Looking for your recommendations for a responable priced scanner that will work with VISTA and provide clear, detailed scans of coins that have been certified. Used to use a microtek (which I LOVED), but it does not work with VISTA, and the HP I have now is a piece of junk for detailed scans. :help!A:
In general scanners don't work with slabbed coins. In fact in general scanners don't work well with coins. That being said I'll try and address your questions. Have you contacted Microtek to see if they have a Vista-compatible driver for your scanner model? Most times that's all it takes. A digital camera would be much better, but even a reasonable macro-capable point-and-shoot camera would be several hundred dollars which may be beyond you budget. As for scanners that DO work with slabs I'll have to leave that to others. Just remember it would have to have a Vista-compatible driver.
I just looked at the Microtek site. It appears some scanners do have Vista drivers and some don't. I suspect the "don't" models are older models that Microtek no longer supports.
I'm not a big fan of the results of scanned coins. You have no control over the angle or intensity of the lighting and the scanned images just look flat. A while ago I posted a thread about using the most basic of equipment to get decent results. The camera I use is an old one but an equivalent today would be less then the cost of a scanner with a lot more features. Here's the thread: http://www.cointalk.com/t114269/
i disagree with the bold part. i got my point and shoot, with macro for $180. mine is the 14mp with the touch screen. but they have the same thing with a 10mp and no touch screen for $100. also the camera has an "anti-shake" option, so you can shake the camera all around and still get a clear picture. so if you don't have a tripod its not as big of a deal(still recommend). anyway the camera is capable of taking great pictures. i have not even scratched the surface of learning it and have been taking beautiful shots of my coins. i have also seen other brands, samsung, cannon, etc, that have over 7mp and macro for under $100. digi cams are getting cheap, very cheap, that is why you see so many gimmicks coming out(screen on both side of camera, projector built in). if the op is dead set on a scanner and cant get drivers for his, i would recommend an HP. i have tried scanning coins on a ton of different brands and nothing has worked better then my HP. i actually tried two HP's, the one was a lot better then the other. if you want i could get the model number? either way, scanning is inferior to photographs, especially with slabbed coins. the only thing that scanning is better with is notes. and i am not even sure of that, i got some awesome note shots with my camera.
Well, I can't disagree with you since I haven't looked at point-and-shoot cameras in quite a while. I used my Nikon Coolpix 995 for a LONG time before I decided that I wanted something that could get REAL close. And it was only 3.2 Mpixel. Now I have a Nikon DSLR and probably only use about 10% of its capability. But I can darn near get an image of a mintmark that would fill a whole computer screen.