Minolta Scan Dual III

[brian_bryce1]

I am interested to hear from people who own or have used this scanner,

what they think of it. Also I am interested in seeing some scans,

perferably some at 100% (cropped I guess). I have read the stuff at

imaging-resource and steves but wish to know more.

[robert goldstein]

I, too, am interested in this scanner. It seems to be the same

unit as the Dimage Scan Elite II, but does not have Digital ICE3

or Firewire connection. The Scan Dual III has software dust

removal, which is much more likely to affect image sharpness.

In my mind, the only reason to choose it over the Scan Elite II is

price.

[gbaida]

I have just got it. It reads through dark part of slide better than Dual II. Dust removal capability impressed me, even though they say it is not the best. Color is beautiful. With 8-passes, dust removal and USB1.1 it is slow, but with USB2.0 should be fast

[._._z]

I read that plug-in boards containing USB 2.0 ports are or will be available for under $20.

[elliot_n]

I've had the Scan Dual III for about a fortnight. It's a nice scanner.

 

It's greatest flaw is the Minolta Scan software, which, with all but the flatest

negatives, will clip either the highlights or the shadows or both. The only

solution is to scan in 'color positive' mode and then invert in Photoshop. I'm

hoping that Minolta will address this shortcoming with a software update.

 

At the moment I am scanning B&W negatives (as positives) and I'm quite

amazed at the quality of prints I'm getting out of my Epson 890. They're

more than a match for my old darkroom 8"x10"s - exhibiting excellent

sharpness, well-defined grain, and lots of highlight and shadow detail. I've

been getting these results with XP2 and, more suprisingly, over-exposed

Neopan 1600.

[mendel_leisk]

This is somewhat off topic, my experience is 11 months with Minolta Dimage Scan Dual II. Confirming what Elliot Nicholson is saying regarding Minolta software, I spent 8 months scanning 1800 black and white negatives, and was literally on last image when I tried scanning as color slide instead of black and white negative. After a lot of experimentation, I'm currently using Vuescan exclusively. Some thoughts and ideas:

 

1. I recollect a poster saying something to the affect that by the time you get a fair way into a scanning project, you will realize things you could have done better on your first scans, and you will want and need to go back and redo these. This is about the only benefit I've realized from Minolta's software.

 

I recollect another poster saying to someone with a big scanning project ahead, that they would be broken backed, bug-eyed and carpal syndrome by the time it was done. Bottom line, you need to pace yourself.

 

2. I'm scanning black and white with Minolta Dimage Scan Dual II with Vuescan with settings:

 

Device Tab:

 

Media type: Image

 

(For provia100, I settled on color slide|Ektachrome, but for black and white I'm sticking with image)

 

Bits per pixel: 48 RGB

 

Color Tab:

 

Color balance: Neutral

 

Black point (%): 0

 

White point (%): 0

 

Image Curve: log dark

 

(very occasionally, I'll go to gamma, or adjust brightness a bit. Scan from disk using raw file is handy for this. It's good practice to just save Vuescan's raw file first, so you don't need to handle negs. again)

 

Brightness: 1

 

All Spaces: sRGB

 

Subsequent in Photoshop: invert, clip 0.1% each channel (rgb), convert to grey scale, clean and final save as 8 bit per channel.

 

3. I'm curious, does Minolta Dimage Scan Dual III manual continue to specify emulsion up? After some trials, I'm following their suggestion. It requires that you specify Device|Mirror in Vuescan to avoid mirrored image. I also specify focus for each scan, focus point roughly at middle. You may want to offset focus a little, to average out, but that can be a crap shoot, if you check focus at various points manually in Vuescan, they can be all over the map. Center works pretty good, especially if your main interest is centred.

 

Please have a look at my first (Minolta) and second (Vuescan) efforts following. I've gone a little bigger than photo.net's stipulation of 800 largest image dimension, to show a little more detail:

[mendel_leisk]

Second sample:

[brian_bryce1]

Anyone else, any samples from this exact scanner, is the software still the same, etc?

[joey_beeson]

I am researching film scanners for a college classroom. Is this

the same build as a Scan Elite? Do you think the quality will

stand up to student (ab)use?

 

I'm seriously considering buying about eight of these scanners.

Any advice would be appreciated. Also we are using Mac G4s

with OS X. Does the VueScan software support OS X? Is there a

plug in for Photoshop 7 in OSX?

 

Thanks,

 

Joel

[mark_hyams]

This scanner sounds like an amazing buy, and it seems to be almost identical to the scan elite II, except for the Digital ICE, but I noticed one difference on the minolta website. The dynamic range for the scan dual III is listed as: "4.8 (computed)" while the scan elite II is listed as: "4.8". What's the deal with this computed thing? Is the 4.8 for the scan dual III only accurate if you do an 8x scan?

[brian_bryce1]

I assume that just mean that it is the theoretical DMax based on the CCD, the resolving power of the lens, etc. Instead of them measureing it directly by some physical test.

[brian_bryce1]

Well I finally got one for and have done some tinkering. Here is a 100% crop:

<BR><BR>

<img src="http://glue.umd.edu/~bryceb/100percent.jpg">

<BR><BR>

all that has been done is the dust brush, a histogram adjustment (I just set it so that the range was from black to white by sliding the end points), and the use of AdobeRGB. Also of note is the picture was taken with the focus at infinity. So perhaps this isn't the best sample blow up. Hopfully I will be able to pos something more soon.

<BR><BR>

I also have a 50% reduced copy and sharpened of the full scan <a href="http://glue.umd.edu/~bryceb/lookouthills.jpg">here</a>.

<BR><BR>

I hope to put up a detailed overview of the scanner sometime soon as there aren't really good reviews with samples.

[brian_bryce1]

Here is another(one of my father's pictures), no adjustments except for color space<BR><BR>

here is 100% crop:

<BR>

<IMG src="http://glue.umd.edu/~bryceb/flower100.jpg">

<BR>

here is a crop at 25% with a USM:

<IMG src="http://glue.umd.edu/~bryceb/flowercrop.jpg">

[brian_bryce1]

Noticed a green color cast assocated with the sRGB and adobeRGB color spaces, so I have rescanned the first picture without the color correction on, it is more brown now, probably more like it acutally was. I don't think it would be noticable on the flower so I haven't redone it.

[jimvanson]

I bought this, my first scanner last week. I intend to use it exclusively for B&W negs, both chromogenic and silver based. Dust removal is not an issue, performance is! I was attracted to this scanned because of the price / performance that several articles dwelled on.. My theory is learn on a inexpensive scanner. In a year or so I�ll know what I�m doing and what medium format scanner will suit me the best. Then I�ll drop the big bucks, probably sharing the unit with two or three friends. So what are my impressions? Minolta�s software and software support suck. There is no Minolta web site to go to if your in trouble. The scanner software would not install on my XP Pro machine. I�m a bit of a computer guy so I took a spare drive, installed Win 2000 on it and then installed the scanner software on that drive. That got me running. Once you start scanning you�ll find the software is brain dead...it is VERY user unfriendly and it will lock up. I�ve spent the past hour trying to scan one neg. Some of the user unfriendliness will disappear as I get more comfortable with the scanner but this is an area that MUST BE addressed by Minolta. And the locking up? Only time will tell. I will add my impressions of scan quality in the several days. If anyone has a specific question or suggestion re; operation or testing please feel free to ask.

[robert goldstein]

Jim,

 

If Vuescan can support this scanner, it would seem to be a simple and

inexpensive solution to the software problem.

[brian_bryce1]

Jim,

Here is some stuff that may help:

It does work under Vuescan, but I had several times when vuescan would freeze. On the other hand I have had no problems whatsoever with the minolta software, installing or otherwise.

 

VIA usb controllers are extremely temperamental in the older revisions (I do not know about the new ones) but my VIA133A south bridge had several timing issues, and would "lock" many devices (Canon scanner and an epson printer) as the data stream was interrupted. If you have another computer altogether or a friend�s I would suggest trying it on that. If that seems to fix it you may wish or get an independent USB controller on a PCI card. My Adaptec card has had no issues as of yet. (PS turn off the on board USB controllers in the BIOS if you get an add in card).

[jimvanson]

Brian... I'm pretty sure your correct about the VIA USB controller being the problem re; scanner lock-up. The Via drivers may also be the reason I can't install the software on my XP Pro drive. That drive has been faithfully running XP for more then a year. During that time I've installed/uninstalled hundreds of progs...my registry must be a nightmare! The scanner would not install on w2k initally. I had to download VIA's newest USB drivers for it to work. When I appempted to install those same drivers in XP Pro the would not install. So no scanner on that system yet. I'm going to try the vuescan software this evening. Thanks For Telling Me About It Guys!. If I don't like the way that works I'll look at the Adaptec card. TKX for all...jim

[b_friedman]

I too am looking at this scanner. However I have a Via based mobo and have had a heck of a problem getting the USB ports to work right. My epson printer and canon flatbed scanner both caused bad crashes.

 

For me the problem was not just VIA's known issues with USB drivers, it was also related to what is called a 'loop lockup'. I will have to see if I can find the link that helped me fix it, but for me it turned out to be related to my vid card drivers. First make sure you have the latest 4-in-1's and the USB filter.

 

Apparently this can happen in win98 or xp. Do a google for 'Staying out of the loop' (I can't right now otherwise I would track the page down for you.)

 

Hopefully when I get the dual III my problems won't come back :P

[b_friedman]

Found it:

 

http://www.viaarena.com/?PageID=77