ScanSnap iX1300 Compact Wireless or USB Double-Sided Color Document, Photo & Receipt Scanner with Auto Document Feeder and Manual Feeder for Mac or PC, Black

This scanner is amazing, so small yet can scan multiple items into your laptop or phone in seconds.

East to set up and nice and small but works fast.

I have been using Fujitsu scanners for years now but needed a new one to help me close up a house with thousands of documents and pictures. This machine is amazing. Such a tiny foot print yet handles large volumes of documents with ease. Printed documents go into the automatic document feeder. Irregular items like photographs and receipts are put in the front. Scanning is so far and the documents returned so efficiently. Creating new files is easy. With any other scanner cataloguing my files and possessions would have taken more than a week. With this machine it was all done in less than a day.

Snap Scan IX300. We bought this to digitize 40+ years of teaching notes, journals, letters and pictures. 30,000+ pages of all thickness and types of paper. I would by it again. It has good resolution. It can scan 2 sided which makes the process easy and quick. Autofeed and manual feed modes work great. The manual feed can take thicker stock and even cardboard backed pictures. There are problems with the auto feeder at times, but usually caused by it being overloaded, pages sticking or the guides not sized to fit the paper width.

Software is OK. Review the options to get full benefit. Resolution, single vs. Duplex scans and continuous scan settings are important to remember. Must change the settings when switching from photos to documents etc. I like the after scan edit ability to rotate, re-order or delete pages as needed.

I wish this had scratch resistent glass “lenses” The plastic lenses can scratch and the scratch lines show up in prints. That is why I gave it a 4 overall instead of 5. Avoid staples or other things that can scratch when going through. That is what happended with our scanner. A few staples got through and it is no longer suitable for most photos. It leaves lines in the photos. But we did get thousands of photos through before this happened. Still useful for documents and text. Learn how to correctly open and clear a jam, so you don’t scratch the lenses when removing a jam.

The wifi is OK, but for reliability when scanning more than a few minutes, I used the USB connection.

I have been buying, owning & operating tech gadgets since the late 70’s and this scanner ranks up there with the best on that list.

Just look at these features:
a) USB or Wi-Fi option
b) compact size – easy to pull out when needed and then store for later – not a lot of desk space
c) duplex scans of standard paper document in about 2 seconds each
d) duplex scans photos at 600dpi in about 5 seconds each
e) auto top feeder (about 10 sheets) or manual front feed

We have another brand’s multi-function color laser unit that we bought several years ago (for a good chunk of cash) which has served us well. However when the wife suggested we scan all our old photos (boxes & boxes of loose photos and shelves of photo albums) – I knew I was not going to spend years scanning two or three photos at a time with that thing’s flatbed scanner.

I read the reviews and most suggest another brand’s scanner that is almost twice the price of this one. I decided to take a chance and be a bit more thrifty and it has worked out more than I could have hoped for. Mostly that decision came down to this model’s manual front feeder.

In one week I have spent about 4 hours with this scanner and have scanned almost 1k photos. The most time-consuming part is taking the photos out of the albums. I just pop them in the front manual feeder and then let the scanner spit it back out where the photo then drops into a bin underneath for disposal – each photo takes about 5 seconds scanning at 600dpi and the quality is good enough (note: the quality really depends on how good the original photo looks. those old 70’s polaroid’s are not going to scan and then be able to printed at 24″x36″ size down the line – let’s be realistic – but they look good enough to me on the computer reviewing them afterwards).

My only wish is that it could scan at 1200dpi but that would certainly jack up the price. There are a few pictures which we put aside to scan with the multi-function scanner for this reason because those pictures have more sentimental value.

I had two occasions this past week needing to scan a full-size paper bill and decided to use this instead of the multi-function. It scans a piece of paper both-sides so fast that it is done before you blink.

The software is very basic but it is completely functional. Since this is just a scanner I am glad the software just concerns itself with the simple scan settings and not image manipulation or PDF editing. I have purpose-made software to do that other stuff.