Just to make a side note: for a sustained transfer Firewire is still beating USB2.0 attaining full ~40 MB/s (or even more) whilst USB2.0 performance is still highly-depedent on particular drivers and chipsets. So far having USB2.0 HDD remote device I wasn't able to go over 17 MB/s hooked up to my USB2.0 capable MB. If there is choice of IEEE1394 vs USB2.0, I woudl certainly vote for Firewire (not to be fogotten that teh USB also captures CPU resources - about 20-30%, while Firewire is peer-to-peer almost freeing your CPU completely for another tasks).
Alex --- Ellis Vener <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > On Friday, October 17, 2003, at 06:13 AM, Thys wrote: > > > Hi > > > > After hunting everywhere for a proper review of the Minolta 5400, > and > > not > > really finding any, I decided to buy the thing. I have been playing > > > around > > with it for a short while only, but I thought I'll share my initial > > impressions with the group... I have made several > > scans with a Canon FS4000 which I borrowed for a while and > therefore > > can > > compare the Minolta with scans made with the Canon. > > > ... > > Compared to the FS4000 on a 2.4GHz P4 with 512Mb RAM on Win2k, I > found > > the > > following: > > - Scan times: At highest resolution, it is slower than the Canon. > > Using an > > Adaptec SCSi card on the Canon, I was doing 4 scans @ 4000dpi with > > Fare on > > and 3x multi scan (on Vuescan) in about 1 hour. On the Minolta, 4 > > scans on > > Vuescan with Ice on Medium at 3x multi scan took about 1hour 15 > minutes > > using USB1. I was rather hoping for the Minolta to be a bit faster, > but > > maybe if I upgrade to USB 2 or get Firewire... > > three items here: > 1.) at full resolution the Minolta (@5400ppi and true 16 bit per > channel color depth) is going to be creating larger data files than > the Canon FS4000. > 2.) Firewire and USB 2.0 are much, much faster than regular USB, > which > I assume you were using. USB 2.0 maybe faster than firewire depending > > on the implementation. > 3.) ICE will slow you down. > > > > - Image quality - Colour: Looking at the scans side by side, I > noticed > > that > > the Canon's colours are much richer and saturated than the Minolta. > The > > Minolta looked duller by comparison, but I hope I can improve that > > with some > > scan settings. The true colour of the slide (Fuji Velvia) was > actually > > somewhere in between these two results. > > What color space (workspace) are you using? Is your monitor > accurately > calibrated and profiled? > > > - Image quality - sharpness: The Canon was definitely sharper and > more > > snappy on the same image. This could be (and I suspect it is) the > > effect of > > Digital Ice vs Canon Fare. I intend to do another test with Ice off > > (unfortunately I scanned all my Canon samples with Fare on) The > > difference > > was very obvious and before sharpening, the Minolta scans looked > > pretty bad > > compared to the Canon's. > > > - Dynamic range: I was very upbeat when I saw the amount of shadow > > detail > > and low shadow noise recorded by the Minolta as compared to the > Canon, > > until > > I looked at the highlight detail. The highlights in the Minolta was > > > much > > more blown out than on the Canon. I noted that, for example in a > > landscape > > with clouds, I could make out a lot more subtle white variations in > the > > clouds of the Canon scan than the Minolta. It is clear to me that I > > > have > > some exposure settings to tune. I suspect, in spite of the much > higher > > specification of the Minolta in DRange, there won't not that much > > difference > > between the 2 in the end. I'll do more testing there. > > > - Other: File sizes are, off course huge (200Mb plus). At high > > resolutions > > the difference in pixel size between the two scanners does become > quite > > obvious (which is why I bought it in the first place). I also noted > > > that > > there were some artifacts visible in one or two places of the > Minolta > > scan > > (like a line with a few disjointed pixels running across the width > of > > the > > scan) I wonder if that has anything to do with the scan speed (it > stops > > several times during the duration of a scan). I saw something > similar > > in the > > Canon scans, using USB, until I plugged it into the SCSI card and > it > > disappeared. (With the SCSI, the Canon scanned continuously, > without > > stopping) > > > > I don't have any definite conclusions yet, because I would be doing > a > > lot > > more scanning and testing with the new Minolta, but so far, I just > > realized > > that that the Canon FS4000 is in fact a remarkable scanner for the > > money, > > compared to the Minolta which is, at least on paper, the best > available > > today. > > > > Regards > > Thys > > > > Thys, > > Thanks for this first look. I think in general you are going to b > helped by more RAM and switching from USB to USB 2.0 or Firewire. > what > would really like to see is a Firewire 800 implementation as it is a > 2x > faster standard than Firewire or USB 2.0 > > > Ellis Vener > Atlanta, GA > > "I believe in equality for everyone, except reporters and > photographers." - Mahatma Gandhi > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe > filmscanners' > or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message > title or body __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Shopping - with improved product search http://shopping.yahoo.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Unsubscribe by mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED], with 'unsubscribe filmscanners' or 'unsubscribe filmscanners_digest' (as appropriate) in the message title or body
