Trying to get my ColorGetter3 Drumscanner Going

[minesix66]

Hi,

I am new to drum scanning and this is my first time using a drum scanner. Here are some questions that I have.


1. Do I connect the apple keyboard to the dongle on the back of the Mac. I think I have to use an adaptor because the keyboard has a usb port. Do I need to connect the mouse to the dongle?

2. What is the Diff Lock Silicone oil used for? What cleaner do you recommend for the drums? Do you like using the Scan Gel?

3. I have some Scan Science Lumina Scanning fluid that I used when I wet mounted my film for my Epson 4990 scanner. They said it is better than the Kami Fluid, would you use it?

4. I planned on mounting a 6x7 (Provia 400) transparency with the emulsion side down like they said in the manual, is this how you did it? What aperature would you recommend?

5. Is there anything I should pay attention to when I mount the film on the drum with the mounting station, doing the scanning or anything else that they have might not talked about in the manual.


I just powered up the scanner and I was able to get the drum to turn but it didn't scan. I was getting error readings from the Host (Dell) computer. Does anyone have an idea of what to do. My Samsung 940S won't work with the Dell is there a better monitor than the Princeton 17inch that I could buy? I am not able to get the Apple G3 to get into the operating system even though it does boot up. I did plug the monitor into the G3 and ran it seperate, the screen did show the software running, but wasn't displaying the video correctly.

[minesix66]

Here are some more pictures



I have another disk that says, "ColorGetter 3, Controller Software Version 5.3.4 P/N 38482-301 Rev D." I don't know if I should boot with this disk because it seems like it is a newer version as opposed to the one in the picture?

[Bruce Watson]

My. You bought a ColorGetter without getting any instruction on it, and you still managed to get all the pieces. That's a miracle by itself. Nearly all the old ColorGetters sold by people who didn't actually use them have lost the control unit (your little Dell) and are therefore nothing more than boxes of parts. I'm just sayin' that you did good. Really good.

Everything that follows is from memory. I have not tried to scan anything at all on my ColorGetter for a number of years. Five or six, maybe more. IDK. So... here goes nothing:

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You're getting a diskette driver error from the control unit because you don't have a diskette in the drive. That's what the control unit boots from. There is no hard disk. The thing is seriously old (early 1990s). There's a copy of the ColorGetter II maintenance manual out on the web. Look for it. Download it and print it (yes, it's big, and yes the copyright holder is long gone so you aren't violating any copyrights that anyone can find, and we did look). Yes, it's not for the 3 or 3Pro, but AFAIK there aren't any maintenance manuals known for them. And... the II is the basis for the all the 3s and Falcons and Eagles, so it's likely that Optronix never wrote a maintenance manual beyond the manual for the II.

What the manuals don't show you is that the power cable for the control unit connects to the back of the scan unit. Do not plug the control unit into a wall outlet and try to boot it manually. This way when you turn on the scan unit from the switch on the scan unit control panel, the scan unit will power on the control unit. If you don't have it setup this way, you're not going forward.

You have a 3Pro. Don't bother trying to boot off your ColorGetter 2 diskette; it will fail. Insert the ColorGetter 3 diskette into the diskette drive. Controller v5.3.4 is the latest version.

Do figure out how to make a backup of that diskette, and make one. You're not going to find another one. Ever.

Assuming you have the GPIB connected properly (don't know if you routed the cables as they should be), you turn on the system by first flipping the power button on the front of the scan unit (contains the scanner drum). This will power up both the scan unit and the control unit (your little Dell with the diskette in the drive). You have to do it this way; you can not boot the control unit manually. The scan unit has to power on the control unit to get the timing right. If everything is working, the scan unit will eventually move the carriage to find it's home position. It will first move the carriage all the way to the left (from your position at the control panel) to find the end-of-travel limit switch. Then it will reverse and move to the right to find the home position limit switch.

If it gets this far, it should display a message on the control panel that says it's ready. At this point you can press the drum door open switch and open the door and either pull the drum out, or load a drum you've already loaded with film. Prepping a drum is an art in itself. We'll get to that later.

At that point, start ColorRight Pro running on the Mac. You can probably start ColorRight Pro sometime after the scan unit starts moving the carriage to the left. If you start ColorRight Pro too early, the scan unit will not have established itself on the GPIB before ColorRight Pro looks for it. If ColorRight Pro looks but doesn't find it, everything comes to a halt. The only cure I've found is to shut down everything (Mac and scan unit) and start over. I'm talking hard boot, because you need to restart the GPIB. Just sayin' that it's better to start ColorRight Pro later rather than earlier.

If you get this far, with the scan unit saying it's ready, and no errors from ColorRight Pro on the Mac, you're done. You've successfully booted a drum scanner.

Now you have to put your prepped drum into the scanner, close the door, spin it up, and do most of the rest from the Mac using ColorRight Pro to run the system.

OK then. So endith this lesson.

You want more. I'm sure you do. Because I did when I went through (a decade+ ago) what your going through now. And the place to get that "more" is not here. Nice as the LFPF is, it's not the best place to ask ColorGetter questions. Because... I'm probably the only guy here with any ColorGetter experience. So hie thee to the Yahoo group ScanHi-End. While this group is almost entirely Aztek people now, there may still be three of four of us ColorGetter guys there. And there's other resources, like the excellent step-by-step Chris Brown tutorial on how to prep and load a drum (in the files section).

Now... this all sounds just so intimidating that it'll give you nightmares. But, it's not really anything like as bad as you probably think by now. It's certainly no worse a set of learning curves than trying to learn how to really use a view camera. The well kept secret of drum scanning is that it's actually pretty easy, once you've figured it out, if you're a detailed kind of person. It's just that the process contains a lot of steps, and each step builds on the last one, so there's no real room for screwing up. If you do a bad job of taping film to the drum, realize that there's little hope going forward, cut your losses, and strip the drum down, clean it up, and start over. Sounds easy, but it's a darned difficult lesson to learn.

And... all this is actually quite well worth it. A working and reasonably tuned ColorGetter 3Pro is a heck of a scanner. It can be seriously sharp, and has excellent smoothness and tonality. It's my favorite scanner. I like it a lot more than a Tango, and even more than an Aztek Premier, although everyone has their favorites.

Good luck with it. Let me know how far you get and what your next stumbling block is. I'll do what I can for you.

[minesix66]

Hey Bruce,

The problem was the floppy drive, it wasn't reading the diskette. I replaced it and it worked, so far. The only thing I can't do right now is scan because I think the dongle is not hooked to the keyboard. I have an apple USB keyboard hooked into the USB port and not through the dongle, so I ordered an apple Mac II adb keyboard with the mouse and was hoping this might work even though I was told the dongle only needed to be plugged in without the keyboard connected to it for the colorright software to work. I will try the boot sequence you described and hope that works. I do have all the Colorright manuals and color getter service manuals. I tried copying the files off the disk via DOS and Windows 98 but when I saved them to another disk the new disk didn't work. Still trying to figure this one out.

I did go to the Yahoo forum, but so far you are the only one who has responded to my questions.

Thanks for your help, I really appreciate it. I won't give up on the scanner and I am getting the hang of the mounting the film on the drum.

[Bruce Watson]

I tried copying the files off the disk via DOS and Windows 98 but when I saved them to another disk the new disk didn't work. Still trying to figure this one out.

In the old DOS world there was a difference between copying the files, and copying the disk. You'll have to figure out how to make an executable copy of the disk -- a disk image, not a bunch of files.

Are you running ColorRight Pro 2.0 or ColorRight 5.1? If you're going to be scanning any negatives, B&W or color, you'll want ColorRight Pro 2.0 because it will let you do 16 bit file saves. 5.1 is IMHO really only good for trannies. It might be possible to still buy a copy of Pro 2.0 from ColorByte Software. IDK.

In my system the ColorRight Pro 2.0 dongle plugs into the keyboard, and the keyboard cable runs between the MAC and the dongle.

Interesting that you're using a MAC that has a USB port. They quit making this equipment before USB was invented IIRC. So I'm surprised you've got a MAC that will talk USB. AFAIK, MacOS 9.2 is the latest version that will run ColorRight Pro 2.0; I'm surprised any version of MacOS has USB drivers. Live and learn.

[minesix66]

I think I might have ColorRight Pro 2.0 on the computer. I will take a pic of the monitor screen tomorrow and post.
I am Running the Dell 333 s/l with the powermac G3, it has 2 usb ports in the back of the computer.

I have an on going discussion on how to make the image file on the Yahoo Board right now. I am using Magic ISO I think I am doing it right.

[minesix66]

Hey Bruce,

I do have ColorRight 5.2 and disks labeled scanner drivers.

I was able to get the scanner going like you mentioned above. When I start CG 5.2 the Apple goes into Mac OS 9.2 and then tells me sorry, I can't find the ColorGetter!

When I get home I will post some pictures of the Dell Boot up screen, I don't know if that has anything to do with it. I am getting a diskette drive 1 seek failure but then I get a screen that shows everything is successfully installed. The pictures could explain it better.

I don't think I have ColorRight Pro 2.0

[Bruce Watson]

I was able to get the scanner going like you mentioned above. When I start CG 5.2 the Apple goes into Mac OS 9.2 and then tells me sorry, I can't find the ColorGetter!

Covered this is a previous post above. It's usually a timing issue of when you start the ColorRight software on the Mac.

[minesix66]

If it gets this far, it should display a message on the control panel that says it's ready. At this point you can press the drum door open switch and open the door and either pull the drum out, or load a drum you've already loaded with film. Prepping a drum is an art in itself. We'll get to that later.

At that point, start ColorRight Pro running on the Mac. You can probably start ColorRight Pro sometime after the scan unit starts moving the carriage to the left.

I did start ColorRight Pro 5.0 when the carriage went all the way back to it's initial position. Still getting error.

I noticed the Apple G3 isn't recognizing the GPIB possibly. I did take the board out and put it in my old Windows XP system it recognized it right away. I reinstalled on the G3 and it couldn't find it. Here is some pictures to show you what I did. When I click on the Interface box to set up the GPIB Card the PCI Slot is grayed out with every other area is solid black. IE bu

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[minesix66]

Here are the pictures