The Right Tools for the Job
I am asked all the time, :What kind of scanner should I get?" and my answer is always "It depends." What types of things are you going to scan? What size are they? I will document the different tools that I have found useful and which ones I should have skipped.
All Purpose Flatbed Scanner
I have used both the Epson v600 and the Canon 9000F Mark II. They are both able to scan slides and negatives. I control both of them with an excellent scanning application called VueScan. I have found that the included software is not as powerful or flexible as I need. I also like how I can use the same software for all my scanners. For beginners it also has an "basic" mode that takes care of most simple scanning jobs.
The best high speed scanner I found is the Fujitsu ScanSnap iX500. It works for both my desire to go "paperless" as well as doing a great job scanning documents or books that have been unbound. It does a pretty good job on photos that are not fragile. If you have a lot of photos that are in pretty good shape and are the same size, put the scanner in the highest quality mode and scan in batches of about 25-30. This will pull the photos slower and avoid streaks that often show up on photos that are auto fed.
This is the newest scanner that I use for books that I am not able to unbind or albums where I am not able to remove the pictures. It can detect page turns as well as has a foot pedal for taking pictures. When I am scanning albums, I use this scanner in conjunction with AutoSplitter software. This allows me to scan the entire page and then break the scan into individual photo files.
If you have any questions, please feel free to email me taylor@familyhistorynerd.com