Originally posted by: OdiN
If you can find out the voltage and amperage that the scanner needs, you should be able to get an adjustable wall wart from radio shack and accompanying connectors to fit your scanner.
Make sure the Radio Shack supply is a regulated type, as the older Radio Shack adjustable supplies were unregulated and at typical (not yet scanning) low load would float to a significantly higher voltage. Also some adjustable supplies only go up to 12V while the scanner might run a little higher, 12V is commonly used by I have seen a few (non-HP) that used 15V.
By the original description of the cable as "regular" I would suspect it's a typical DC barrel connector, which comes in various sizes so the OD (outer diameter) and ID (inner diameter) will need to match, or a couple best-guess connector sizes might be bought and the right one soldered onto the PSU leads (observing correct polarity which is "often", but not guaranteed to be, outside ground and inside positive power).
Once the needed voltage is found, with a regulated supply the current can be fudged a little so long as it is enough. In other words I would expect a common 1A current, 1.5A at most, is sufficient for a typical scannner and actually scanner actual consumption is a bit less than that.
A few online electronics surplus 'sites may have what you need for example MPJA, BGMicro, AllElectronics, Electronic Goldmine, Excess-Solutions to name a few. As an example at BGMicro,
http://www.bgmicro.com/index.a...n=VIEWCATS&Category=99
you'd want the type they're calling switchers, not one with no mention of switching or regulated, and "probably" not one that is linear (regulated) because the linear type waste a lot of power, create more heat and linear is not needed for a scanner.
BGmicro also has a few sizes of the barrel connectors if the original connector is not right like these:
http://www.bgmicro.com/index.a...n=VIEWPROD&ProdID=9505
http://www.bgmicro.com/index.a...=VIEWPROD&ProdID=11124
Unfortunately BGMicro (and some others) don't describe their parts very well, these should be 5.5mm OD and the 2.1 or 2.5mm are ID measurements. These two sizes seem to be the most common barrel connectors used on most equipment but check yours... visually it can be hard to tell 2.1 from 2.5 ID unless you have a 2.1mm ID you know is 2.1 and it won't plug into the socket, but if you can tell it's 5.5mm OD then buying both is only 25/50 cents more.
If the scanner takes 12V a random suggestion would be the following then if you can't discriminate whether it's 2.5 or 2.1mm ID (and can that it's 5.5mm OD), also throw a 2.1mm ID connector as linked above into the order. This supply certainly is capable of more current than the scanner needs (I just don't know about the voltage) which is ok since it's regulated, and ok since at surplus pricing it isn't costing much if any more for that increased current capability.
http://www.bgmicro.com/index.a...=VIEWPROD&ProdID=12293
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