Epson Perfection 4870 PRO Scanner
See it at Amazon.com for $599.00Average Customer Rating
(5.0 out of 5)
Amazon Customer Reviews
Most Helpful First | Newest First (5 out of 5)Highly Recommend!
I shoot black & white 35 mm. Previously relied upon either a Polaroid SprintScan 4000 or drum scans. The 4870 produces gorgeous scans and is easy to use. I'm very happy with my purchase. SilverFast has proved to be a dissapointment for use with B&W negs. I would probably have purchased the regular 4870 vs. Pro version if I had it to do over again.
(5 out of 5)Just Buy It; You'll Love It!
I finally have my perfect duo for scanning and editing. I am a "peripheral junkie" and have found a dream come true in this scanner. Yes, you will pay more but you will not be disappointed. I buy scanners at least yearly, but I won't do this in 2005 because I have found a wonderful product.
Scanning is super fast. Digital Ice really does make a difference. The organization of your scans is intuitive and easy. You can scan and make edits prior to the scan. I prefer to make my edits in Photoshop Elements #3.
When I have used the Digital Ice work flow, I have made significant edits on very old photos from my ancestors' 3rd World cameras with fabulous results.
"Digital Ice" is a significant component of this program which makes it worth the price. I haven't researched it recently, but this was the only scanner in December that bundled this component.
(5 out of 5)Wonderfull
Yes, it's really wonderfull for restoring very old B/W negative films. I am using it with negative films that are 60 or 70 years old and the result is incredible
(5 out of 5)Good Scanner, Poor Software
I bought this a few years ago to scan 4x5 negatives, and the scan quality is very good.
The software stopped working. I reinstalled one of the versions that comes with it (there's Epson Scan and SilverFast), but it's functionality is falling apart again. Now it won't scan color negatives correctly (won't remove the orange cast). Still works fine for slides and prints though.
For b&w negatives and very high quality prints, I get good results at about 2700 dpi. For good quality prints, 600 dpi seems to capture all the detail, and for snapshots, I use 300 dpi*.
* I like to use a resolution that doesn't produce pixellation at the intended output scale--even if the pictures aren't sharp, they look better fuzzy than pixellated (IMO).
The scanner does take some time to warm up if it's idle for more than 5 or 10 minutes. But it does a great job.
One thing I have noticed is that a large JPEG file may not save, even though it appears to. I don't know if this is a Windows thing, or a scanner (software) thing, but it is best to Preview your files in Explorer before closing the file in the scanner application. That can be very frustrating after doing a couple hours worth of retouching on a scan. Large TIFs also don't seem to save at all. I am able to save JPEGs up to about 10 MB, TIFs up to about 40 MB, and larger GIFs. Bitmap images aren't worth working with, IMO, so I don't know if they save correctly.