Scanning old manuals

From: Stephen Dauphin <ai705_at_osfn.org>
Date: Tue Mar 9 11:32:43 1999

On Tue, 9 Mar 1999, Arfon Gryffydd wrote:

> Okay,
>
> I have some old computer manuals and I just bought a scanner...... Anyone
> care to suggest the best way to convert these manuals to electronic form
> and not take up HUGE amounts of memory?
>

I'd like to second this notion. Could those on this list, who are
scanning for posterity, share their methods?

What platform(s), what hardware(s), what software(s). Any intermediary
format(s), final output format(s). Whatever it takes.

I am especially puzzled by dpi. Seems everybody in the world is scanning
at 600 or over. I am contemplating using a Hewlett Packard at 300 and
from some test scans, including pictures, I am hard pressed to tell the
difference between 2 and 3 hundred. Extremely high numbers coupled with
millions of colors (where applicable) seem to me to be just a waste of
storage space.

[I note Jim Stricklan's reply came in while writing this. I have scanned
down to newspaper legal notice size. Is this 6 point? It OCRed virtually
identically at 200 or 300 dpi and the results were high 90%]

I am also interested in what people are using to descreen/despeckle
material that was printed using a screen. Are there any third party ways
to do it or am I dependent on the scanning software? If there is other
software, are they any more successful than what I have seen?

Nothing elaborate. Just a short paragraph or two summary of technique.

I realize that these summaries could be considered somewhat off topic,
but I don't think it is a major hazard, given the traffic on the list in
recent days. Certainly, there may be particular peculiarities involved
with the material we are saving and I am hoping any respondents will
specifically address this.



                                          -- Stephen Dauphin
Received on Tue Mar 09 1999 - 11:32:43 GMT