Plustek OpticFilm 8200i SE Film and Slide Scanner | 7200 DPI, 48-bit Output | Infrared Dust and Scratch Removal | Silverfast SE Plus 8.8 Bundle | Mac and PC Support Review

I'm using this scanner to (finally!) start digitizing about 4000 slides from a 40 year old photograph. I've tried several scanners - a high end Microtek flatbed scanner (too slow) and recently a $120 Pacific Imaging 7250u scanner (broken with very poor image quality, I returned it to Revain). I now scan multiple slides with the 8200i! I spent about 15 minutes with the SilverFast 8 software but found it too complicated even for this longtime software fanatic to play around with. Also, the…

Plustek OpticFilm 8200i . . After reading several articles about this scanner, I ordered it. The results are amazing, especially the ability to virtually eliminate scratches and dust marks from both negatives and slides. My flatbed scanner couldn't do that, and it took tedious hours in Lightroom to clean up the images. No matter how carefully you store your photos, dust and scratches will remain on them. The scanner performs a final scan to detect and fix these errors. You can blow them out…

It took me a long time to realize that this scanner is technically completely outdated. But I recently bought a Canon 9000F Mk2 as a flatbed scanner for reflective materials (I'm a designer) and I tried the transparency/film tray function. I've always wondered why the Plustek is so bad at rendering dark backgrounds (even if they're dense, of course, but quite detailed). Very high resolution (4800 ppi) and TIFF format for maximum image integrity do not help. But I found it just as good as…

First, it's not a bad scanner, it basically does what it claims to do. The sad part is that he's just not very good at what he does. It wouldn't be such a big deal if it didn't cost $400(!) and came with software that looks like the developers abandoned it 15 years ago. Quality: No big deal. As others have pointed out, despite the ads, DMAX isn't doing very well. I've also had rare instances where he refused to scan higher contrast negatives? So my guess is that QA is not that good. However, I…

I bought the Plustek 8200i two months ago and have been using it to scan hundreds of slides and negatives ever since. The scanner and the Silverfast software that came with it enabled me to begin creating a digital archive of my pre-digital camera-era analogue slides and negatives. I have found this scanner to be an invaluable tool for digging into my own past and I would highly recommend it to anyone with the time and inclination to undertake such a project. Installation and registration: I…

I have made several hundred slides and negatives with this machine and the scan quality and ease of use are amazing. The SilverFast software is a nice bonus but requires simpler documentation to use. First, you don't need to use most of these features if you have photo editing software that you like better, like Photoshop. The editing you can do after scanning (after scanning) should probably be done in some other software. Just use SilverFast, to get a quality scan and do everything else…