Hardware Review of:
EPSON Perfection 
1200U 

Packed with the scanner is one USB cable, one power cord, CDs for PC and Macintosh and a 104 page manual. My recommendation is to follow the manual explicitly until what you see on the screen doesn’’t match what is on the page. Then bumbling around, instinct and the force will eventually get you through. Manufacturers don’’t revise manuals every time they make changes to the software. The software CD-ROM contains the Epson TWAIN driver that tells everything to work. Included is Adobe PhotoDeluxe Business Edition 1.0 (Windows) or Adobe PhotoDeluxe version 2.0 (Macintosh). Broderbund PrintShop PressWriter has built-in templates to aid in creating newsletters, brochures and such. NewSoft Presto! PageManager for Epson enables one to use the scanner’’s Start button and Optical Character Recognition feature. And ArcSoft Photo Printer, a photo layout program that allows one to create multiple photo montages and calendars and such. 

Instructions in the Scanner Basics manual on setting up your scanner is thorough. One of the key items is to use a coin to unlock the transportation lock on the side of the scanner. If you can only remember one thing, make it remembering to turn on the scanner before you turn on your computer. That’’s the way your computer will recognize it has an appendage. My computer tower has two USB sockets and a cord to plug into one of them to effect a hub. The hub is intended to provide four more USB sockets. The bad news is they are useless as far as I can determine. I have a USB printer, a USB CD burner and this USB scanner. One manual and one technical support person have stated their equipment won’’t work when plugged into hub sockets. These gadgets were engineered to be plugged into the computer, not an extension cord. Well, not to worry. I keep my printer plugged into one USB socket all the time. I plug and unplug the CD burner or Epson scanner, whichever I intend to use. No adjustments are necessary. To confuse things, in order to use my printer, I need to turn it on AFTER I turn the computer on. If you have the ability to walk and chew gum at the same time, these little ideosyncracies will be easy to overcome. 

Can you spell inexplicable without looking it up? (What I can’’t understand is if you can’’t spell a word, how can you find it in the dictionary to check the spelling?) Well, anyway, one problem I experienced with my scanner is that after a few uses, it wouldn’’t work. Little messages would appear saying it couldn’’t find the scanner and all sorts of wierd warnings. I uninstalled the scanner and then re-installed it. After which it would work a few times and then went back to lalaland. In frustration and desperation I searched somewhere in the readme files and somewhere there was a reference to the possible incompatibility of Adobe PhotoDeluxe Home Edition with the Adobe PhotoShop Business Edition. (I had written a review on Home Edition for PC Alamode and had left it on my hard drive.) I uninstalled Home Edition and have not had any more difficulties since. 

System requirements for Windows 98: an IBM compatible PC with a 486/66 MHz or faster processor, 16MB Ram (32MB recommended), 50MB available hard disk space, available built-in USB port, CD-ROM drive, mouse or pointing device, VGA or higher resolution monitor with 640x480 resolution (800x600 or higher recommended) and 256 colors (65,000 colors or more recommended). 

System requirements for Mcintosh: iMac or Power Macintosh G3 with built-in USB port, System 8.1 or later (iMac), System 8.5.1 or later (Power Macintosh G3). If your system is running OS 8.1, you must download and install the iMac Update 1.0 from Apple at http://swupdates.info.apple.com before you install the Epson USB software. Contact Apple Cpmputer if you have problems installing this update. If your system is running OS 8.5 or later, you do not need to download and install the update. Your operating system already includes full support for the Epson USB software. Also: 32 MB RAM (64 MB recommended), at least 50 MB available hard disk space, CD-Rom drive, mouse or pointing device and VGA color monitor with 640x480 screen resolution (or higher recommended) and 256 colors (32,000 colors or more recommended). So who’’s counting? 

Installation of the scanner software begins with turning on the scanner, then turning on your computer. If you haven’’t been paying attention and have turned the computer on first, then click on Start and shut down your computer. Make sure the scanner is on, then turn your computer back on. Usually a message then appears indicating your system has detected new hardware and the Add New Hardware Wizard appears. Insert the scanner software CD-ROM in the CD-ROM drive and click Next and you should be on your way. The tricky part for me was specifying a location to find the drivers. If you have difficulty, follow a trail of cheetoes and solicit help from your guru. The key to it is finding the /Win98 folder. 

There are detailed instructions on installing Macintosh software. It’’s in English, but it’’s Greek to me. Just know that if you buy the gadget, the manual explains everything. (I have never even touched a Macintosh except to eat one.) When you double click on the PhotoDeluxe icon on your desktop, the software format appears. Along with the familiar tool bar at the top of the screen will appear these boxes: Get and Fix Photo (My Photos, open file, digital camera, scanners); Special Effects (Artistic, transform, collage, cool, elegant); Projects (Business cards, web forms, promote, presentations); Internet (My connectables and other guided activities); Send and Save (to disk, printer, email/web, to applications); advanced (edit tools, rotate, size, touch up, repair, effects). 

For example: click on PhotoDeluxe icon, click on Get Photo, click on Scanners, click on Mode tab, click on Guided, click on Printed Document, click on Sizing, click on Original 100%, click on Type: Color Photo, click on Scan tab. Place item to be scanned on the scanner glass, close top and click scan and sit back...you have scanned your first scan. Click Done and admire your handiwork. 

Now is the time to go to the tool bar and click on File and when the drop down menu appears, click Save As. You will have a choice of PhotoDeluxe, Acrobat PDF file, Index color file, Grayscale file, JPEG file, GIF89a Export and Other. Click on JPEG file. This changes the PDD file you get from scanning to the workable JPEG file. This should put your image in My Documents. Go to Start, click on Documents, click on My Documents at the top, find your document and left click once on it and the thumbnail appears and indicates the file size. If your intention is to print your image, then proceed. If you plan to email the image, it needs to be approximately 50 KB in size or you will have to use a whole jar of vasoline to get it through the email lines. (A little humor there for you serious ones who might just take the vasoline bit literally.) If you have an image manipulation program, use it to reduce resolution. 

Another way to reduce image resolution is in the PhotoDeluxe program. Starting with your desktop screen, double click in the PhotoDeluxe icon. When the program appears, in the upper left you’’ll see SEND & SAVE. Click on it and then click on the EMAIL/WEB tab. Click EMAIL, click TRIM, click OK, click SIZE (they say it’’s optional, but it isn’’t, because you have to click on the SIZE tab to get to REDUCE). Click on REDUCE and by clicking on Reduce Resolution it will convert your image resolution to 72 dots per inch. Click on Mail and then click on JPEG format which will transform your image to one that almost any emailee can open. 

Optical Character Recognition is included with Presto! PageManager which is for image manipulation. PageManager even has its own icon on the desktop. 

I scanned a typewritten page that had copy about 1/3 of the top of the 8/1/2 x 11 sheet and the scanner apparently sensed it. The resulting scan was sort of short sheeted, because a few of the bottom lines were not shown. I could not find it in the trouble shooting or readme areas, so I went to the Epson Technical Support website: www.epson.com and emailed my request for information. Somewhere in the manual Epson states an approximate two working days reply time. About a week later the reply came requesting a soil sample or something like that. 

Epson offers a Transparency Unit for the 1200U. It replaces the regular lid and includes film holders for 35mm to 4x5 inch transparencies. Street price for the Transparency Unit is about $85. Hint: not having the device, I just placed twenty of my 35mm slides on the glass, scanned and printed a quickie proof sheet. 

I’’m satisfied so far with my Epson Perfection 1200U Color Scanner. It is my first flatbed scanner. I chose not to take a chance on one of those $50 wonders.