Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2001/12/28

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Subject: Re: [Leica] Whither Kodak RFS 3600
From: Henning Wulff <henningw@archiphoto.com>
Date: Fri, 28 Dec 2001 13:47:56 -0800
References: <Pine.SOL.4.33.0112281125280.22611-100000@centipede.gpcc.itd.umich.edu>

At 11:27 AM -0500 12/28/01, Dante Stella wrote:
>Given that I have a huge backlog of [Leica and compatible] negs to scan,
>is this automated scanner a solution?  Does anyone like this thing?  The
>pricing is pretty attractive, and so is the batch scan capability.  Does
>Silverfast make it usable?  A lot of people bitched about the Kodak
>software.
>
>Thanks
>Dante

I recently bought one for my son, who had been using a Coolscan II. 
He is very happy with it (on a Mac, system 9.1). He likes the scan 
quality, especially the higher dynamic range than the Coolscan and 
the batch scan mode. I was able to afford the scanner for him 'cuz I 
took the 110 rolls of film that came with it :-). My son said the 
software, as far as he is concerned, is slightly better than Nikon's. 
Vuescan does not work with this machine, and I don't think Silverfast 
does either.

Initially, a lot of people had problems with the software, but as far 
as I have been able to determine, it was not because it was bad in 
the sense of poor controls or poor interface, but because it was 
flaky and crashed very easily. It's gone through a number of 
iterations, and the scanner firmware has also been updated. Seems OK 
now; he hasn't had a crash due to the scanner software yet, so he 
says.

When the SprintScan 4000 from Polaroid first came out, I had it and a 
Coolscan 2000 at home for a week, and on the basis of that comparison 
bought the Coolscan, due to better dynamic range mostly. Also the 
Polaroid Insight software was terrible at the time. Now, so I hear, 
the Polaroid is even competitive with the Coolscan 4000, although 
I'll believe they have similar dynamic ranges when I get to try it 
myself. In any case, Polaroid has worked on their machine and 
produced something quite decent, even though it started out poorly. I 
believe the Kodak RFS3600 is a similar item, and it has some 
features, such as the whole film scanning, that others lack. It seems 
quite a good value now.

Just remember that the batch scanning on this thing works on uncut 
rolls of film; for mounted slides you need the Coolscan 2000 or 4000 
with their often flaky and expensive SF-200 batch attachment.

- -- 
    *            Henning J. Wulff
   /|\      Wulff Photography & Design
  /###\   mailto:henningw@archiphoto.com
  |[ ]|     http://www.archiphoto.com
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Replies: Reply from "Greg J. Lorenzo" <gregj.lorenzo@shaw.ca> (Re: [Leica] Whither Kodak RFS 3600)
In reply to: Message from Dante Stella <dante@umich.edu> ([Leica] Whither Kodak RFS 3600)