The killer "shoebox scanner" you can't buy

Wouldn’t it be great if there were a desktop scanner that could, in a few hours,  digitize all the old snapshots you keep in that shoebox in your closet? I talked about it with my co-workers in our podcast because I’d heard pre-PMA rumors about such a device. But I was still surprised to find it in plain sight on the PMA07 show floor yesterday. It’s called the Kodak i1210.   

What makes this scanner different than the ones in Staples is that, unlike a flatbed scanner on which you must carefully place a small group photos side by side, this baby has an automatic document feeder into which you can place a healthy batch of photos of various sizes all at once. It scans up to 30 letter-sized documents per minute at 200 dpi, a decent resolution for snapshots. (At higher resolution, the rate drops a bit but it’s still miles ahead of a flatbed scanner in terms of convenience.) And you can keep adding snapshots as scanning proceeds.

I watched the woman at the booth scan the three photos shown in the picture I snapped from the show floor and posted for this blog. (Click the thumbnail image for a larger view.) The photos went through the scanner in just a few seconds. And should an occasional snapshot go through slightly askew, the scanning software will rotate the digitized image so it looks like you fed it in perfectly straight. Kind of like orthodontia for snapshots.

So let’s see: Thirty per minute times 60 equals…1,800 per hour! That’s overly optimistic, especially since Kodak’s recommended daily volume is 1,500 pages. Still, even if you scan in a mere 500 in an evening, how long would it take to put your family’s entire history on a DVD that you could then duplicate for all your relatives? Less than a week?

So what’s the catch? Well, the cheapest version of the i1210 (which scans only one-sided documents) costs $799. Pricey, but about the same as Epson’s priciest flatbed scanner.

And you can get 500 or more photos scanned for 39 cents each at DigMyPics.com or up to 1,000 scanned for $49.95 at www.ScanMyPhotos.com But with those kinds of services, you must ship your precious photos through the mail and hope they don't get lost.

Why Kodak won't sell you one

The i1210’s price is moot for now because Kodak won’t sell it to consumers. They won’t even sell it to someone else to sell to consumers. This is strictly a product for business use. After chatting with some of Kodak's executives at PMA07, I think I understand their business strategy. They’d rather a consumer pay for scanning services and buy lots of the profitable goodies that go with it — such as photo books and mugs — than own his or her own “printing press.” Sounds a lot like what Kodak’s business model used to be in the film days, before cheap inkjet printers freed us all from paying for developing and printing billions of snapshots we didn’t want, on top of the ones we liked.

It’s particularly ironic that Kodak should be treating consumers this way, because the company just took an opposite, pro-consumer approach in entering the inkjet printer market with consumables priced below entrenched players like Canon, Epson, and HP. A Kodak exec told me that they took this approach because their research showed that pricey ink was one of consumers’ biggest gripes about inkjet printers. I guess when you’re a newcomer to a market, it’s good business to put the consumer first, but when you’re established in one, you can take a “what’s good for us is good for the consumer” approach.

Still, now that the scanner is out of the bag, so to speak, isn’t only a matter of time before HP or Epson or some other scanner maker brings out a product so many of us would love to have and, eventually, gets the price down to $100 to $200? The history of the technology market indicates that this is inevitable. It’s just not clear how long we will have to drool over the Kodak i1210 before someone liberates all those shoeboxes in our closets.

-- Jeff Fox, Technology Editor

Comments

[Printing Division]

We picked up one of these at my work to scan stacks of invitations and stationery that need product images added to our website, and I've been experiencing issues that concur with the first few comments about red and green streaks appearing on the image. Don't get me wrong, the volume it can handle beats a flatbed hands down, but the quality just isn't there yet. Which is probably why they are mainly intended for businesses scanning documents that aren't worried about the image quality.

The images aren't as crisp as I'd like (like high-speed photography on sub-par cameras), and I'm continually cleaning those streaks with the clone and heal brushes. Also, the scans tend to have inconsistent lighting with a light red/pink hue around the edges that require color correction if you're a stickler for quality images. In my opinion, if you value quality over time saved, stick with a flatbed.

[Charlie]

I have fixed the scratching problem on glossy photos, but I am getting way too many red and green lines running down the images. This makes it most difficult when trying to scan large quantities of photos. Does anyone know of software that can fix or reduce these lines. I belive it it is just dust or debris that is stuck on the scanning glass, even though I clean and dust off the photos/scanner religiously. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Buckpres2000@yahoo.com

[Billthescanner]

I just purchased this i1220 scanner and I'm attempting to use it to scan in all my family's photos. I fixed the problem caused by the feeder scratching the photos but random green/red/blue lines still appear on the photo files once in a while. Is there some modification I can do to the scanner to fix this?

Thanks!

[Lori Rupp]

Great scanner but not really for the consumer. The scanner needs modifications in order to scan photos correctly. For the price and the effort to modify I don't see that this is for the general consumer.

[Cam Phone Guy]

Just looked at your photo and that's an i1220 that can scan both sides- and as mentioned it's set to scan 'top'- thus the photos are 'face up' not 'face down'.

[Cam Phone Guy]

The scanner you really want is the i1220 as it scans both sides. Why scan both sides for photos? Dust falls on the lower surface all the time so we set these scanners to scan the top only!
I would image that a consumer could buy one but the duplex scanner lists for closer to $1,000. And it needs modifications to correctly scan photos. The folks at scanmyphotos.com use a $40,000 Kodak scanner that can scan a thousand photos while you go get a Starbucks and be done before you are with that latte!
You can find a local lab with one of these scanners by searching for a lab at ipiphoto.com. We have purchased about 200 nation-wide. I don't know that Walgreens is testing these- they've tried a different one that is NOT working out. Kodak is building a different version for mass marketers that don't have the staff to figure these out- or even let customers do their own but from what I've seen it's best to let someone else do it as it is possible to damage your photos if you're not careful. Qualified users have no problem with the scanners.
Now we wish someone would invent one for slides and negs that was this fast and easy to use!

[Jim]

you kind find these scanners everywhere http://www.superwarehouse.com/Kodak_i1210_Flatbed_Scanner/1012434/p/1488088

[Ruairi Fox]

This scanner is being tested at a few Walgreens stores throughout the country, or that's what we were told in our last photo newsletter. That means it is still a year or two away from hitting every store assuming the test goes well. Apparently, according to Walgreens employees whose store is testing the scanner, there are occasional problems with the auto-feed.