For the last few decades, reading printed books has been on the decline year to year. Some part of the change can perhaps be attributed to the rise in other forms of entertainment (e.g. Netflix and iTunes), but mostly it’s just been all of us collectively deciding to switch to a variety of book reading apps.
In 2011, Amazon announced that they were selling more electronic books than physical ones through their Kindle platform, which was available on all Kindle devices, as well as smartphones, tablets, and personal computers. Apple with the iBooks ePub reader for Mac, iPad, and iPhone was not too far behind. The rest of the apps for reading books were generally created by smaller third-party startups.
Mac Apps for Scanner Drivers Filter. High-quality scanner driver with support for several manufacturers. VueScan HP Precision Scan. Your scan results can be shared via email or you can save them to cloud storage services like Dropbox, Google Drive, iCloud Drive and Evernote. The app is free but offers in-app purchases if you want more capabilities or extra storage. Mobile scanning apps can go where your physical scanner can’t like a business lunch or your school library. Book Crawler app. Book Crawler is the app for aesthetic lovers. Across reviews, users comment that this app has the most pleasing interface, so if that’s something that’s important to you and you’re a Mac or IOS user, then this app could be your perfect personal library match.
While reading on dedicated devices, such as Kindle, Nook, or Kobo, now takes the top spot, with smartphones and tablets coming in second, reading books on Mac also has its own benefits, which have long been overlooked. Let’s see how and why you should read more on your Mac.
What Are The Best Book Apps For Mac
Use another scanning method or app: If you cannot scan to your Mac from your printer, try using an app, such as HP Smart or HP Easy Scan, or another method, such as Scan to Email or Scan to Network. Troubleshoot network and USB connection issues: Go to one of the following documents for additional scan connection troubleshooting. As for the scan results, they are by default displayed on the screen in table format but they can easily be exported to several file formats such as CSV or XML. LanScan from Iwaxx is available from the Apple app store. It’s a simple application that does just what its name implies: scan a LAN. Reader+ can scan books with rear camera of your device instantly, so you can enjoy your own paper books in iPad or iPhone. And support the following file formats. pdf, epub, txt - zip, rar, cbz, cbr You can add following items - Book (for scan) - Shelf (folder) - FTP Server - GoogleDrive.
Reading on your Mac has a few advantages over specialized readers or your smartphone. First of all, you have enough screen real estate to easily process a book of any kind, especially if it involves illustrations and graphs, which you can enlarge and modify as needed.
Second, reading on Mac doesn’t lock you into a specific format, such as .mobi, .epub, or PDF. If you’ve been wondering how to read book online, it’s practically only possible on Mac.
Third, as you read on your Mac, taking notes and annotation becomes so much easier. Reading could be a truly educational experience, which in turn could elevate the quality of your reading material.
Luckily, all the best book apps are available on Mac for less than the price of a single magazine. Most popular app examples include Kindle, iBooks, and MarginNote.
Is Kindle reader for Mac a good choice?
The most widely used reader for Mac is the Kindle app from Amazon. Undoubtedly, its best feature is the access to millions of Kindle-compatible books in the .mobi format. Besides, Kindle for Mac boasts an adjustable interface, where you can change your preferences as to fonts, line-spacing, and background colors.
The drawbacks of using a Kindle reader for Mac is mostly being restricted to .mobi format, available only on Amazon. Plus, the Kindle app doesn’t make it easy to upload your own books that you got somewhere else. For years, the Kindle reader for Mac has been avoiding the idea of bringing hyphenation to the platform, which makes text lines more uniform and easier to read. Although the platform supports hyphenation now, most of its books still don’t.
You can try and download Kindle for Mac on the official Amazon website or in the App Store. Kindle’s main competitor as of now is Apple’s iBooks app. Let’s see how they differ.
Why use iBooks for Mac?
Without a doubt, the iBooks app (now called Apple Books) is convenient simply because it already comes pre-installed with your Mac. You can use it to buy any book in the Apple Book Store, which carries nearly all the popular titles.
Unlike Kindle, Apple Books is the best ePub reader available on the market, although it also does support other formats, most notably PDF. You also have more adjustment options, particularly, hyphenation works much better in the iBooks app than it does on Kindle.
The latest updates to iBooks also included the support for audiobooks, which has expanded a straightforward book reader app into a full entertainment and education experience available at any time, whether you’re driving or relaxing at home.
How to read with MarginNote
The third popular book reader app is MarginNote. While it supports ePub and PDF just like iBooks, its unique features lie in advanced annotations, mind-mapping, and flashcards that allow you to better absorb all the reading material.
Annotations let you highlight text and make quick notes on the margins, whether to explain certain concepts or to save ideas for later use.
To make an annotation with MarginNote:
- Simply highlight the text by clicking and dragging your cursor
- Choose one of the available options: either make a note, add a tag, highlight with a certain color, or look up the sentence online
- If you’ve selected to make a note, use all the tools in the pop-up window and click on the icon in the top right when you’re done
To use the app to include an excerpt of text in a mind map:
- Choose one of the available excerpt tools from the top bar
- Highlight the part of the text you’re interested in
- Click Add to MindMap
To make a flashcard in MarginNote:
- Highlight the text as before
- Click on the share icon in the top bar
- Select Add to Card Deck
Finally, you can export all your notes into Evernote, Anki flashcards, iThoughts mind-mapping, or print.
MarginNote is an indispensable ePub reader for Mac if you’re a student, professional researcher, lawyer, or just like to read challenging books that need some breaking down for better retention.
Make reading experience more focused
In the end, no matter which app you choose for reading, you should hope for a good, distraction-free reading experience, where you can focus on one thing at a time.
HazeOver is a lightweight Mac utility that allows you to automatically dim everything on your screen but the currently active app. It lives in the background but is always available in your menu bar in case you need to adjust some preferences, such as the level of dimming.
So when thinking about the best book reader app for your Mac, lean towards Kindle only if you already have a large library of .mobi books. Otherwise, choose the iBooks app for lighter reading materials and MarginNote when you really need to dive into something worth contemplating. Accompany all of these apps with HazeOver to improve your reading experience and minimize any distractions.
Best of all, you can try MarginNote and HazeOver for free via Setapp, a platform of more than 150 Mac utilities that bring solutions to any app-related problems. What’s next on your bookshelf?
Meantime, prepare for all the awesome things you can do with Setapp.
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Some would say that the smell of the book and holding a hefty, musky piece of bonded paper in your hands is enough to hold on to this technological relic. But these sentiments are being fast pushed into the bin of history, a simple realm of nostalgia rather than convenience and efficiency.
Here is why most books will become ebooks in the foreseeable future:
• You can hold an entire library’s worth of ebooks in your pocket. On the other hand, how many physical books can you hold in your pocket, not a single one?
• Can you search an entire book within seconds, for any word and phrase, like you can easily do with ebooks?
• Can you instantly buy or exchange a physical book, completely disregarding the cost and environmental burden of transportation?
• Is it more comfortable to hold a thin, light, illuminated screen, or a heavy, unwieldy stack of papers which are prone to damage and decay?
• Can you provide infinite backup redundancy for physical books?
As you can see, the sheer technological inertia of convenience, efficiency, perseverance, and eco-friendliness of ebooks will override all the nostalgia some people may have left. All books will have to become ebooks, or be lost forever.
With improvements in battery and screen technology, and the availability of e-ink screens for specialized ebook reader devices, this will become increasingly apparent. Already, most books are offered in ebook formats first, and physical copies second.
However, we still have millions of books contained within their restrictive papery bonds. In order to digitize them all we need quality devices to perform this important task.
Unfortunately, for the average user, there is still no book scanner in which you can simply slot in a book, and all the work will be done automatically for you. Nonetheless, there is still some range of convenience and conversion efficiency to be considered when it comes to book scanners. Let’s take a look at some of the best book scanner options on the market.
1. Plustek OpticBook 3900
Externally, you could mistake it for an ordinary scanner, but book scanners are specifically optimized for speedy scans, along with a number of features that enhance the final scan of the text. In the case of OpticBook 3900, the primary among those features is the Shadow Elimination Element technology, accompanied with a thin 0.24” edge. This corrects for the book spine shadow you would normally see if you had scanned a book with a regular scanner, or a photocopier.
Furthermore, the optical resolution of 1200dpi with a 48-bit color depth range is more than enough to accurately capture any imagery a book may hold. Be warned though, select only the highest resolution for pages that require it, those that contain images.
Otherwise, you should select the 300dpi resolution for pages that only contain text. That way the scan will be done in about 7 seconds, which is unfortunately still too lengthy for a dedicated book scanner. Still, the Plustek OpticBook 3900 is quite robust, as it offers a daily duty cycle of approximately 2500 pages, which is about 5 hours of daily operation.
If you have a very low scan throughput in mind, and a lengthy 7-second scan at lowest dpi is not too off-putting, then for such a low price the Plustek OpticBook 3900 is an adequate solution. It can work with both Windows and Mac systems. Of course, you could also use it as an office document scanner, in which case it is an excellent and super affordable choice.
2. Plustek OpticSlim 2610
If you are looking for a light and compact document/book scanner for under $60 it is hard to find anything better than the OpticSlim 2610. Weighing at just 3.1lbs, or 1.4kg, the ‘slim’ part of its name certainly fits the bill. You can easily store it as you would store a folder in a drawer.
But that doesn’t mean there is not some serious scanning capability to work with here, as it is specifically designed with thick books in mind thanks to its specialized lid design. It is also focused on the ease of use aspect of scanning, as with 5 one-touch buttons you can effortlessly set to scan, copy, OCR, custom setup, or email.
The maximum resolution of 4800x4800dpi is an overkill for any detailed image you may encounter, but, like always, keep in mind that the higher the resolution the lengthier the scan will be. The 300-600dpi resolution range is enough for accurate textual digitization.
The Plustek OpticSlim 2610 performs all of its duties without fault, besides being slim, compact, light, it also has full compatibility with all Windows and Mac systems, and can hassle-free scan very thick documents and books. All of it for a super cheap price. In addition, the specialized OCR software does its job in removing the need for correcting errors and retyping post-scan, especially for PDF files.
3. Ipevo Ziggi-HD Plus
Easily mistaken for a desk lamp, the Ziggi-HD Plus is a very comfortable document and book scanning solution, once you properly set it up. Its 8.0 megapixel, auto-focused camera is enough to perform up to 3264 x 2448 resolution scans, and it is compatible with both PCs and Macs. The area it can effectively capture is approximately 13.46” x 10.04” or 342 x 255mm.
Unlike all the flatbed scanners, it offers a unique feature of live video recording, although at only 30fps, but still at fullHD resolution. The video-streaming can further extend to its maximum 3264 x 2448 resolution, but then the framerate drops from 30 to 15fps, which is not something to worry about when you are not filming live-action movies.
The proper capture and video-streaming setup is ensured by its multi-jointed stand and swiveling head. The combo of video streaming and detailed document capture is a fantastic solution for both traditional and online educational institutions, and freelancer teachers and instructors. It goes without saying that it can be plugged into an LCD projector, further increasing its range of use.
For just under $100, it is a fantastic product. As for book scanning, you can simply enjoy reading the book in your comfy chair, while Ziggi-HD Plus captures all the pages you turn. Great product with a wide range of application.
4. CZUR ET16 Plus
One of the more luxurious overhead scanners, the CZUR ET16 aims to improve the scanning procedure in all areas:
• Dual side lamps evenly cover the entire scan area to ensure excellent scans.
• Black mat provides the reduction of surface glare, interference, and artifacting in scans.
• Reduced glare when scanning magazines, certificates, laminated documents and other glossy pages.
• Smart software allows you to auto-flatten pages and automatically crops out your fingers as you hold the pages.
• Even if the document is not ideally placed on the mat, the ET Smart Book Scanner software will automatically recognize the page edges, and adjust them accordingly.
The scanning speed is amazing, mere 1.5 seconds per 2 pages thanks to its 32-bit MIPS CPU, which is out of reach for even high-end flatbad scanners that have a higher price tag. See samples of scans on the Czur website.
Although all scanners possess the OCR (Optical Character Recognition) technology by default, the conversion to an editable document in all major formats – Word, PDF, TIFF – is effortless. Not to mention that the integrated ABBYY technology allows this scanner to recognize the characters of 187 languages.
The maximum scanning size is up to A3 format, and to further increase your comfort and convenience it can be plugged into pedals, which you actually might end up getting in order to exploit the ET16’s incredible scanning speed.
Sleek in design, fast, powerful, convenient, great software focused on auto-correction…the CZUR ET16 Plus seems to have it all, so if you are fine with the relatively high price tag, there is no reason to not get it.
5. Fujitsu ScanSnap SV600
With almost twice the price of the CZUR ET16, does it also offer twice the benefits? In a word – no.
Although it does have one nifty feature that the ET16 doesn’t have – automatic page turning detection. However, you would still have to adjust your page turning speed to the scanning speed, so not having to click the scan button every time when you turn a page is of dubious value. It is up to you to decide if it is important enough to splurge extra $400 compared to the ET16.
All other features present in ET16 are present in the SV600 as well:
• Detection and auto-correction of multiple documents.
• Auto-removal of fingertips
• Correction of page curvature
• Competent OCR software
As far as quality goes, the scanned images are crisp and clear, perfect mirrors of their physical objects. In short, you can count on a high-quality scan of anything you put beneath it, and just like with ET16, the maximum scan area is up to A3 size.
If you have a ton of things to scan on a regular basis, the SV600 might be for you despite the prohibitive price tag, but it does seem to be a robust, professional, overhead scanning machine producing exceptional scans.
6. Vupoint Magic Wand
And at last, the most mobile and affordable scanning solution – the handheld Vupoint Magic Wand. There is no better solution when you know you will need to scan something on your trip. And even if you don’t know you’ll need it, its under-foot size and slight 6.9 ounces weight makes it a no-brainer gadget companion.
Its size also limits its scanning capability to up to 8.27” wide scanning material, but that should cover most formats for documents, books, and magazines. It can be set to 3 scanning resolutions: 300dpi, 600dpi, and 900dpi. If you are just scanning text and set it to the lowest resolution, you should be finished with a single page within 3 seconds, which is a respectable speed.
Of course, your hand will have to do all the work, so you will have to practice for a bit in order to achieve the best results. In the bundle is included a microSD card, so if you set the scanning resolution to lowest you are good to go for about 5000 scans. OCR software does its job and turns the text into editable PDF or Word files, supported ONLY by Windows operating system (Windows 10 and older), not Mac.
How does it scan?
It depends on the material being scanned and if you have followed the instructions. Always make sure it is on the proper setting – PDF or JPG, and which dpi resolution. The surface that is about to be scanned should be as flat and smooth as possible, and your hand should be steady as you roll over the material. If you are a student or a researcher who often needs to copy books or parts of documents which cannot be taken from the library, this is a great cost and time saving scanning solution.
Flatbed vs Overhead Book Scanners
There are basically 3 types of scanners for documents, images, photos, and books:
1. Flatbed – those are the most widespread ones
2. Overhead – like a desk lamp, they offer some extra features and a wider flexibility and comfort of use
3. Handheld – the most mobile ones, often the size of a thicker marker
Although the third ones are the most ‘handy’, they are not as nearly efficient as the other two types because more manual labor is involved, not to mention that such compact size somewhat sacrifices scanning quality. So, we will focus on just the flatbed and overhead scanners.
As always, depending on your particular needs, you have to hone in on the best solution that is right for you. There is no best solution for every occasion.
Flatbed vs Overhead Book Scanner
Ease of Use
Flatbed, horizontal scanners have a long tradition and as such people are accustomed to using them, be their standalone scanner, a bulky photocopier, or a multifunctional device that includes printer and telefax. The familiarity with technology is very important if you intend to implement it into space where many people will make use of it, like public libraries, schools, or office environments.
Mac Scanner App
Almost all flatbed scanners are exceedingly easy to use with no setup required, and can easily be moved to another location. Which cannot be said for overhead scanners, as they need to be firmly affixed to a hard surface, and not many people are aware that such devices even exist.
Functionality
Overhead scanners often offer features that can’t even be implemented into flatbed scanners, like video streaming and the ability to use them in conjunction with LCD projectors. Both of those features are critical when it comes to situations where you need to present material in front of large audiences or even if you are performing one-on-one online tutoring session.
As for the scanning purpose alone, flatbed scanners by default press the material between the lids so the scanning result is more consistent, in addition of avoiding damage to the spine of the book because the scan can be taken under a 90 degree angle. This is not the case with overhead scanners where you have to manually spread out the book to 180 degrees, which could result in book damage after repeated use, depending on the type of the book. That being said, with overhead scanners you never have to worry about the size or thickness of the books, magazines, and documents you want to scan.
Cost and Scanning Efficiency
Even high quality flatbed scanners are much cheaper than overhead scanners, while also offering greater scanning speed. As you can see, it all depends on your specific needs. At the same time, it is safe to say that flatbed scanners would be a better solution for most situations, especially if scanning alone is a sufficient functionality to have.
Book Scanning Services
Buying your own scanner, be it flatbed or overhead, is almost always a cheaper solution than seeking out professional scanning service. However, if you earn more money per unit of time than you would by spending your time on scanning, and correcting the scans, then a commercial book/document scanning service is the way to go.
There are several benefits to using book scanning services:
• OCR software is not infallible. Even the most advanced ones, like we mentioned in some of the reviews, does create garbled words or words with missing or conjoined letters from time to time. Book scanning service is an additional layer of making sure you don’t end up with shoddy scans.
• Book scanning services have a lot of scanning experience under their belt and must have a goal of offering the best quality unless they want to be pummeled by competition. Therefore, they know which tools and software produce the best results for each type of content, in addition to manually checking the results.
• The more material you have to scan the cheaper the end pricing will be.
Free Book Scanner App
Some of the more notable book scanning services you can employ are:
1dollarscan – the most affordable one at just $1 per set, which constitutes 100 pages. So an average book of about 300 pages would only cost you $3 dollars, or $4 if there are 320 pages. More importantly, they offer re-scanning for $0.2 or free if you have a membership, within 14 days of the initial scan. So, it is always in their best interest to perform the best scan the first time around.
BlueLeaf – are much more expensive with $.10/page for non-destructive scanning and $.07/page for destructive scanning (the book is then not returned). However, with both options you have first 50 pages for free, and additional books are about %60 cheaper. The biggest feature they promote is their OCR accuracy, but they still provide a disclaimer urging you to manually proofread the text, if it is to be published.
Used Book Scanner App
BoundBookScanning – slightly cheaper than BlueLeaf at $0.06/page for destructive and $0.09 for non-destructive scanning. Their main marketing strategy that elevates them above the competition is speed and quality, for which they offer numerous customer testimonials.
Conclusion
When you know your needs, the scope of digitization work required, and your financial resources directed into this expenditure, the choices are simple to pick:
• A dedicated flatbed scanner with enough flexibility for thick books and sufficient speed for the price offered.
• An overhead scanner for when you need the additional functions like video streaming and LCD projector plug-in, in addition to increased level of comfort while scanning.
• A hand-held scanner for when you cannot take the books/documents with you, or just want to have an insurance of capturing a moderate amount of content fast, wherever you end up being.
• A commercial service for when you don’t want to hassle with choosing a scanner, buying one, setting it up, and learning how to use it to its fullest potential. Or when you either have money to spare and only have a couple of books to scan, in addition to being certain that you will never be in need of scanning again.