It seems that the collective wisdom here is that the current generation Kodak/Creo/Scitex flatbeds are phenomenally good. Unfortunately, they'd break the bank for me and domestic logistics prohibit setting up a LF enlarger (even though used ones are remarkably cheap these days). In fact, domestic logistics prohibit even setting up my current MF enlarger. Thus, I find myself being dragged, kicking and screaming, into the hybrid age (as someone who has earned his living as a softwaore engineer on high-end supercomputers for the last 3 decades, I find this somewhat ironic ;-) ). Recently, some of the older Scitex flatbeds (notably the 342) have been appearing on the auction sites for not much more than the high-end Epson/Microtek "prosumer" scanners. I can't find any technical documentation for these scanners on the web (not surprising after a succession of corporate takeovers), so I thought I'd ask my questions here.
1) These scanners advertise >5K dpi - is that true over the entire bed, or is resolution reduced outside of the sweet spot? Since I'm mainly interested in MF and LF scanning, what can I expect on 6x6 and 4x5? What about if I go completely nuts and start shooting 11x14?
2) What sort of Dmax is reasonable to expect?
3) How, in general do they compare to the IQSmartN (N=1,2,3) scanners? How about to the "prosumer" (Gad, I hate that term) flatbeds from Epson and Microtek?
4) Can one use mounting fluid with these scanners?
5) Any other suggestions for used high-end scanners?
Thanks!
Steve
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