Networked scanners are another one of those things that are simply incomprehensibly pricey; a quick search just turned up tens of devices which are selling for more than £900. And you don’t buy ease of use with that money: if you’re working in an office with people who aren’t very comfortable around computers, these machines can be intimidating and difficult to get to grips with.
So Eduardo Luis has come up with a cheap, and incredibly simple (single-button-simple) alternative to the brain-crampingly expensive off-the-shelf networked scanner, and has built a device using a Pi, a couple of LEDs, a resistor, a push button and an old scanner. Pop a document in the tray, push the button, and your document is scanned and sent to email automatically, with no further interaction from you. Here’s some explanatory video: Eduardo goes into more detail on his website.
We love watching you guys come up with ingenious ways of replacing expensive specialist equipment (see baby monitors, time lapse camera rigs, virtual analogue synthesisers – and, of course, the ubiquitous media centres) with the Raspberry Pi. Give us a shout via the Contacts page if you’ve got something similar you think we’d like to feature on this blog.
