Thinkpads Forum

Hi, I was wondering if anyone here has plugged a USB-powered flat bed scanner into their 600 series Thinkpad, and whether it worked well or not.

Am thinking of getting a Canon CanoScan LiDE 70 scanner and would not run the 600X off the battery while scanning.

It would run at USB 1.1 since I am still on Win98SE. To get to USB 2.0 I guess I would have to upgrade to Win XP - and also get a USB PC card??

My 600X has the Pentium III processor running at 650 mHz, and 192 MB RAM.

Thanks!

Welcome to thinkpads.com!

My daughter was using a 500Mhz 600X with a Canon LiDE 25 scanner about a year ago. The system was running WinXP and had 576MB of memory but the scanner was plugged directly into the laptop's USB port so it was running at USB 1.1. She didn't complain about the speed of getting images imported into Adobe Creative Suite 2 but then again, I don't know what kind of resolution she was using. Since I never heard her complain about it, it must have worked good enough to get her through a couple of college classes.

As far as getting Windows USB 2.0 support, I think that Windows 2000 SP4 (?) has it as well as WinXP SP1 and newer. Yes, if you want to get the full speed out of the scanner you will need a PCMCIA-USB 2.0 adapter as there's no way to bump up the 600X's built-in USB system. Whichever OS you eventually install, I would suggest that you increase the system memory to at least 320MB or more. The older PC100 memory is a little expensive (as measured in $$$/MB) but as long as you stick with "low density" modules (i.e., 16 chips on a 256MB or 8 chips on a 128MB), then you should be fine.

sarakay wrote:It would run at USB 1.1 since I am still on Win98SE. To get to USB 2.0 I guess I would have to upgrade to Win XP - and also get a USB PC card??

No need to upgrade your OS. You should be able to get USB 2.0 performance on a Windows 98SE machine if you add a USB 2.0 PC (CardBus) card that says it is compatible with Win98SE. You will need to add vendor-specific Win98SE drivers -- usually these come with the USB 2.0 card.

rkawakami wrote:[...]if you want to get the full speed out of the scanner you will need a PCMCIA-USB 2.0 adapter as there's no way to bump up the 600X's built-in USB system.

As Ray says, the built-in USB port will always be limited to 1.1 speeds, even if you do add a card and drivers for USB 2.0.

Phil.

The Canon scanner needs 5V at 500mA according to their website. A PCMCIA USB 2.0 card will probably not supply enough current. Here is a quote from the Belkin website.

From the cardbus controller of the laptop you get 1Amp at 3.3 Volts
which equals 3.3W. The USB Controller of the card draws 350mA at 3.3
Volts. The remaining power is boosted to 5volts (minus some efficiency
loss) leaving you with 350mA at 5 volts to all the USB ports. There are
some USB devices that may require up to 500mA of power.

The scanner should work from the built in USB 1.1 port but it may require an external power source with a USB 2.0 card.

I have a USB PCMCIA card that I bought for the T20 when it was working... Works like a charm in the 600E. If any device needs to be powered, I can always hook it into the onboard USB port via a separate dongle.

It was a cheapo one bought on ebay, so there may be better models.

Thanks for all the replies! You folks are very helpful.

I'm going to go ahead and order the scanner, and look into the memory upgrade - I've been following the thread on memory for the 600 series.

Since I'm used to my current ancient scanner connected to my ancient desktop thru the parallel port, USB 1.1 will probably seem lightning fast to me! Maybe I'll look into the 2.0 upgrade later. It sounds like the USB card would need an external power supply to drive the scanner, which would reduce portability.

BTW the purpose of all this is to scan old family photos. I have plenty, and some older relatives have some that go back to the 1860's or so. I want to take the PC and scanner to the relatives' homes, set them up on the kitchen table or whatever, and scan the old pics on site. The LiDE 70 is small enough and light enough to travel in the laptop bag.

Again, thanks!

Sara

sarakay wrote:Thanks for all the replies! You folks are very helpful.

I'm going to go ahead and order the scanner, and look into the memory upgrade - I've been following the thread on memory for the 600 series.

Since I'm used to my current ancient scanner connected to my ancient desktop thru the parallel port, USB 1.1 will probably seem lightning fast to me! Maybe I'll look into the 2.0 upgrade later. It sounds like the USB card would need an external power supply to drive the scanner, which would reduce portability.

BTW the purpose of all this is to scan old family photos. I have plenty, and some older relatives have some that go back to the 1860's or so. I want to take the PC and scanner to the relatives' homes, set them up on the kitchen table or whatever, and scan the old pics on site. The LiDE 70 is small enough and light enough to travel in the laptop bag.

Again, thanks!

Sara

No no no. You won't need an external power supply. Perhaps I was not clear. The cards usually have a little plug-like socket which has a cable. This cable supplies power, and connects to an onboard USB socket (all onboard ports are powered). Therefore, all you need to do is not be using the onboard USB port, plug in the powered plug for the card, and you will be able to run non-powered USB items from the card.

I will get a photo of the whole setup up in a bit, so you can see what I mean if you are still confused.

Hope memory prices don't scare you off. Just lurk in the marketplace or post a want add. Someone might be able to accommodate you!

Aha! Now I understand! Powering thru the existing USB port makes a lot more sense.

As you can probably tell, this is my first laptop, so I am "learning by doing."

Just wait until I try to put memory in ... I will pester you guys to no end!

Thanks again,

Sara

http://s110.photobucket.com/albums/n96/ ... 300278.jpg

You can find a picture of what I am talking about there. The cable is removable and hooks into the onboard USB port.

Thanks, DS! That makes it much clearer.

Sara