Scanmarker Air Reading Pen & Pen Scanner | Translator Pen for Dyslexia, Students & Professionals - Compatible with Mac, Windows, iOS & Android

I'm an academic and this is a great device. Caveat: when I got mine, it would not stay connected to my computer. I filed a request for assistance on their web page (as per instructions) and they got back to me within a few hours. We set up a phone appointment, and in less than 10 minutes they corrected the problem, and I've had zero difficulties since. Now, with that caveat, here is my review: this is a very targeted device. It has one primary job, and it does it splendidly. That job is to copy text from the book or paper you are reading (or from a Kindle: it works flawlessly with kindle paperwhite reader) from the page, into your notes. It will scan into Scrivener, into Word, into Pages, into plain text. It does so quickly and accurately and reliably.Why would you pay to have that done? Why not just type the quotes in yourself?Well, you could, but this is so much faster and more accurate. And when you are doing initial research on a project, your first weeks involve little more gathering quotes and possible notes from others. You can spend an entire day in the library doing nothing but collecting relevant snippets for your paper, and during those long hours, this device is a godsend. You get so much more done in so much less time. You scan in your quote (maybe even a paragraph or two) in no more time than it would take you to highlight it. Then type in your comments and cross-references and the whole thing is already sitting in your notes, and so what, in earlier days would have been your highlights and your marginalia are suddenly already filed away and they are both searchable text-- so you can actually find that quote again when you need it. Brilliant. Especially if you are working with library texts that you cannot highlight, this is great.Pros: speed, accuracy, battery life, workload reduction, faster research and writing: all plus plus plus.The only con, and it's a reach: This is not a device for older texts-- I am thinking here of anything 18th century or before--even some 19th century. Like any OCR scanner, the software simply cannot read the older fonts. Additionally, you should be aware that the pen lights up strongly as it scans and transfers text, so any text the library will not let you photograph with a flash will not be available for use with this pen either. Also, this is a text only device. It will not scan formulae or images. But even with that sort of very limited limit, this thing is worth its weight in gold to any academic or student. I've a dear young man in my life who is headed off to university this year, and I will absolutely be purchasing a second one of these to send with him. I don't doubt he'll put some miles on the thing.

Just finished highlighting the key points from a whole chapter in the book I'm reading. Overall, I am very happy with this product - will make note taking much easier. It was also very easy to share it once I was done with the document (I uploaded it to my Dropbox directly from the app).I am using it with my Samsung Galaxy 6(Android), and it was working within 5 min of trying to get it setup. Very easy to use. I tried setting it up with an older Android tablet, but the app was not compatible (something to be aware of if you have an older Android!).Things to get used to:- I noticed that it seems to scan best when you try to be smooth and scan faster rather than slower (as the tips suggest). But when you get the technique down, it really does a nice job recognizing the correct letters.- I sometimes noticed the first or last words being left out of lines that I scanned. Apparently I need to scan a few spaces in front of the line, then keep going past the last word in the line a little too.- It doesn't scan apostrophes very well (it usually just leaves them out)- When a line ends in a hyphen (to designate the middle of a word), it usually just puts a space between the first half of the word and the second half of the word (requiring you to go back manually and delete that space).- There is a limit to how big of font it will scan (then it just starts to scans in a funny way). Some chapter titles were hard to scan, but you won't have problems with normal text.A possible area of improvement (it'd be great if the developer notes this!):- As another reviewer noted, it would be really nice if they updated the app so that if you don't like the line you just scanned, with the press of a button it would allow you to delete it and try again. As of right now, it is a pain in the butt to delete the whole line (either hold down backspace for 100 characters until it is deleted, or highlight with your fingers the words you want deleted - either way it just takes way too long)

Overall, the Scanmarker Air has worked very well for my purpose: scanning lines of text rather than taking hand written notes from books.Originally, I was *extremely* frustrated with the Scanmarker Air though, because it would invariably not scan straight or not be smooth enough. What I learned is that the use of the included plastic "guide" is vital, and it doesn't necessarily need to touch the paper to scan properly. Since I began using the guide regularly, the Scanmarker Air has only very seldom not been able to properly pick up the lines of text. However, that does come with a bit of a caviat. If your source has successive lines of text placed close together, the device's width might accidentally pick up multiple lines of text even with use of the plastic guide. I've had this happen on a couple occasions.Overall, this is a really nice device. Much nicer than I originally thought it was before I finally did something smart and used the plastic guide. I've never had a problem with it refusing to connect. Although, sometimes I do wish the battery life was better. Depending on how much you're scanning, you may find it easier to have the device continuously connected to a charger.