Polaroid SprintScan 35 LE

I bought used scaner and I found it povides reasonable quality for reasonable price. Software works nice on my Mac 7600, but typically crashes low-cost Windows 98 P233 computer with system reboot. Pentium III system works fine with the same memory capacity and same Adaptec 2940 SCSI adapter.

Sharp scans, exellent color correction features with new PolaColor Insight 4 driver (esp. for negatives). Mutch better that earlier versions of Polaroid scanner software I try to use. SS 35/LE uses the same engine with Microtek Scan Maker 35t+ (as well as other Polaroid scanners have lower-costs Microtek "brothers")

Poor dinamic range, noise and linear artefacts in dark areas of negatives (or bright areas of pictures) in Blue channel. (Maybe CCD sensor corrupted and needs to be changed).

Agfa and Umax top flatbeds w/transp. adapters

N/a in Russia outside Moscow

Didn't work out of the box and had to send it to Polaroid to get a firmware update. When I got it back the Polacolor software could only produce horribly grainy and garishly colored scans on slides -- it could not even translate negs. Switched to Vuescan but and got grainy but still unacceptable scans. Would not give me good neg scans. Called Polaroid and they insisted Polacolor should work. After two months of frustration and not even one good scan, I threw it away and bought an Acer Scanwit 2720s, which ended up being everything I though the Polaroid was going to be, except at half the cost. Would never buy another Polaroid scanner of any type after this experience.

none that I could figure out

scanning negs and slides

Acer Scanwit 2720s
various flatbeds

responsive but unable to help

It worked fine until the streaks appeared - not hair on the bulb, not crap on the bulb, something in the scanning mechanism - they knew what it was. My advice is this: don;t buy a Polaroid! You get what you pay for, so if you want a reasonably good scanner that will last less than three years (probably) go for it. If not, look elsewhere. Me? I'm not really bitter, just trying to save you the hassle...

Easy to set up
Software user friendly
Good scans when working!

The motherloving thing produces great big streaks all over my nice colour pics!!!

Selling it for scrap, buying a Nikon Coolscan like I shoulda done in the first place...

Free (UK) but they identified problem, but fix was to buy a new unit at moderate discount. Minw was out of warranty ny six months. Unacceptable.

Unit was reasonable in price at the time (several years ago) and did many scans over the years.

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Had this unit now for several years, scanning slides into Photoshop for 8x10 printing. Initially the software worked reasonably well with several phone calls to Polaroid. Twain was very fussy. Moved the unit to another computer Win98SE and got into a world of Twain problems. The old SprintScan software used to allow 800% enlargement to print (about 45 mb for 8x10) but the Twain would not work happily with Win98SE. Polaroid was promoting Polascan, but this would only allow resolutions for low-end inkjet printing and not the 800% enlargement I was used to.
Finally I went to Vuescan, which seems to be such a simple program to install (without Twain). Vuescan is plain-jane and I used it only to do raw scans to be dealt with in Photoshop. The old SprintScan software would have been preferable to me, but I just could not get it to work. That's the end of the software story.
I just had a harware problem, though, I was contendly scanning away when the Fluorescent tube quit. I tried the spare tube, no. I went to the manual: disconnected the computer, switched SCSI id to 7. Turned power on: the unit cycled as expected, ie there was power in the unit. I took the unit apart. Fuse is OK, no power to the tube terminals. No power to the little fluorescent-tube board, no power from the main power supply board. What to do? Phone Polaroid???

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Initially Polaroid had very good phone service where the TECKIES spent long phone calls walking me through ASPI and all. But now I guess the unit is so old that Polaroid wants you to pay for phone calls, or even better buy the new units.

I have had the scanner for 2 years, but have only used it occasionally. It stopping working mid-scan recently, and I couldn't get it to work again. (I checked everything, I can't list it all here) Anyway, customer support charged me $42.00 for the the call (It's out of warranty), and they determined that something was indeed wrong with the scanner. They said that they would charge $125.00 just to look at it, and any repair would be in the range of $400.00 to $600.00. The scanner was used less than 20 hours total, and very well cared for (under a dustcover in an air-conditioned closet). I don't think I'm going to send it in for repair, I'm going to buy another brand.

Very good quality scans. The new v. 4.51 software is a massive improvement.

Broke after less than 20 hours use.

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Expensive.