Installation problems for Epson 4870 USB 2.0 Windows XP,
July 14, 2004
Reviewer:
An electronics fan
The scanner works
fine, but slowly in USB 1 ports. When connected to the USB 2.0 hub,
although the scanner was recognized by Windows XP, there was no response
from the scanner, although on and properly connected. Several hours of
uninstalling and reinstalling its software and downloading USB patches and
updating drivers from Viaarena.com did nothing to solve the problem. If
the problem isn't cracked in the next day or so, the scanner is going back
where it came from.
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2 of 2 people found the
following review helpful:
Love This Scanner!, June 11, 2004
Reviewer:
An electronics fan (Dallas, TX)
I
scan only 35 mm black-and-white negative film (including C-42). Scanning
at 4800 dpi, 16 bit I get beautiful scans with great detail (about 58 MB
files). Love the automation of scanning 24 negatives at once. It takes
only about 70 minutes. Scan quality better than a pro-photo cd and close
to the quality of a drum scan.
Setup was easy. Build quality is good. I'm quite happy. Would highly
recommend.
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14 of 19 people found the
following review helpful:
Huge Stability & Reliability Problems, March 29, 2004
I just received my Epson
4870, and have just spent a frustrating 12 hours getting this thing to
work reliably.
My observations so far:
1) The hardward and drivers are very unreliable. Half the time, neither
the Epson nor the Silverfast are able to communicate with the scanner.
Turning the scanner off and on and rebooting the computer sometimes helps,
but I sometimes I have to reboot multiple times in order to get it to
work. I am using the USB cable that came with the scanner.
2) After upgrading to Silvertfast to 6.0.2 to get ICE support, the
software simply stopped working, freezing Photoshop.
3) When I am lucky enough to get the scanner to work, the Epson
software often quits halfway through the scanning process, citing an
inability to communicate with the scanner. This is very frustrating, as I
am scanning 120 film, which takes a good 20-30 minutes per slide (with ICE
enabled).
4) The scanner is S-L-O-W. If you are scanning medium format film, be
prepared to spend 30 minutes or more on each scan (not counting retries
due to the unreliable nature of the scanner).
5) There is no way the resolution on this thing is 4800 DPI. Although I
haven't been scientific about it, my guess is the real resolution is
closer to 2700 DPI.
6) The scanner does not come with a carrier that supports 120 film
longer than 12 cm. Although I knew going in, I would have liked to have a
carrier that accepts longer film strips, because I also shoot using a 6x17
panoramic.
7) Epson technical support is 9-6 Monday through Friday only. I work
during the week, so my chances of getting any support from Epson are close
to zero, unless I decide to take a day off work.
I am very unhappy with this purchase, and will be looking into
returning my scanner back to Amazon, probably replacing it with a Canon
9900.
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2 of 10 people found the
following review helpful:
Scanning 2 1/4x2 1/4 transparencies......, March 26, 2004
Reviewer:
An electronics fan
There is no
discernable way to scan these. Bummer!