I just purchased a Brother all-in-one laser printer this past week, not just because laserjets are cheaper to operate, but because we needed a multi-funciton piece of equipment that faxes, copies, scans and the like.  One of the things I was so very much looking forward to was to beginning to move us to a paperless environment, and scanning all old documentation which could easily be done with this all-in-one product and it's document feeder.  The device is EXACTLY what I wanted-- and performs flawlessly--  with one exception, the software included in it called Paperport, v 11 by Nuance.  I have 2 vista machines and an XP machine that I attempted to install it on, and it absolutely would not install on either of the Vista machines (go figure). 

So I tried to contact the manufacturer of the software and they wanted $40 just to talk with them by phone (with no guarantee of a solution), and they told me that I needed to contact the product distributor, Brother in this case.  So I did.  Brother initially denied any affiliation or knowledge of the product, but then when I pressed the non-english speaking representative she said that she had a patch.  Well it really wasn't a patch (language barrier, I guess), but she wanted me to install/reinstall the software, which I had already done.  I could tell she didn't have any clue what she was doing, so I told her to stop reading the procedure she knew nothing about on the paper in front of her, and asked her to stop wasting my time on the phone with her.  By this time, I was agitated and still had no solution, so I left the call. 

So i scoured Google and found this product, A-PDF's product, Image to PDF.  *IT'S EXACTLY WHAT I HAD NEEDED.  Simple to use, and a small file, I took about 30 seconds to download it, another 30 to install it.  It was easy to select my new all-in-one printer via the twain driver, and in less than 2 minutes, I was already testing it on a couple of documents.  It worked flawlessly, and did EXACTLY WHAT I HAD WANTED.  It's intuitive, a clean interface, and bright.  It was perfect. 

A-PDF Execs--  a note for you and potential business opportunity--  *GO TO THE BROTHER COMPANY AND SHOW THEM YOUR PRODUCT.  It's a third of the price of the "product" they now include in their scanner suite and yours actually works.  Not only that, but it would save them the trouble of having customers calling their support center and finding no help there as well, which would build their business image.  You'd save them money and face.  The best way for customer service to have a good reputation is to not need their services in the first place, I always say  :) .  A-PDF--  you could do that for Brother.  Sounds like a match made in heaven. 

So if you need GOOD scanning software, go check out the good folks at A-PDF.  www.a-pdf.com

If you want to see the software product page for the A-PDF Image to PDF, go here instead.  http://www.a-pdf.com/image2pdf/index.htm   In my estimation--  $27 well spent.

Peace,

John Lehmberg