11/23+ Settings

The stuff I've scanned (like m3100ma1.pdf mentioned above) is usually US Letter size and done at 600 dpi bi-tonal (1 bit per pixel). The scanner happens to LZW encode the TIFF file. There is no option to G4 encode. That usually turns out to be 200-400KB/page but it so happens that one page in that manual did not look too good. So I redid that one page as greyscale (8 bits per pixel) and that just so happens to be over 50% of the total file size (i.e. wipe that one page and you are looking at more like 400KB/page). It's only 14 pages or so, hence one greyscale page makes a big difference. I've seen someone else quote figures of 50-70KB/page for G4 encoded 300 dpi scans of TOPS manuals, which I assume are the typical US Letter size. Obviously going to 600dpi might be expected to produce a factor of 4 increase (i.e. 200-300KB). Or it might not - who can say with compression! I don't see a SC41MS.pdf on that page so I have no idea of the scanning resolution or the encoding. I've found that using Acrobat 5 in the office I can covert PDF to individual G4 TIFFs (although this is *slow* but it is unattended) and I can then re-import these (in groups of 50 max) which is reasonably quick. But it sucks away time. So if anyone else needs them cut down, be my guest :-) For the few that I've had to process manually (i.e. book format, with pages individually scanned as all-odd-ones, all-even-ones) the conversion to G4 TIFF is a part of the process I use to stitch everything back together in reasonable time. In that case I'm seeing a reduction of maybe 25% in size (although I've not tried to measure it on a reasonable sample ... so don't quote me). If the scanner gets an upgrade that allows it to do G4 TIFF, I'll certainly use it. If a tool turns up that can do unattended conversion of TIFF-in-PDF -> G4 TIFF (or better yet, G4-TIFF-in-PDF) I'll certainly use it. Antonio