Pandigital Personal Photo Scanner/Converter, White (PANSCN06)

I came across this product when I purchased Pandigital's 10" digital frame. I have 2,500+ photos - ancestory and my family back to 1972, and old/new family records as well. Scanning on my printer/scanner is a pain. Launch the software, open the lid, ,close the lid, scan the photo/document, open the lid, repeat process, etc. Very time consuming. So this product seemed like it would fit the bill. I read the reviews on Amazon, ordered, and off we go.Product arrived, everything in the box. Mine came with a 512MB SD card. Breezed thru the owners manual, plugged it in, and powered it up. Instructions stated the SCAN2PC software is on the SD card. NOT. When I put the SD card in my PC it stated that the card needed to be formatted as well. So I went with the offline scans - just scanner and SD card.I decided to do some tests 1st before I got serious. I scanned about 15 items of various sizes - black/white, color, and documents. I scanned at both 300 and 600 dpi. At 300 dpi each scan is about 3 seconds - twice that for 600 dpi. Loaded up on my PC and found no appreciable difference, same for the documents, when viewing. Then I plugged the SD card into the digital frame. Again no difference I could tell when viewing. Based on the test, I scanned everything at 300 bpi.I also did not use the plastic sleeve which would have really slowed the process. I scan about 100 at a time, plug the SD card in my PC, copy up, and edit from there. You will get the hang of scanning old black/white that are curled. I also wiped the black/whites with a microfiber cloth prior to scanning. The cleaning swab works well and gets dirty fast especialy on the B/W's. I just clean it at the end of the day with a damp cloth and mild soap - good as new when it dries. I also use an air duster with the cleaning swab. I have had only 2 photos come thru with a line on them. Not an issue.Before I load them on the digital frame, I resize them all down to 800 x 600 (I use Windows 7). This makes them load faster and significantly reduces the size and does not affect the viewing quality. The total 3,900 photos (about 4.6 GB raw) shrink down to just 403 MB. Thats about a 10 to 1 reduction in size.I have scanned all the family documents - ancestor birth/death cerficates, marriage licenses, wake cards, letters, notes, school records, etc. (this stuff goes back to 1860). Also scanned all my family's documents as well. My kids all have a CD of the photos/documents so a great offsite backup.Only negative is Pandigital's customer support. I registered the product on their website and then filled in the missing software problem and submitted. I got an auto email back stating I would get a response in 48 hours. I have done this now 3 times and never a response. My friend also ordered one and he had the same issue - no software on the SD card. He called their customer support, on hold for 30 minutes, stated problem, and was told they would send him the software. That was 3 weeks ago and still have not received. Would be easier if they would just put up on their website so it could be downloaded.So I give the product a solid 5 STARS on quality, funtion, ease of use, and speed. Customer support as of now gets a big ZERO. I am now in demand to do my cousin's family photo's as well. Overall well worth the money - a GREAT purchase.

I just got my  Pandigital Photolink One-Touch PANSCN06 8.5-Inch x11-Inch Photo Scanner  (PANSCN06) and scanned in about 20 4X6 photos. All I can say is Wow. What Speed. The photos are transfered to a JPG file straight onto the included SD card (a 1 GB card was included in the box, how nice!) After you turn the scanner on it starts defalults to the 300 dpi mode which is indicated by a Green LED light. If you press the power button again the GREEN LED power light changes to an Orange LED light and the scanner will now scan in 600 dpi mode.A single 4X6 photo in the default 300 dpi mode takes about 3 seconds to scan in, the 600 dpi takes about 10 seconds. A full sheet of 8.5X11" paper takes about 7 seconds at 300 dpi to scan but, since the paper is constantly moving so you get the sense that it's going as fast as it can.The Picture quality is quite acceptable for the photos I tested. I do not have any high resolution photos on hand to compare the two scan settings. Either way this scanner is not going to be able to compete with flatbed scanners having a density of 9600X4800 dpi. It's not for that! In other words, the scanner is not going to magically "sharpen" 3X5 or 4X6 photos over and above the resolution they were taken with. However, the picture on the computer screen (1920X1080) look very much like the original photos. I did not notice much difference comparing a 300 dpi scan with a 600 dpi scan. This isn't because the 600 dpi isn't working, it was because the orignial photos were not so sharp themselves that higher resolution waranted any further rsolution. If the original photo was taken with a shakey holder of the camera then digitizing that event isn't magically going to make it dissapear. For that kind of Magic, You need artistic photoshop skills.I have software that can print JPG files into a PDF. So I was able to scan a document and several photos and select all of them within the context menu of my file manager and combined them all into a single PDF - pics and photos! Was kind of cool. I am not sure I need to do this routinely but it is nice to be able to do so. With the purchase of this scanner I now have a very convenient document scanner in addition to a picture scanner and will no longer be on the hook to the wife for this task. 1 honey dew taken off the list. YaY ME. The wife is thrilled about how easy it is to do....so gents, get yourselves a brownie point or two with this purchase. lol...I have not seen any lines in photos or scans as yet. If my unit physically breaks down be assured I will update this review to state so and how long it lasted. If I haven't its still working.If you need a convenient scanner for digitizing photos or documents you won't be dissapointed with this. I was torn on the line beteen buying a higher quality scanner or this. If you are waffling about it my advice is to try this first and then see how bothered you are about needing the higher quality. You'll probably decide as I did that this fits the need.

I researched different scanners and this is the best for use and value for money. So easy to use - I use it with a SD card and then put it into my computer and have also linked directly to the laptop using a USB. I thought that the SD card option was quicker as you can manage the photos in one go. My dentist uses it to scan all her paperwork and also recommended it to me. Look at a YouTube tutorial clip as it gives you an idea of the speed. It's sooo easy. Th regular dpi is quicker than the higher res which I used but still relatively quick. I highly recommend this and I am now ploughing through all my photos to put them into photo books. Tip - download photobook templates from somewhere like Photobox and do your albums first and then wait for one of their amazing discount offers which they issue every other month as you can get amazing deals ! I also bought the wand scanner as I want to digitise all my son's art work from the last few years rather than store boxes or bin. This is useful for bulky things or pages larger than A4.

It only scans one time, then i have to unplug the power, plug it in and start over again before i scan the next....and what is even worse is that the scan i make doesn`t show on the sd cards i use in the photoscanner....so it is not working at all....waste of money.

Bought this after spending a LONG time reviewing which device to buy to scan approx. 3000 printed photographs from the pre-digital era. Made the right choice. Very easy to use, and gives great quality images even at the power 300dpi setting. Easy to scan to either the free 1gb SD card, or straight to computer. Just scanned 174 photos at 600dpi and they took up only 102mb. No need to use the protective pocket to scan but had to use it to feed small (<10cm) photos through the device as small photos don't seem to go though on their own. Also noticed that if the odd photo went into the scanner at an angle, the image is corrected and straightened. Takes only a few seconds to scan each photo. Still to try an A4 size document, but confident it will work. So can now digitise old photos even whilst sitting watching the tele. A quality product. Highly recommended.

What a wonderful gadget. It is so easy to use and the quality of the scan is perfect. I particularly like that it doesn't have to be attached to a computer to do the job of scanning as the photos are stored on a SD card. Received the item very quickly.

Very handy, as I have a huge pile of photos to archive for which I have no negatives. I will say there are two issues. Occasioanlly (usually when scanning at the higher resolution) I get faint parallel stripes appearing on the left hand side of the larger pictures. So I have been making sure to scan them as far to the right as possible. And the scanners needs a lot of cleaning. At least after every five scans - otherwise you get artefacts appearing from dust and other debris. But this may be just because I am scanning photos from the 1980s going back as far as the 1930s, and some of them are a bit flaky.But for the price, I am pretty happy.