Travelling Light: Personal Document Scanners
Small, lightweight personal scanners—such as the imageFORMULA P-215II Scan-tini—offer an on-the-go document capture solution. Here’s what makes them the ultimate accessory for any road warrior.
Not every office has a desk and chair in a company building. For some, it’s a makeshift cubicle on any unoccupied tabletop; for others, it’s whatever bureau their latest hotel room offers. And for others—such as truck drivers—there’s simply no fixed address. Whether you’re going from city to city, spending the week on the road or working remotely for the day, having the ability to capture and store documents digitally means less piled up paperwork. Small and unsuspecting on the surface, personal document scanners bring the power of document capture to any workspace. Here’s what makes them the ultimate road warrior for every work environment.
They’re Portable
Personal scanners can easily be carried in a briefcase thanks to their compact and lightweight design. They don’t wire their user down with cable clutter as most are powered by a single USB cable when connected to a computer. Users can digitalize their paper trail anywhere and everywhere—a truck driver can scan a bill of lading from the comfort of their cab, for example, or an executive can scan receipts for their expense report while waiting out time at an airport gate.
They’re Productive
Portable scanners that are duplex—that is, they can scan both sides of a document in a single pass—and have automatic document feeders (ADF) boost productivity in any office setting. With a flatbed scanner, you have to handle every page individually. With an ADF, you can set multiple pages in the feeder, hit go and scan a stack of pages while you tend to other business. Mobile models offer impressive scan speed for their compact, travel-size body. And that speed often applies to both scanning images and scanning directly to a searchable PDF format. Many also allow you to program your own short-key commands by configuring regular scan jobs to one-touch memory.
They’re Flexible
They’re called personal “document” scanners, but they deliver more capture capability than just letter-size pages. Beyond business documents, they have the ability to scan tax forms, receipts, photos, even plastic, embossed cards such as driver’s licenses. Some scanners—such as the imageFORMULA P-215II—come with dedicated card readers that allow, for example, a mortgage broker or insurance agent to scan a client’s identification on site.
They’re Convenient
Portable scanners are ready to work when you are. “Plug-and-scan” capabilities means there’s no extra time spent downloading software or drivers. More recent models offer optional wireless adapters that allow you to scan to mobile devices. Digitizing files not only minimizes the accumulation of paperwork and keeps you organized on the road, but it also makes it quicker and easier for you to retrieve data when it’s needed.
They’re Precise
All Canon personal document scanners use the same imaging technology as Canon cameras. Their CMOS Contact Image Sensor ensures crisper image capture and easier text readability. Almost every scanner has at least 600 ppi (pixels per inch) optical resolution, high enough to clearly capture any document. They’re even able to handle documents with less decipherable details: some models have features to help improve the legibility of hard-to-scan documents.
They’re Compatible
Bundled with ISIS/TWAIN drivers and Mac TWAIN drivers, portable scanners are an ideal solution whether you operate in a Windows or a Mac environment. Embedded software can assist with document management, allowing you to scan directly to cloud applications such as Google Drive, Dropbox, Microsoft SharePoint and more. Additionally, standard Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technology converts images or documents with written text into searchable, editable files.
Ready, Set, Scan
The performance capabilities of many portable scanners means there’s no need to sacrifice productivity for space. Here, for example, is what the imageFORMULA P-215II can do.
Canon imageFORMULA P-215II
Compact in size only, the imageFORMULA P-215II Scan-tini document scanner comes complete with built-in card scanner and produces high quality imaging that brings sophistication to mobile information capture, storage and collaboration.