Portable Scanner Doxie Adds some Zing to Scanning
Posted in: Accessories and Peripherals, portable, Today's Chili
Scanner-printer combos are one of those gadgets that gather dust in most houses. But Doxie, a lightweight portable, paper scanner that started shipping this week, could just make scanners cool again.
“Document scanners are frustrating and poorly designed,” says Travis J. Hicks, chief operating officer of Doxie in a statement. “Doxie is portable, USB powered, and comes with elegant software that scans paper directly to web apps like Google Docs, Evernote, Acrobat, and Flickr.”
Apparent, the company which makes Doxie, had announced the device at the Consumer Electronics Show in January.
The $129 device works with both PCs and Mac. To scan, plug Doxie in, insert the document and the device draws up a PDF copy.
At just about half a pound (10.9 ounces) Doxie is easy to carry around and can scan documents in full color at up to 600 dpi. The software bundled with the device has photo editing features and an easy way to connect with online photo sites such as Picasa and Flickr. And it can save files in PDF, JPEG or PNG format.
The ability to upload files to sites such as Evernote and Scribd is neat and Doxie also offers users a short URL that they can use for sharing files. There’s no wireless connectivity so you will have to plug the scanner into a USB port to upload files or photos.
Still, the Doxie seems like a handy device to have and could probably make itself much more useful than conventional scanners at home.
There’s one weird thing about it. It has Pepto-Bismol pink hearts over it and a button with a large heart etched on it that starts the scanning. We understand Doxie wants to be cute but really pink hearts? It’s difficult to understand why anyone who doesn’t watch Hannah Montana might want that on their gadget.
Photo: Doxie
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