Epson Perfection 2580 Photo Scanner | 
| Brand: Epson
List Price: $179.00
Buy Used: $178.85
You Save: $0.15
Rating:  15 reviews
Media: Electronics
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Shipping Weight (lbs): 10
Dimensions (in): 19.8 x 15 x 6.1
MPN: B11B172091
Model: B11B172091
UPC: 010343850576
EAN: 0010343850576
ASIN: B0002NR4Y0
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Condition: Factory refurbished (Factory sealed). Comes with 30 day exchange and one year service warranty. No shipments to PO, APO, AK, HI addresses.
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| Features:
| • | 2,400 dpi optical resolution | | • | 48-bit color, 16-bit grayscale | | • | Integrated 35mm film loader | | • | Epson Easy Photo Fix for 1-touch color restoration | | • | USB 2.0 interface, PC and Mac compatible |
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| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
A flatbed scanner with an Auto Film Loader for 35mm negatives / 2400 x 4800 max. dpi / One-Touch Color Restoration / PC & Mac / USB 2.0 Maximum Resolution - 12,800 x 12,800 dpi with software interpolation Color Depth - 48-bit internal/external Greyscale Depth - 16-bit internal/external Optical Density - 3.2 Dmax Scaling (zoom) - 50% to 200% (1% step) USB 2.0 Interface (backwards compatible with USB 1.1) Supports PC and Macintosh Computer Systems Unit Dimensions - 10.83 (w) x 16.5 (d) x 3.4 (h) Unit Weight - 6.6 lbs.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 10 more reviews...
 Has it all August 29, 2004
Ronald K. Goodenow (Northboro, MA USA)
99 out of 102 found this review helpful
Though I'm a scanning veteran, having worked my way through a few generations of SCSI and USB devices, I must admit to being mightily impressed by the 2580 and at least parts of its software package. If a tad clumsy to use at times, the bundle offers an option to do some color correction of faded prints as they are scanned, and another nice one to easily scan multiple images at once, properly setting up separate files for each. One can choose default, home or professional settings to fine tune scans. Like most scanners in this price range the 2580 has buttons on its front which provide for instant scanning, e-mailing, etc.
The proof is in the pudding and I must say results are just fine. Although I've yet to try the film strip reader, results with old 35mm slides were easily equal, if not superior, to a far more expensive Olympus slide scanner I bought a couple of years ago. A couple of old 2x3' prints turned into beautiful 8x10's, and so on. The USB 2.0 connection is very fast (once the scanner warms up), and despite its features the scanner's footprint is pleasantly small.
Now for some precautionary information. The Epson's twain driver apparently doesn't like competing with those left over from previous scanners, particularly Canons. So if, after following directions to install the scanner very carefully (you MUST install the driver software with the 2580 disconnected) it does not fire up when called from the Epson supplied apps, or any other scanning ones you have, be sure to fully uninstall other scanner drivers and be sure to kill the older scanner in device manager as well. My main computers run Win98SE and I've yet to see what would happen were I to use it with my XP laptop which has portable scanner software on it. But keep my findings in mind and save yourself a call to customer service.
As for the application software's usability, the included ArcSoft program provides basic editing as well as a neat set of projects (make your own calendars, etc.) but serious users will want to scan into Photoshop or another more feature-laden program. The 2580 works well with both a Paperport program I've used for years (and has many good features) and Photoshop Elements, my editor of choice.
There is no printed manual or even a big pdf one. This said, the html-based help feature is easy to use and, in terms of software and general setup issues, quite good.
Finally, I had to call Epson support for some help on the driver issue, my initial concern being I had a hardware problem. Direct telephone help is a long distance charge, but I must say my call went through to a real live person almost instantly, and her support was friendly and fast. And, no, Epson has not outsourced its help desk to the other side of the world. It's right in the middle of America, in Colorado.
All in all a fine product.
 Good but could be better October 24, 2004
A. Johnson (London, UK)
53 out of 54 found this review helpful
I bought this scanner to scan in my old negatives. This scanner will do that with no cropping required, although it is a bit of a skill to get each strip to load properly at first. I do however have a problem with this scanner, and that is that is isn't as good as it should be in aligning the negative frames with its scans. The the process of scanning is itself quite tedious as it takes about a minute per frame (yes frame, not strip, and more if you want better quality), but to be expected. However, I find some of my scans come with black edges where the alignment is just not quite right. Is this the end of the world? No, but it is annoying to have to rescan perhaps several times to get the image to occupy the full frame with none of the border also captured. This is supposed to be all automatic and to spare users from having manually to align negative strips in little plastic holders, and it does that - but the process isn't as automatic as it should be.
 Film Scans 'can' be great, sometimes better than original.. April 17, 2005
MyTwoCents (Louisiana)
22 out of 22 found this review helpful
So I did a lot of looking around at the more expensive scanners, then this one caught my attention. It was given a best buy award from PC World, and four other top review sites gave it good ratings. I thought cheap price and good ratings, wow, that can't be true.
I ended up buying this scanner with a rebate. I got it home and setting it up was a snap. It does seem a little flimsy in comparison to my 6 year old Hp 5200C (which was enormous). The included software is really a joke. I agree with the poster who said it can be confusing. So until you want a headache, my advice is the stick with the desktop icon "Epson Scan". Also for your first scans stay with "Home Mode" not Professional.
Now on to the scans, first I scanned a 4 by 6 colored photo at 300dpi, and it looked fine. To my surprise, it looked about the same as my 6-year-old scanner. The colors were true, skin tones were great, but dark and light areas had just a tad too much contrast. Easy to fix with Photoshop (or other photo editor).
Then I tried the film scanner, which I have NO prior experience. Now I should mention I was using the Professional Mode and scanning at 600DPI. My first scan was horrible!! The picture was so soft it appeared to be out of focus!! My daughters' blue dress appeared purple, and over exposed. After many more tries I started to wonder why it got such High ratings? There had to be something wrong. The next day, I started the scanner in "Home Mode", played with nothing, and on the first scan got a picture that actually had More detail than the original print. Other than changing to "Home Mode", I don't know what could have been the problem. I've now scanned 60 35mm filmstrips with what I would consider great results. The film feeder works great but not flawless. No filmstrips have been damaged, and I find that lining your filmstrip edges up with the metel bar as your putting it in the scanner works best. If the scanner won't take in the film, you may have it the wrong way as it's hard to tell (with old film) what side is up and what side to put towards the scanner. Also, I'm scanning now, as I'm online typing! So it doesn't hog your system like some programs. Lastly one reviewer said you'll be taking scans of dust, and it's true if there is dust and prints on your filmstrip. Then there will be dust on your digitized image too. I find a lent cloth works great for taking prints and dust off a negative. The only other thing I want to mention is the life span of this scanner is only 10,000 cycles, the more expensive scanners have about 36,000 cycles. My conclusion is, that for the price it's a great buy. I would have given it five stars if it won't for the software issues.
 Wasted hours June 15, 2005
T. Geyer (Lombard, IL USA)
18 out of 25 found this review helpful
I bought this scanner with the intention of scanning in all my daughter's wedding negatives. After investing at least five hours muddling around with the inept software that came with the scanner, I finally figured out the non-intuitive method required to save settings and repeat the process of scanning negative strips.
Long story short, after spending dozens of hours more scanning in negatives, I realized every image had a reddish cast to it. Dozens more hours were spent performing color balancing with Adobe Photoshop Elements. As an experiment, I tried scanning in a couple of proof prints and compared those images to the same images scanned from negatives. The proof images were clear and beautifully color balanced, as opposed to the negative images, in which everyone appeared to have a sunburn.
So the moral of the story is this: don't assume images scanned from negatives (at least with this machine) are necessarily superior to print-scanned images. That mistake cost me hundreds of wasted hours. I don't know if the problem was in the negatives themselves (the printed proofs are just fine), or the negative scanner on this machine. But I am extremely disappointed with the results.
Disappointingly slow November 14, 2004
natmicstef (Caribbean)
17 out of 21 found this review helpful
Unfortunately the very accurate review of 24th Oct was posted after I had ordered this scanner otherwise I would not have. Yes it does take 1 minute per frame so the product description of "digitize and restore stacks of negatives in a few simple steps" though correct, would take a lifetime to actually do. I am going to buy a high speed USB cable to see if that might increase the speed..otherwise can't see myself digitizing anything. Oh well, at least I have a nice document scanner!
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