GiiNii GN-5LS NuLife Full Page Picture Scanner with 2.4-Inch LCD Screen-Black

This was for my husband. He is an avid genealogist and wanted this to take with him when he visits family members as he can scan any old pictures they may share during his visit. Then he uploads those images to his computer when he returns home. It is simple and pretty easy to use for those like us who are not so techno-savvy.

When I decided to do a little spring cleaning last month, I unearthed five or six boxes of old print pictures, some that were in a trunk belonging to my parents and even their parents. Print film has been around longer than I realized. The task was daunting, but I started, none-the-less, using my flat-bed scanner. After about an hour of that, I realized this was not going to get the job done. I quickly researched several scanners and chose the GiiNii among several that looked about the same. So far, I have scanned about 3,000 prints and the GiiNii is still ticking. It is very simple and fast. You just feed the photo (bare or with the provided plastic folder) into a slot and in just seconds the scanning is done. A LED screen lets you see the result, just in case you need a do-over. I did not give the GiiNii five stars because it does have occasional glitches. As other reviewers have indicated, it sometimes leaves a horizontal line in lower portion of the scanned photo. It also occasionally cuts off the top of vertically scanned photos. These are completely random events and does not happen often, but it happens. If a photo is cropped at the top, I simply delete it, and scan again inserting the photo the other way. You can rotate photos before finalizing the deal. The horizontal lines are usually so faint, it does not detract from the picture. If you were later going to blow it up to a 11 x 14, it would probably not be what you want. They recommend calibrating it every now and then, which is simple, but as far as I can tell, not entirely necessary. There is also a cleaning process that I used only once, just because I was curious how it worked. I like the fact that you can scan to an SD Card, then when time permits, download to a computer. As you can tell from the picture of the unit (if you are looking at one), it is very small and compact, about 12 x 3. It does not need to be hooked to computer to operate, which makes it very portable. Long story short, there are probably several good scanners out there, but for the price and durability (so far), I am very happy with this little gizmo.

The website says the scanner is Mac compatible, but I could not get 2 different iMacs to recognize the scanner. I emailed GiiNii customer support and was told to call and they would submit it as a warranty claim. No thanks. Brand new unit? Sorry. If you think the LCD screen is a helpful addition, dont count on it. The angle the screen is at makes viewing only possible if you are directly over the top of the screen. If it is a foot or so away you really cannot see the screen. In addition, the resolution of the images on the screen really isn;t good enough to let you know how the finished scan looks. I returned it and purchased a Pandigital Portable scanner. Not much more luck with that one.

This thing was totally non functional. We sent it back.

It works great if you can get it to clean. Out of the box it must have had dust particulates in it because the pictures came out scratched, where no scratches existed. I ran the cleaner through it about 15 times before it was finally acceptable. Since its not a hinged opening keeping the dust out and cleaning it is more of a problem than using a normal scanner. If your just using it for documents it should work just fine.

I probably have at least a couple of photos. Im scanning them into the computer so I can either give them away to family members or put them in scrapbooks. You can scan right to an SD card then insert the card into the computer and copy or you can copy straight to the computer. The only problem I have with it is the little plastic sleeve you are supposed to put your picture in to scan it. It has streaks on it, and it will only hold up to a 4x6, but the machine will scan up to an 8x10. I probably shouldnt be doing it, but I just quit using the plastic sleeve and started scanning with out it. I found that mine makes streaks on the photo if I scan it all the way to the right which is the way you are supposed to do it. There is a little trigger to the right side that tells the machine you have a photo in it to scan. I discovered if I used a white piece of paper to feed through with the photo, I could move the photo to the left and miss the streaky part. I also found that if you have a dark photo, it has to have a white frame around it: ie the white paper, or it wont scan the whole photo. Sounds like there are a lot of problems with it but reallly its no trouble to make the adjustments I made and its probably only my machine. It was more trouble to send it back. I WOULD definitely buy it again!!! Most of the other scanners I found only scanned up to a size 4x6 which doesnt work for me at all!

Love the scanner. Easy to use. But after about 200 photos it has developed a line, looks like scratches, through the image. Cleaning doesnt help. Maybe I can contact Customer Service for help.

Feed can cause a mark on pictures.

HH disc will not work...Ive tried several...will return product after I contact company

Love this and it s amazing, totally satisfied!