Visioneer Patriot 680 P6801D-WU 48 bit 600 x 1200 dpi Sheet Fed Scanner

Pros: The Hardware itself is very nice, and the specifications of this scanner (Speed / Resolution / Simultaneous Duplex through the sheet feeder) are great.

Cons: Visioneer has had the same BETA Vista driver for 18 months now, and these are the only Vista drivers there are. The BETA Vista driver is very buggy -- for example, none of the buttons on the scanner do anything at all, which I have confirmed is a driver issue. Because of this, it is not possible to scan more than one page using the flatbed (after scanning one page on the flatbed, the scanner / driver thinks that is all there is and sends the scan to the computer, creating a one page document. If you have two or more pages, then each page will be in a separate file).

Visioneer customer service and technical support will say only that 'we are working on it' and 'there is no ETA [for a working, released driver].'

Other Thoughts: NewEgg is great!

Beta drivers are known to be buggy and not reliable; that is understandable. But to release a product like this with only BETA drivers and then not update them with better BETA drivers at some point, nor release a 'released' driver for 18 months (and counting) should give anyone tremendous pause.

Pros: Much faster than my Xerox 152. Much faster then either of my copiers or older scanners. Feeds 70 Plus pages at a time without missing or jamming. Jams are very rare on this unit so far. Keeps pages straight, duplexes at high speed at up to 80 pages per minute. One touch software works easily, included paperport works well. Can be programmed to send the files up to 99 folders or places. Example, you program a folder to be number 33, you punch in number 33 and hit start on the scanner, it will deposit the scanned file into that folder. Great for office networking or for the office to use a common scanner.

Cons: Bulkier and bigger than the small xerox units, but this one feeds paper better and straighter with a tray that is angled to be more flatter than the smaller xerox units. It's "almost black" color looks out of place in many offices..like Darth Vader's scanner.

Other Thoughts: Haven't found any fault with it yet! We are scanning 3000 files at 70 pages per file, and so far, this thing hasn't missed a beat. We've done 8 to 10 thousand pages so far with almost "zero" trouble. Just put it in the feeder, push "start" and it deposits it in the one touch folder with a name like "scan 1" and the next is "scan 2" or you can get auto naming by date like October 24, 2007 (1). The next will be same date, only (2). You then go back and rename it. 200 dpi gives fine scans of black and white or grey scale, but color will take a lot longer time to scan. Truly, we are getting about 80 page per minute on duplex, 200 dpi black/white with this thing.