Just so folks are aware: the scanner that we're talking about is PC-only. It connects via the parallel port.

There's also a USB version, and maybe, although I'm not sure, a SCSI one too.

By the way, when I bought mine almost 2 years ago, I paid $145.00CDN for it, new; in other words: I paid dick. It works great (you can see examples of raw scans, unaltered, on my website). The res. is a little low (300 x 600, which really means 300 x 300), but that's not a problem, even for lineart images (you can scan in color or grayscale, and play with the image in PS). If you have a basic understanding of scanning techniques, you can produce some great stuff with that cheap piece of shit.

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Enormous Publications
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Are you sure? I spent a while looking to find evidence of a USB version of the A3 model, and couldn't find even a hint of it.

Nat, yes I'm positive about the USB version, and I'm pretty sure about the SCSI. I found this:

http://www.mustekdirect.com/products/prod_scan/a3ep/index.html


which seems to indicate that I am indeed right. The problem of course is to actually find one of them, in whatever configuration. I've seen them on ebay, and they go pretty high; 300-400 bucks US in one case, if I recall correctly.

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Enormous Publications
http://www.enormouspublications.com

Whoops, shit, I gave the wrong address. This is the right one:

http://www.eagledata.fi/Mustek_A3EP.htm


It looks Finish.

Or is that Finnish?

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Enormous Publications
http://www.enormouspublications.com

It does? I can't see anything on that page that mentions USB or SCSI. To the contrary, that page is specifically for the parallel port version of the scanner: "The Plug-n- Scan A3 EP plugs directly into the printer port on the back of your PC." (While many printers are now connected via USB, the term "printer port" in the PC world of the time meant a parallel port.) And checking their list of scanners in the drop menu, the A3 EP is the only A3 model on the list.

The fourth line next to the picture has the letters SCSI in it. So does the text at the bottom of the page. It must mean that they're talking about the SCSI version; it wouldn't make much sense to tell everybody that they don't come in SCSI, which is the only other possibility that I can see.

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Enormous Publications
http://www.enormouspublications.com

Also, I don't see mention of USB anywhere either (on the 2 pages I looked at), but I know for a fact that the A3EP (did) come in such a version.

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Enormous Publications
http://www.enormouspublications.com

I finally found a reference to a USB version of the A3:
http://www.mustek.com.tw/html/prod_scan/A3usb.html

Given the lack of any information about a USB version on the US page now and in the past, I suspect it (and the A3 SP) weren't released in the US.

Note that This page lists it as a new product -- although it is unclear when this page was updated! I find it listed in the catalog of a store in Beirut: http://www.microfolie.com/microfolie/new.htm
and a couple other places, but none in the US.

I'm reasonably sure that the Mustek USA site used to have all 3 versions listed as available.

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Enormous Publications
http://www.enormouspublications.com