Best scanning software for OS X?

[slackerinabox]

I have two scanners (one with an automatic document feeder) and the default software that comes with the scanners are a bit craptastic. Does anything similar to Presto page manager exist for OSX? I like to archive pdfs so multipage scanning via ADF and simple document management would be great.

Thanks!

 

[mike2fix]

I looked for quite some time for suitable scanning software for the Mac and found nothing. I cannot believe the state of scanning software on a Mac, agree the built in imaging software is terrible. I downloaded every shareware/trial/freeware scanning software that I could find and ended up using Windows software in a VM or in Bootcamp.

 

[Eug]

I just use Image Capture, but for multiple page documents, my networked scanner does multiple pages --> single PDF automatically anyway, and saves it to a CompactFlash card which I access through the network.

 

[SKORPI0]

I've been using VueScan both for OS X and Windows. Works on wireless AIO devices too. Lot's of drivers for old scanners.
Scan a book and save it as a single pdf file. :thumbsup:

 

[ismay]

Here's another vote for VueScan from Hamrick software, www.hamrick.com. The software works with a huge variety of scanners and is incredibly feature rich. However, it's also simple enough for those interested in just obtaining a high quality scan without a huge amount of fuss. It's great for use with a flatbed scanner for getting the highest quality images.

However, if you're just interested in scanning docs into OCR aware PDFs, I don't think that there is a simpler package solution than the Scan Snap scanners and software from Fujitsu. The benefits of the Scan Snap and similar scanning systems for Macs are discussed in Mac Power Users podcasts MPU 003 and MPU085. The latter podcast is about going Paperless and David Sparks' new e-book of the same title. "Paperless" is available in iTunes and is highly recommended.

If you're just looking for software to scan to PDF, you might check out the ABBY Fine Reader. It is included as part of the software package supplied by Fujitsu with its Scan Snap scanners. Can't comment on the ABBY product alone because I've not used it without the rest of the integrated software system supplied by Fujitsu.

 

[slackerinabox]

Thanks for the Vuescan suggestion, but it's crashing on start. I'll troubleshoot tonight but my scanner isn't mentioned specifically (lists "Kodak AIOs," not my particular model). Or it could just be another weird Lion incompatibility.

Re: Scan Snap -google shows that it's a hardware product and not software. Is Abby Fine reader the software that they use? I'll check that out as well. OCR is a nice touch but I'm more interested in just scanning/archiving the documents for reprinting later (bills, receipts, etc. nothing academic).

Thanks again for all the suggestions!

 

[atechwatcher]

I downloaded the app and was able to scan from an Epson Artisan 837 and an HP OfficeJet Pro 8500 A909g. Both are a little old and the Epson stopped working with their software on my last MAC OSX upgrade (10.9.2).

VueScan worked first time and has a nice UI. I bought the standard edition for $39.95. Purchase flow was quick, easy and I am good to go.

Scanned a color high end doc to PDF and a normal text doc to a JPG and both worked as expected. Very pleased (of course this is hour 1 of using it).

Thank you SKORPIO and others for posting the recommendation.