35mm Slide Viewer, 3X Magnification and Desk Top LED Lighted

I had old slides from 1996 when I went to Bosnia to help in a hospital. This scanner was cheap and did all that I needed. What astonished me most was the poor quality of pictures that I took back then. This picture is the old bridge in Mostar that was destroyed in the Balkans war. I was worried that this scanner (which of course does not scan, but takes photos) would not be up to the task, but it certainly was. I found the brightness adjustment was useful, but the RGB controls are not needed (better to edit after the scan). Others have noted that it is difficult to push thin slides through. I solved this problem by taking a piece of plywood, 2 mm thick, and cutting a pusher that was 50 mm x 130 mm. You can then push single thin slides very nicely and scan 100 or so in no time at all. Excellent value for money. I read a review saying that Kodak badged similar scanners (much more expensive) are no better. That may well be true. Certainly I would not need a better scanner for my pictures. It is good to be able to use it independent of a computer. The screen is pretty good. But at times I did connect it to my computer with the included HDMI cable.

This is a great little gadget. Before buying I reviewed a good number of the similar scanners including finding reviews on YouTube. It looks to me as if all these things are basically the same, though some have a bit more functionality. They all seem to scan to 22MP, they all have brightness and colour modification and they all need a memory card, they all have multiple adaptors for various types of film and slides and they all power off a USB. The main differentiator is really the screens. This one has a five inch screen and is roughly half the price of a Kodak 5 inch screen equivalent. Perhaps it has a much superior screen, but the functionality is the same.

Some things to note. I was digitising old slides taken by a relative and have not used the film accessories. The slides do occasionally ride over each other and jam in the feeder. It is very simple to remove the feeder (which clicks very satisfactorily into position) and sort them out. The slides only feed in one way, landscape. If you have slides that have been taken portrait you have to scan them landscape and re-orientate with a photo editor. It is very simple.

It works very well, the screen is good enough to see easily what you are doing (I would not want to go smaller). I was able to work the machine without reference to the instructions, which when I did look at them were pretty good. I powered it off my battery block as it gave me more room to work than having it hitched up to my computer. A USB to USB_C cable is provided, as is a plug for the USB end, but unless you want to sit right by a socket to work a battery block is the way to go.

I used the brightness adjuster on quite a number of the photos and the colour saturation on only a couple. You can’t really go wrong. The worst that is going to happen is that you have to scan something again. Each scan is indexed 1 to x, so you can track what each scan is. Most of my slides were annotated, so this feature was useful for identifying who or what was the subject of each photo.

Once you have copied what you want switch the cable to the computer and download the photos and sort. It really is very easy.

Overall I would say you don’t really need any more than this.