Fujitsu ScanSnap S300 Color Mobile Scanner

I have rarely been this excited and pleased with a piece of electronic equipment. This is, without doubt, one of the best office machine purchases I have ever made. ScanSnap was a 'snap' to set up and start using. It occupies otherwise unusable space on my desk, is simple to use (insert document, press button) and has worked flawlessly thus far. I've tested on color photos as well. 5x7 scanned to a 152kb PDF file and looks great. Business card scanning software works well too.

If I need to copy a document, I can scan and print right from my desk. If I need to scan and email, piece-of-cake two step process. Scan and store, just as simply. Only draw back is less exercise. No more trips to the central copy/fax/scanner to run a couple page job for me!

Best feature? It is small and light enough for me to carry along on road trips and can be powered from my notebook computer's USB port. With this, my notebook PC, portable printer and mobile broadband dongle I can load up the RV and still be a complete office almost anywhere.

I am a consultant and work out of my home office about 70% of the time. I deal alot with documents and purchased this scanner in hopes of getting a good scanner for the variety of documents that I handle almost daily. I am always converting the paper document to pdf. My objective was to reduce the size of my paper files, eliminate the need for a fax machine, and increased efficiency (example: sign agreement and immediately turn it around to conclude the deal). I am very happy to report the ScanSnap has exceeded my expectations in all categories. And I consider myself to be a tough judge. So let me provide some real-life experiences: (1) the scanner is very fast, (2) very small footprint, (3) so far it has successfully scanned all documents on first attempt in a wide variety of sizes and shapes and regardless of the number of pages (max so far: 20 at one feed). I have set it for the 2nd best scan resolution and find that is enough to provide very readable scans. The color is excellent too, showing the signature on documents in the blue ink I always use. The software provided is great and does what I need it to do. The ScanSnap is small enough that I would consider it to be portable, although I have not carried it with me to my clients locations. I run it using Vista Business on a Dell laptop and have had zero problems to date (about 7 months usage). I have had no contact with customer service. Highly recommended.

I did quite a bit of research before purchasing a mobile scanner. I work in the litigation support industry and my needs are not the same as the rest of the business community at large. For example, within the legal field, a tiff image is industry standard for legal support software. (ie Sanction II, Trial Director, Summation, Concordance.......and so on) My research turned up a total of 0 scanners that will scan to a tiff image with thier bundled software. So, I moved on to try and find a scanner with TWAIN dirvers to use in other scanning applications. My problem here was that at the time, none of these scanners had driver support for 64-bit operating systems. It seems I was stuck.

I chose to go with the Scansnap S300 because when I checked the manufacturer web site I found Windows 7 support drivers ready to go. My trade off with using this scanner is that I have to go through one more step to get to my desired tiff images. The bundled software will allow me to scan directly to Acrobat, although it is in a sort of "back door" approach. I can set a scan profile in the software management utility and have it scan to acrobat. So you do not open Acrobat, click "create new PDF from scanner" and go from there. Rather, you load your paper into the scanner, select your "PDF" scan profile, and press the button. Your paper is scanned and then opened in Acrobat. From here, as I have a full version of Acrobat and not just the reader, I can save my scan to a tiff image for my litigation support-ware. It is an extra step, but as I will list below, I am very pleased with this scanner thus far.

My Pros and cons are: Pros- Outstanding scan quality. Outstanding scan speeds. Document feeder that works very well. Windows 7 (64-bit) support and good instructions on how to properly load said drivers as they are not yet included on the packaged CD. Quiet operation. Design allows for easy cleaning of the scan lens and replacement of feed rollers. Color scans of photos look fantastic as well.

Cons- No TWAIN drivers, and in a call to customer support it does not seem likely there ever will be. Scanner needs separate connections for data and power. So you need to be near A/C power or tie up two usb ports on your computer.

My needs are different from the general business traveler so my review may not speak to very many. This scanner is an outstanding piece of gear and I am very glad I chose this one. On a side note, while poking around on the Fujitsu web site I came a across an offer for a free carrying case. I believe this offer expires soon, so check the web site for more details.

The ScanSnap S300 has been the best electronics purchase I've made in a very long time. I've eliminated all the random paper that tends to accumulate on a desk (and kitchen counter). What few bills I still receive in paper are now scanned and stored with the others electronically (originals shredded of course). When the kids bring home papers that need to be kept I now just keep them electronically. No more lost project papers.

I've been using it for about 2 weeks now. It's a fantastic tool to help you organize your desk and life plus it just works well. That seems like an obvious thing but far too often in the electronics world devices have bugs or irritating shortcomings. I haven't found any on the ScanSnap S300. The duplex scanning is amazing. It's easy to merge PDFs. It can handle most paper sizes. It doesn't jam. It even scans photos that are suitable for online use (Facebook, etc.) - I wouldn't recommend it for your permanent photo scanning unless you don't mind lower resolution scans. Keep in mind though, it's not intended for that. Oh yeah, and it's fast; it scans with an incredible, breath-taking, makes-you-want-to-scan-something-else-anything-else, "Top Gun" speed.

I basically bought this to help reduce the amount of paper in our home file cabinet. I've used it for about a month now - and it's been great. I appreciate the size (can just toss it in a desk drawer when not in use) and how simple it is to use (I use to be an "early adopter" kind of guy - now 4 kids later - I just want something that works quickly / as advertised). You just plug in the power cable and the usb cable / open the scanner / load your the items to scan / and push one button - then you get a pdf with a simple option to email it / or save it anywhere on your drives. The icon in the system tray makes it easy to switch any of the scanning features on / off. This is not what you want to buy if you need to scan 100 page legal documents (you can load about 15 pages at a time) - but if you just want to remove some clutter (think old bank statements, bills, receipts) from your regular household life - this will do the trick. Could type a lot more about the software, etc. - but really I never have that much time. :-)