Only
Review: Epson Perfection 1640SU Photo Scanner

I have an old and trusty Nikon 1000 scanner that has done its duty by me for many years. However, I do a lot of medium and large format work and regret not having a more versatile film scanner. Unfortunately, the big scanners vary in cost from a bit too much to near extortion. Since my flatbed scanner was old and horrible I decided to look into buying one of the better scanners with a transparency head. After a great deal of dithering I settled on the Epson 1640 SU.

Drivers are available for Windows 95, 98, ME, 2000 and NT 4.0 I installed into my Win 98 machine with minimal effort, using the USB interface. I went from box to up and running in less than a half hour. The transparency head comes in it's own storage case with a set of film holders for standard film sizes (35mm, 120mm and 4x5, and another for doing Epson instant photo prints). It rests on the scanning glass, so it takes all of 5 seconds to install.

Accompanying Epson software includes TWAIN drivers, Smart Panel (an easy scan and save interface), and Film Factory Lite (home photo management software). Also included are Adobe PhotoDeluxe and Photoshop 5.0 LE. Since I have the Adobe profession products on my system I did not load these, but they are accepted standards. I did load Scansoft TextBridge Pro, a very nice optical character recognition package. Also included are some ArcSoft utilities and a special offer for Monaco Systems color matching software. This makes a package deal which is only exceeded by HP's top of the line scanner, which costs almost twice as much and has less scanning power.

I used a negative from my old Hasselblad with a 150mm lens. I scanned the entire negative at 3600 dpi at the 14 bit black and white setting. File size was 98.87mb and it took about 2.25 minutes to scan. I scanned the image directly into Photoshop 6.0. Resolution and image tonal range was excellent, and extreme enlargement showed image breakdown to be very slow. For my kind of work, the digital image was nearly equivalent to a photographic image. I would rate this as excellent, unexpectedly good for a general purpose scanner.

35mm slide scanning is not as good though. The thickness of the slide makes focus a bit softer and there is no holder for slides. I recommend removing the slide from the paper mount and putting it in the 35mm film holder. Then remount the slide in a plastic, reusable mount. Scanning this way, you get an image that is every bit as good as the 120 image. 4x5 scanning is also great, but you need to watch your file size. Use the provided film holders whenever possible. They take a lot of the trickiness out of the process.

The TWAIN interface is a bit complicated. They have taken the liberty of simplifying operation for the photographer or home user who is uncomfortable with scanning technology. This is all well and good, but once you've got your feet wet and are ready to take direct control the interface feels a bit clumsy. Don't get me wrong, you can do just about anything you want at the scanning point, just expect to have to spend a bit of time with the advanced manuals on the CD.

This scanner is perfect for the amateur or professional photographer who has high standards but lacks the budget for exotic equipment. It is extremely well built and easy to use. With its high resolution it should perform satisfactorily for many years to come.

Rating:
Summary: A Professional Scanning Instrument at an Accessible Price
Review: Epson Perfection 1640SU Photo Scanner

I have an old and trusty Nikon 1000 scanner that has done its duty by me for many years. However, I do a lot of medium and large format work and regret not having a more versatile film scanner. Unfortunately, the big scanners vary in cost from a bit too much to near extortion. Since my flatbed scanner was old and horrible I decided to look into buying one of the better scanners with a transparency head. After a great deal of dithering I settled on the Epson 1640 SU.

Drivers are available for Windows 95, 98, ME, 2000 and NT 4.0 I installed into my Win 98 machine with minimal effort, using the USB interface. I went from box to up and running in less than a half hour. The transparency head comes in it's own storage case with a set of film holders for standard film sizes (35mm, 120mm and 4x5, and another for doing Epson instant photo prints). It rests on the scanning glass, so it takes all of 5 seconds to install.

Accompanying Epson software includes TWAIN drivers, Smart Panel (an easy scan and save interface), and Film Factory Lite (home photo management software). Also included are Adobe PhotoDeluxe and Photoshop 5.0 LE. Since I have the Adobe profession products on my system I did not load these, but they are accepted standards. I did load Scansoft TextBridge Pro, a very nice optical character recognition package. Also included are some ArcSoft utilities and a special offer for Monaco Systems color matching software. This makes a package deal which is only exceeded by HP's top of the line scanner, which costs almost twice as much and has less scanning power.

I used a negative from my old Hasselblad with a 150mm lens. I scanned the entire negative at 3600 dpi at the 14 bit black and white setting. File size was 98.87mb and it took about 2.25 minutes to scan. I scanned the image directly into Photoshop 6.0. Resolution and image tonal range was excellent, and extreme enlargement showed image breakdown to be very slow. For my kind of work, the digital image was nearly equivalent to a photographic image. I would rate this as excellent, unexpectedly good for a general purpose scanner.

35mm slide scanning is not as good though. The thickness of the slide makes focus a bit softer and there is no holder for slides. I recommend removing the slide from the paper mount and putting it in the 35mm film holder. Then remount the slide in a plastic, reusable mount. Scanning this way, you get an image that is every bit as good as the 120 image. 4x5 scanning is also great, but you need to watch your file size. Use the provided film holders whenever possible. They take a lot of the trickiness out of the process.

The TWAIN interface is a bit complicated. They have taken the liberty of simplifying operation for the photographer or home user who is uncomfortable with scanning technology. This is all well and good, but once you've got your feet wet and are ready to take direct control the interface feels a bit clumsy. Don't get me wrong, you can do just about anything you want at the scanning point, just expect to have to spend a bit of time with the advanced manuals on the CD.

This scanner is perfect for the amateur or professional photographer who has high standards but lacks the budget for exotic equipment. It is extremely well built and easy to use. With its high resolution it should perform satisfactorily for many years to come.

Rating:
Summary: I love it!!! so clean so fast...so quiet
Review: I am no techie by any stretch of the word, but anything that is quick simple easy and fast, I will take. My hubby purchased the scanner for us to scan our wedding pix and in no time I had scanned over 100 pictures. It is quick and quiet, I did not have to crop, lighten, clean up not one single picture. I have recommended this scanner to a lot of my friends. I don't think the software that comes with it is easy to use so my hubby has us using Photoshop, which is just fine by me. I say get it, worth every penny

Rating:
Summary: amazing scanner for old slides!
Review: I hesitated a long time before buying this scanner, because it's very hard to know what quality, what definition one needs to get good prints from slides.
This scanner is easy to install, easy to use. For slides, you must use the Twain 5 option in your Twain menu, but everything is very intuitive and you'll find the learning curve quite smooth.
If you are looking to scan slides so that family memories, etc... are not lost, then this scanner is very very good quality for money, the prints you'll get ( with an epson 890 photo printer, it works wonders) are very good. obviously, we are talking of amateur photography here, I guess a professionnal who sells his photographs would want something with extra-definition.
So if you want to be amazed and moved, to rediscover the past... go for it!

Rating:
Summary: Great scanner...well worth it!
Review: I purchased this scanner at the end of May...and have been using it since then with great results -- I scan photos mostly, but have also spent a lot of time recently with slides, many of which I took more than 25 years ago -- Just yesterday, I used the transparency adapter to work with a friend's slides from almost 40 years ago -- I used the 1200 dpi setting, then previewed, cropped, and scanned...after which I printed the results on the Espson 1280 -- My friend was extremely pleased with the prints -- I rarely use the maximum of 3200...mostly I use the 800 or 1200 dpi and never have the results been disappointing -- The setup was easy, the software installed without a hitch, the scanner works relatively quickly and very, I consider, quite professionally --I think it's a great scanner.

Rating:
Summary: Epson Photo 1640 SU
Review: The Epson Perfection Photo 1640SU is an excellent scanner. Although a bit more pricey than other home scanners, its resolution is unrivaled for the price. I like the one-button scanning it provides. The setup and software are easy. The automatic scanning modes are wonderful and do a great job, however, I like scanning from the TWAIN software from Photoshop because of the customizability it provides. The photo attachment was really surprising to me in the resolution that it provides. I have scanned 35 mm negatives and enlarged them to 5 x 7 inch prints; these prints look like photographs. I even did an 8x10 inch photo enlargement. The photo looks great on the monitor, however, it took forever to do any manipulations. This was not the fault of the scanner, but rather due to the large size of the file (which was around 700 Mbytes). It ended up crashing my computer. I will stick to 5x7 inch prints or use lower resolution scanning in the future.

I especially like the on-off switch on the front of the scanner; my previous scanner did not have this item. I have scanned many photographs now and have acheived magnificent results. This is a scanner that can do routine jobs but also specialized business-quality scanning. Thank you Epson!

Rating:
Summary: Epson Photo 1640 SU
Review: The Epson Perfection Photo 1640SU is an excellent scanner. Although a bit more pricey than other home scanners, its resolution is unrivaled for the price. I like the one-button scanning it provides. The setup and software are easy. The automatic scanning modes are wonderful and do a great job, however, I like scanning from the TWAIN software from Photoshop because of the customizability it provides. The photo attachment was really surprising to me in the resolution that it provides. I have scanned 35 mm negatives and enlarged them to 5 x 7 inch prints; these prints look like photographs. I even did an 8x10 inch photo enlargement. The photo looks great on the monitor, however, it took forever to do any manipulations. This was not the fault of the scanner, but rather due to the large size of the file (which was around 700 Mbytes). It ended up crashing my computer. I will stick to 5x7 inch prints or use lower resolution scanning in the future.

I especially like the on-off switch on the front of the scanner; my previous scanner did not have this item. I have scanned many photographs now and have acheived magnificent results. This is a scanner that can do routine jobs but also specialized business-quality scanning. Thank you Epson!

Rating:
Summary: Epson Perfection Applies to Epson Printers Only
Review: This scanner is basically very good. The only problem I have is that of the Epson Smart Panel software. The features of this scanner software includes the ability to do the following:

1. Scan to Email 2. Scan to OCR 3. Scan for Creativity 4. Scan to Application 5. Copy 6. Photo Print

I had no problems with items number 1 - 4. The copy feature did not work and kept giving me error messages. I searched the internet and found a fix that when downloaded, resolved the copy problem.

The Photo Print feature which I was quite interested in, did not work at all. I referred to the user manual and discovered that this feature will only work for Epson Printers. If I had know this initially, I probably would have bought another scanner.

I guess I can't complain since 5 out of the 6 options work. I have since used another application that works with this scanner to fix and resize photos.