Opticbook 3600 Book and Magazine Scanner by Plustek

If you're like me and you have a tablet pc, then you'll know that one of the greatest obstacles to going completely paperless is getting thousands of pages of books and documents into your computer.  Well, I'll tell you from personal experience that scanning 200 plus pages of a hardcover book on a flatbed scanner is NOT something you want to do regularly.  For students (me) who may have as many as 20 of such books each semester, this becomes a complete nightmare.  Of course you could always just dismantle the book and use an automatic document feeder to scan the pages.  I don't know about you, but I'm really not to eager to destroy books that cost more than my monthly grocery bill...
That's where the Opticbook 3600 book scanner by plustek comes in.  This scanner is made to scan books and other bound printed matter without damaging the book or the repetitive flipping and pressing motions that could give anybody carpal tunnel syndrome. 

With the Opticbook 3600 scanner, there's no need to worry about fuzzy text, shadows, smudges, or text going into raised spines.  What makes this scanner special is the scanning surface of this scanner goes all the way to the edge, there is no border to get in the way of your scan.  Also, notice the dimensions of this scanner, it's extra tall so the other half of the book that you're not scanning can hang easily over the edge.  Did you notice that I said earlier that there's no flipping back and forth with this scanner?  That's because the lid on the Opticbook scanner is reversible, raises two inches upwards for thick books, and even removable.  Just slide the book over so the other page is on the scanning surface and you're set!  There's also easy to use buttons on the side of the scanner for color, gray, text, and book pilot (bundled scanning software) so scanning page after page is just a button push away.  The included software also includes OCR and the ability to create PDF files.

Pages can be scanned at about 8 to 10 seconds which is a lot slower than most quality flatbed scanners, but this scanner is small which means that it is as portable as a textbook, so it's perfect for dorm rooms, crowded computer desks, scanning at the library, or scanning handouts from class.  Also, scans come out beautifully crisp and clear at a maximum resolution of 1200 dpi (optical).  The area of the scanning surface is A4/letter sized so most books will fit.

With the Opticbook 3600 you can scan an entire textbook in less than an hour compared to the hours or days it would take with a regular flatbed scanner.


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