SUMMARY: Three ways to handle less than optimal scans.

If you have scanned a document, or have come upon a recently scanned document, that contains dust and scratch marks, here are a few things you can try:

1. If you have the original, rescan the document. First, be sure to clean your scanner as per the manufacturer instructions to remove excess debris. A minute or two of cleaning can produce a world of difference in image scan quality.

2. If possible, try cropping your scanned file, using image-editing software to remove the most egregious problem areas.

3. Many photo editing software packages come built-in with a “Dust and Scratch” feature. This may help you repair documents if you lack an original for a rescan. Be sure to experiment with the settings so that you remove just dust and scratches and not image detail.

SUMMARY: Keep your scanner off when not in use to prevent burning out the lamp and wasting electricity.

If you are done scanning documents for the day, or you don’t think you’ll need to scan documents within a couple of hours, go ahead and turn the scanner off. Turning the scanner off when not in use should (but does not guarantee) increase the life of the internal lamp, plus it can save>

SUMMARY: Use higher scanner resolutions to increase the resultant image quality.

When scanning anything, my personal philosophy is to always scan using the highest practical resolution appropriate for the source medium or at least close to the highest resolution available by your scanner. I’m not saying you need to scan your photos at 4800 dpi, but don’t scan them at 150, either – perhaps use 300 or 600 dpi.

Yes, scanning with high resolutions takes more time to scan, more time to load the resulting documents, and requires more hard drive space to store the documents, but you can always downsample (lower the resolution) documents after scanning. The results nearly always turn out fine this way, unlike trying to add more resolution to photos previously scanned at low resolutions when you can’t find the originals.

SUMMARY: Prevent your scanner from overheating which can cause permanent damage.

The lamps found in flatbed scanners can get hot – very hot. Always provide for plenty of ventilation room around scanners. I know computer desks can get crowded and messy, but you need to leave a couple of inches completely around scanners to dissipate heat generated by their lamps. Failure to do so could result in the scanner breaking due to heat, or worse.

SUMMARY: Save time; don’t rely> 

If you need to scan something, it always pays to use the best originals that you can. Although computer software can seemingly perform miracles by reducing scratches, bends, and other imperfections, such software may require a bit of expertise, time, and money.

SUMMARY: Don’t let your scanner’s sheet feeder crumple important or> 

Don’t let your scanner’s sheet feeder crumple important or>

SUMMARY: Give your scanned images filenames you can recognize well into the future.

When scanning documents, unless you are directly acquiring them into a document via a software package’s “Acquire image from scanner” tool, you will need to give your document a filename. Do not rely>

SUMMARY: More RAM may speed up the scanning process.

In some situations, especially when scanning large documents in high resolutions, adding more memory to your machine may increase your scanning speed.

As information is sent from the scanner to your computer, it can be stored in memory as a cache and then written to disk. However, if your computer does not have much free memory, it may have to write information to disk in the middle of a scan, slowing the scanning process. By increasing your RAM, you decrease the chance your computer will have to write information to disk during the scanning process, keeping everything in memory until the scan is complete.

SUMMARY: A clean scanner will help ensure the best output.

To get the best quality images from your scanner, it is imperative to clean it often, whether or not the scanner is used. Dust can accumulate>

SUMMARY: Shutting down other software while scanning large documents may speed up the scanning process.

Plan>