Epson Expression E10000XL-PH Wide-Format Photo Scanner

• 2,400 x 4,800 optical resolution; SilverFast SE 6 software
• 48-bit color depth, 16-bit grayscale
• A3 sized scanning surface for originals up to 12.2 by 17.2 inches
• Transparency adapter for slides and negatives
• USB 2.0, Firewire, optional networking; PC and Mac compatible

This scanner is wonderful. The image quality is excellent. I had friends wondering if I should spend so much on a scanner, then when they saw the images of plants I made, they said "How does it make that look so much better than life?"!

Be careful when scanning non-paper items such as plants or ceramics, the glass can be scratched (on this or any scanner). I buy clear acetate or plexiglass to put on top of the glass in such cases.

As a botanical illustrator, I find this scanner to be a great timesaver. I can scan and enlarge the parts of a plant I need to illustrate, seeing detail much better than through a microscope.

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After spending so much on this scanner, I expected it to come with professional-quality software, but it didn''t -at least not for the Mac. Epson Scan is less capable than the software that came with the Microtek scanner I''m replacing, which cost half as much.

Worse yet, color management is broken under Snow Leopard. This is acknowledged on the Epson Web site, and they say they''re looking for a solution, but that''s a year and a half after Snow Leopard was released. So, what you see on the screen is very different from what you get in the scan, even to a less experienced eye like mine.

Not only that, but the software still requires Rosetta, meaning it hasn''t even been updated for the Intel Mac. In fact, unbelievably, rotating the preview window sends the bottom of it behind the Dock, so you can''t read the stats at the bottom or resize the window. That means this software has not even been fully updated for OS X! Basically, you''re getting an OS 9 app that''s being minimally updated to keep it running.

The solution to this is to use SilverFast AI. That software comes with the Photo model of this scanner, which costs several hundred dollars more -or you can buy the software separately from LaserSoft Imaging, which is what I''m having to do, again for a few hundred dollars more. Epson really should not be selling this Graphic Arts model at all.

Update -Even with SilverFast AI and a brand new driver update, this scanner does not play well with the Mac on Snow Leopard. I almost always have to restart my Mac just to get SilverFast to find the scanner. I also have to restart sometimes when the scanner starts producing errors during a scan. And when the scanner''s already on, sometimes the Mac doesn''t start up properly! When that happens, the system is super slow and unresponsive, so that I have to shut off the scanner and restart the Mac again! Also, installing the driver apparently screwed up the permissions on my kernel extensions, which I discovered only accidentally through an alert by TinkerTool System. (DiskUtility doesn''t fix these particular permissions, but TinkerTool System does.)

On top of that, SilverFast seems to be almost as outdated as Epson Scan. I have eight virtual cores on my Mac, and when processing the scanned image, SilverFast uses just one!

Update 2 -It turned out I could get rid of the software errors described above by connecting with USB instead of Firewire. Maybe my adapting from Firewire 800 on the Mac to Firewire 400 on the scanner had something to do with it, or maybe my using a long Firewire cable, but neither was a problem with my old Microtek. In any case, I suggest you avoid using Firewire on this machine, at least with a current Mac. Luckily, using USB with SilverFast doesn''t seem to slow things down noticeably -though for some reason, SilverFast already scans considerably more slowly than Epson Scan.

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This scanner is wonderful! I work for my local historical society and this is the scanner that we use to do all of our digital preservation. We use it to scan large format negatives and it works like a dream.

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This is a awesome scanner. We are using it in our photo lab as a replacement to an old agfa duoscan. WOW...I love that several photos can be placed on the bed and scanned in two clicks!! Great color & well worth every penny!!

I''ve used a 1640XL for years. It is having problems and I decided to upgrade to the 10000XL. I found 2 main problems with this scanner.

The first has to do with the quality of the scan. The 10000XL introduces some darkening that is apparent in the white areas of the scanned image. I don''t know how to say this better. It looks like there is a dirty film on the glass, but there isn''t.

The second has to do with the obstacles the engineers put on top of the scanner to make scanning oversized images harder to scan in multiple sections. There is a post sticking up a few inches in the rear. There is also a raised edge on the right and rear sides of the glass.

When I got the first scanner in, I thought I simply had a defective item it happens. The second had the identical problem and I spent quite some time with the folks at Epson on the phone going over it.

I do fine art reproduction, so this is a problem for me. If I were scanning office documents, it wouldn''t be such a big deal, but then I wouldn''t have spent this much for a scanner.

If I explained this poorly, that does not mean there is not a problem. I have an all Epson shop, so this is very upsetting. I don''t have another replacement for my 1640XL.