ScanMate drum scanner DIY maintenance, troubleshooting, mods

Armando, I believe there is no way to get a raw file from the scanner without silverfast according to multiple comments. There are ways to minimize it but even with that, there is still some USM applied to the scans.

meloV8 said:
Pali, only Silverfast scanning raw without USM :/
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Unfortunately, the product is priced to be way out of my budget. Currently listed for $1,999.00
 
Try to negotiate the price. For sure you will get a good discount. In the package you get also a Silverfast HDR, which you can process the RAW scans from other scanners.
 
Seems like both CQ and Newcolor fiddle with the output. Such a shame really. At least there's a good alternative for the Tango. I wish Silverfast was available for the Scanmates as well. Really tired of the softning filter QC applies when scanning 16 bit, it makes the grain look artificial and downright ugly at times.
 
Kamph said:
Seems like both CQ and Newcolor fiddle with the output. Such a shame really. At least there's a good alternative for the Tango. I wish Silverfast was available for the Scanmates as well. Really tired of the softning filter QC applies when scanning 16 bit, it makes the grain look artificial and downright ugly at times.
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CQ has pure RAW though - am I missing something?
 
BTW, I forgot to mention it here that the sharpness softness that is applied by using TIFF can be bypassed by turning off the Bayer Interpolation in CQ Scan. I tested this a while ago and noticed no difference in sharpness between RAW and TIFF with SM5K after turning it off in CQ Scan.

So anyone who has wanted a RAW 16 BIT from CQ should now be able to get it simply by turning the server side scan processing.

Let me know if you try this and it works for you 🙂

Pali
 
You found an actual solution?! If this works it's big, big news! I'll try it at once. I'll let you know if it works.

And no, you're not missing anything, Pali. But as you might have noticed 16bit RAW does not work on the SM4000 and 5000 🙂
 
Under QC scan > tools i found "allow Bicubic Interpolation" - I guess that's what you meant? Turning it off didn't remove the softness when scanning 16 bit tiff unfortunately. 8bit Raw is still much sharper for me.
 
Netsoft2k said:
Armando, I believe there is no way to get a raw file from the scanner without silverfast according to multiple comments. There are ways to minimize it but even with that, there is still some USM applied to the scans.



Unfortunately, the product is priced to be way out of my budget. Currently listed for $1,999.00
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Thanks again Pali. I totally understand the issue with the price. For testing, you can always try the demo:
http://www.silverfast.com/get_demo/en.html?product=575
 
Kamph said:
I uploaded a demonstration of the problem on flickr.
Flickr's processing mask the problem somewhat, but you can still tell that the grain is noticeably sharper on the 8bit Raw file.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/kasper_kamph/32885153975/in/dateposted-public/
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Kamph, I am sorry for causing the confusion. I just tested the SM5K again and I see that the issue is still there. I need to run the same test with my SM11K because now I am really confused about what I saw earlier. 😕

Here is the resolution target at 11000 DPI from the Tango again with USM turned off.

Tango%20Res%20Test%20NO%20USM.jpg
 
Netsoft2k said:
Kamph, I am sorry for causing the confusion. I just tested the SM5K again and I see that the issue is still there. I need to run the same test with my SM11K because now I am really confused about what I saw earlier. 😕

Here is the resolution target at 11000 DPI from the Tango again with USM turned off.

Tango%20Res%20Test%20NO%20USM.jpg
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Thanks Pali. That's closer to what I was expecting to see.
 
Netsoft2k said:
Kamph, I am sorry for causing the confusion. I just tested the SM5K again and I see that the issue is still there. I need to run the same test with my SM11K because now I am really confused about what I saw earlier. 😕

Here is the resolution target at 11000 DPI from the Tango again with USM turned off.

Tango%20Res%20Test%20NO%20USM.jpg
Click to expand...


No problem, Pali! I hope we find a solution some day 🙂

The Tango without USM looks a lot better, how do you feel it compare to the SM1100? Theoretically the SM with it's smaller aperture should be sharper or so I would assume - encoder problems aside that is.
 
Btw I scanned some Velvia yesterday and noticed some slight bleeding, especially into the black border, as I increased exposure in post. Would this indicate dirty optics?
Also, my initial scan was kinda dark - what are the tell tale signs of a dying lamp besides it dying altogether?
 
Kamph said:
No problem, Pali! I hope we find a solution some day 🙂

The Tango without USM looks a lot better, how do you feel it compare to the SM1100? Theoretically the SM with it's smaller aperture should be sharper or so I would assume - encoder problems aside that is.
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Kamph, Tango is a really nice machine but its hard for me to say that it is better than SM11000. I think they each have their own strengths over the other and here is what I think at this point.

SM11K Strengths

  1. SM11K can resolve much more detail. I did some tests and was able to resolve over 8000 DPI from SM11K. I have a new motor that I haven't installed but I would guess that it would help resolve even more detail.
  2. The focusing mechanism on the SM is far superior. Tango uses an auto focus algorithm that cannot be changed by the user. You just have to select the frame and hope the unit focuses where you want it to. Not a big deal until you scan a high resolution scan and find that focus was off 🙂
  3. SM11K has true 16 BIT Raw.
  4. SM11K is a desktop scanner and can move with you fairly easily.

SM11K Weaknesses

  1. SM11K suffers from really bad banding in the shadows bug at high resolutions. This can be resolved by getting the board modification from abc-scan but without it, SM11K is really limited to 3000 DPI scans or you will get very noticeable banding.
  2. All SMs have the red cast issue. On SM11K, this is very easy to fix with a new IR UV filter upgrade. This eliminates the issue completely.
  3. Motor bearings go bad eventually and you get wow and flutter issues. Only fix is to replace the DC motor that has new bearings.

Tango Strengths

  1. Tango scans are fast! A 5000 DPI scan of 6x7 MF film takes about 7-8 minutes.
  2. The vertical drum loading/unloading is more natural to work with. The drum itself is huge which makes mounting so much easier and reduces how many times you have to mount your batch of film.
  3. Shadow performance of the Tango is the gold standard in all scanners. This is why I bought the scanner and my god, this thing can see through anything and produce scans with zero noise.
  4. The software is designed for easy click and go operations. Makes batch scanning a breeze but there are other major flaws with the software/UI (see below).
  5. Karl Hudson! He is a trained tech from Heidelberg that is very active in the drum scanner community. Not only does he know every little thing about these scanners, he provides full service at very reasonable prices.

Tango Weaknesses

  1. Gigantic and heavy! This is a beast of a scanner. I hired professional help and even they struggled to move the scanner to its final location in the house. It is ~5 ft tall and weighs ~550 pounds.
  2. Auto focuses all the time and will miss focus on occasion.
  3. No true RAW. Disclaimer: Some say true RAW is available from SilverFast but I have not tried this yet. I could not get the demo to work on my Win7 machine.
  4. Turning off USM is an art in itself. I will be writing up detail information on how to do this so other new users don't have to go through my level of headache to figure this software out.
  5. Real DPI is more like 5000 DPI. This is not a weakness but compared to SM and Howtek, Tango falls short in resolving power.
At the end of the day, I am very lucky to have both and I am definitely keeping both 🙂
 
Kamph said:
Btw I scanned some Velvia yesterday and noticed some slight bleeding, especially into the black border, as I increased exposure in post. Would this indicate dirty optics?
Also, my initial scan was kinda dark - what are the tell tale signs of a dying lamp besides it dying altogether?
Click to expand...

The bleeding is likely due to dirty optics. I typically only replace the bulb when it goes out or if I see the inside lamp part turning black from heat over long periods of use. You can try to clean the mirrors of the lamp and see if that helps. Make sure you always do a warmup scan (~15 minutes) before your real scan.
 
That was a very thorough description, Pali! Much appreciated 🙂

The Tango must be the perfect scanner for slides! Negative films are so good these days that I hardly shoot anything else, so I guess I can live with the SM's lesser Dmax. In fact, the SM might be the better scanner for negatives due to it's higher resolution and RAW output. Do you see any difference between the two when scanning negatives (besides resolution that is)?

I'll try to clean the optics and see if it helps. I always let the scanner warm up for about 10 min. though I migt try to do af few prescans and see if it makes a difference.

How much did you pay for the new motor?
 
Thanks Pali for the comparison. Very good reference info.

I am curious about the aperture control in the SM11K. If any, could you scan the target using an aperture close to 10 microns at 11'000 dpi? How it compares to the results from the Tango?
Thanks again!
 
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