[PADG:759] RE: ST200 microfilm/fiche/opaque card scanner

["Grant, Tyra" <tgrant@xxxxxx>]

Forwarding response to list (w/permission of author).
Tyra Grant

-----Original Message-----
From: Mary Stuart [mailto:m-stuart@xxxxxxxx]
Sent: Tuesday, November 29, 2005 5:35 PM
To: Grant, Tyra
Cc: Tom Teper
Subject: ST200


Dear Tyra,

Your note to the PADG list was forwarded to me by Tom Teper since we 
recently acquired four of the ST200s for the History, Philosophy and 
Newspaper Library.  We are very pleased with these viewer-scanners.  It 
took us a while to learn all the features, but now that we are 
relatively proficient, we're getting excellent results.  I should add 
that we've been amused to observe that anyone born after 1985 seems to 
understand instinctively how the S 200 operates; the students just sit 
down and start scanning and saving images, whereas the more "mature" 
staff had a much steeper learning curve.

We had our Systems Office install the ST200s for us, and although they 
were able to get them to work well, we later discovered, when the sales 
rep came to give us the official training, that several of the options 
had not been installed correctly, nor had they installed the proprietary 
software.  (You can use the proprietary software, Scan-Rite, or 
Photoshop Elements, or Adobe Acrobat, to scan the microform.)  Images 
can be saved to a CD or a flash drive, or you can e-mail them or print 
them out if the PCs are attached or networked to a printer.  Most of our 
users have been saving to a memory device.  We had a little difficulty 
setting up the e-mail capability because of internal security 
procedures, and it was also complicated setting up the capability to 
download to a campus online storage service, but all of those processes 
have been ironed out and now operate smoothly.

We've tested the new viewer scanners on some really terrible microfilm 
and have been able to improve the images significantly.  One of the 
faculty in our history department brought in some bad microfilm of 
Soviet newspapers, and we produced some legible images of material that 
had been illegible on traditional reader-printers.   I should add, 
however, that some of our patrons who have a lot of experience with 
reader-printers find that the scanning and saving is much more 
time-consuming than just sitting down at a reader-printer and making 
prints. 

This is a first-generation technology in a sense, and the ST200 looks 
like it was cobbled together from various machines.  There are no fewer 
than five power cords and at least as many on-off switches.  
Nonetheless, I would not hesitate to purchase one of these ST200s.  I 
would encourage you to pay for the installation and training from the 
authorized dealer.  I think that may have cost at least $300, but it was 
well worth it.

I hope this information is helpful!

Best regards,
Mary Stuart
History, Philosophy and Newspaper Librarian
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign