Kodak P570 Personal Photo Scanner

One step up in size from the Kodak P460 Personal Photo Scanner ($99.99, 4 stars) that I reviewed a few months ago, the Kodak P570 Personal Photo Scanner ($99.99 direct), is aimed at the same consumer-level, casual photographers who need to scan photos. Like its sibling, it makes almost all of the setting decisions for you automatically, so you can scan without having to learn anything about those settings. Serious photographers probably won't like the lack of control, but the casual photographers it is meant for will appreciate how easy it is to use.

The two key differences between the P570 and its smaller sibling are that it can't scan strips of film or slides, but it can scan to a larger size, at a maximum 5 by 7 inches instead of 4 by 6. Beyond that it's basically the same scanner with all the same features.

Setup and Scanning
The P570 measures just 1.8 by 7.6 by 3.3 inches (HWD), which makes it bigger than the P460, but by only a little. The 5-inch wide manual feed slot in the front feeds straight through to an exit in the back, where you'll also find the power connector and a mini-USB connector. Also on the front is a memory-card slot. Setup is trivial. Simply plug in the supplied 2GB memory card, and connect the power cable.

To scan, you turn the scanner on, put a photo in one of the supplied protective sleeves, and insert the photo into the front input slot. The scanner will detect it, grab it, feed it, and scan the photo to a JPG file. The only setting you can control is resolution, with a button that switches between 300 pixels per inch (ppi) and 600 ppi.

After you've scanned to the memory card, you can move the files to your computer. Connect the scanner with the supplied USB cable, and the computer will recognize it as a USB drive, so you can copy the files. You can also scan directly to your computer instead of a memory card thanks to a utility that comes with the P570.

The only other software it comes with is Kodak EasyShare, which is basically a photo album program that also has commands to print, send to email, and send to Kodak's Creative Center. The Creative Center lets you turn your photos into photo books, photo mugs, and other products that you can order online, as well as turn them into greeting cards and other items you can print yourself.

One potential issue is the lack of a photo editor. However, you can't really take advantage of a photo editor without spending time learning how to use it, so that's consistent with the emphasis on ease of use. The assumption is that you can use the tools in your operating system, like the Windows ability to manage, print, and, to some minor extent, edit photos.

Scan Speed
The speed for manual feed scanners can be misleading, because it doesn't include the time you spend preparing each original or carefully feeding it so it will go in straight. With the P570, however, you really can scan almost as fast as the scanner can go.

The P570 manages this trick by coming with two protective sleeves and by taking long enough to scan so you can start a scan, remove the photo from the other sleeve, put it away, insert a new photo in the sleeve, and have it ready to go when the current scan finishes. The only extra time will be the few seconds you need to insert the next photo into the feed slot.

I timed the scanner, at a consistent 15 to 17 seconds at 600 ppi, and 14 to 15 seconds at 300 ppi, for scanning 4-by-6 inch photos to the memory card. Scanning to a computer took only a second or two longer at 300 ppi, but almost twice as long at 600 ppi.

In comparison, the P460 and the almost identical Pandigital Personal Photo & Negative Scanner/Converter PanScn05 ($109.99 direct, 4 stars), which both use a smaller sleeve because of their 4-by-6 maximum scan size, took 10 seconds with the same photos at 300 ppi. The key point, though, is that except when scanning to a computer at 600 ppi, the P570's times are fast enough so you're not likely to get impatient waiting for it to finish.

Scan Quality
Scan quality, unfortunately, is not a strong point, with a loss of resolution that comes out looking like soft focus if you reprint the scans and a loss of both shadow detail (detail based on shading in dark areas) and detail based on shading in bright areas. However, the quality is good enough for casual photographers who just want to get their snapshots into digital format and don't mind losing some quality in the process.

If you need better image quality, you should be looking at flatbed scanners, like the Editors' Choice Epson Perfection V300 Photo ($99.99 direct, 4 stars), instead of a sheet fed scanner. The process of scanning will necessarily be more cumbersome with a flatbed, and you may have to learn more about scan settings, but the quality will be better. On the other hand, if you're just looking for snapshot quality, want an easy way to scan your storehouse of photos, and have at least some that are as large as 5 by 7 inches, the Kodak P570 Personal Photo Scanner can certainly do the job. It may even be your preferred choice.

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