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Dave Winer, legendary blog and RSS pioneer, recently blogged about picking up a Fujitsu ScanSnap.

He wanted to show a picture of it, so he did a comparison that I wouldn’t have thought of:

Photo by scriptingnews

It looks like he picked up the ScanSnap S300M, but its the same size as the new ScanSnap S1300 so the comparison still holds.

So, if you were ever wondering how big a mobile ScanSnap is compared to a Dr. Pepper can, there you go!

A large percentage of posts here on DocumentSnap are relating to creating or processing PDF files in some way. However, there’s a dark side to PDFs – or more specifically, using outdated PDF reading software on your computer.

The Lawyerist blog has a writeup on the topic, and points to a scary ZDNet article that reports that a huge percentage of exploits in 2009 were related to malicious PDF files.

Make sure your internet browser, and PDF reader (Adobe Acrobat or Adobe Reader) are updated to the most current version to limit attacks from malicious PDF files. A recent report indicates that more and more hackers are exploiting security issues in PDF readers.

Aside from the predictable Mac vs. Windows vs. Linux wars in the ZDNet comments, both are a good read.

Make sure your Adobe Acrobat Reader is always updated!

If you want to see another video of the Fujitsu ScanSnap S1300 in action with runthrough of the features and benefits, the company has just released a new video (funky music is a bonus).

It’s 3 minutes long. If you’re looking for it, here’s the link to my ScanSnap S1300 review.

It also mentions the Rack2Filer Deluxe Bundle for the ScanSnap S1300 which is also available.
Anyone pick up the S1300 yet? What do you think?

So, what do you think about the iPad?

Are you going to get one?

(In case you’re curious, I haven’t decided yet).

I was fortunate enough to get my hands on a review copy of a Fujitsu ScanSnap S1300, so I thought I’d write up my initial impressions and show some of the new stuff that DocumentSnap readers might find interesting.

As of this writing I have only installed it on Mac OSX, but as I wrote in my initial ScanSnap S1300 announcement post, the S1300 is a “hybrid scanner” which just means it comes with everything you need both for Windows and Mac. Maybe later I’ll do a Windows review too.

Mobile Form Factor

I have to be honest, even though I am a longtime user of the ScanSnap S300M, I have never used it in a mobile situation. I like the mobile ScanSnaps because they take up such a small amount of space, and I personally don’t need the higher speed and capacity of the ScanSnap S1500 and S1500M.

You can see from this side by side shot that the size and shape of the S1300 is basically the same as the S300 series.

All that being said, the S1300 comes with mobile features such as USB power, so you can use it without having to plug into a wall outlet (though if you use it this way you need two USB ports – one for the data connection and one for power).

Installation

Installation was very easy. Just put in the CD, install the software, and then plug in the scanner. Fujitsu does a good job of making it extremely fast from unboxing to scanning.

One really nice surprise was that when I installed the S1300 software, it automatically upgraded all my profiles I had with the S300M. I was not expecting that at all!

Long Document Scanning

The ScanSnap S1300 lets you scan long receipts and documents (finally!), a subject in which I have complained about before. To do long document scanning, just put the document in and hold down the blue power key for 3 seconds. Once it starts blinking, its in long document mode. See the video below for a demo.

Auto Quality

If you have small documents, you can have it automatically detect them and up the quality. This was a feature introduced with the S1500 series and is now on the mobile scanners.

Searchable PDFs

One limitation that the S300M had is that it did not come with OCR software to make searchable PDFs. The S1300 comes with it built in for both Macs and PCs.

You can choose on a profile basis whether you want the document to be searchable, and (similar to the S1500 series), you can have it detect highlighted text on a document and save the PDF with searchable keywords. Pretty cool.

Speed And Capacity

Obviously, the S1300 is not going to be as fast as its cousins the S1500 and S1500M. If speed and capacity are your main criteria, you will want to go for the higher model. However, if 8 pages per minute (double sided don’t forget!) is OK for you, and you don’t need to hold more than 10 pages at the time, the Fujitsu ScanSnap S1300 is a great scanner in a very small and portable package.

Since I know some people like videos, here is a video where I show the ScanSnap S1300, some of its new features, and some of the software that comes with it.

Have you tried the ScanSnap S1300 yet? Let us know what you think in the comments.

Recently the Evernote blog posted a really cool tip for searching your Evernote notes from inside your browser.

Basically, you tell Chrome or Firefox to use Evernote as a new search engine, which you can then search with in the address bar.

Google Chrome’s address bar doubles as a search bar, which makes it really easy to search various sites without actually going to them first. Now, you can add Evernote as a search engine in Google Chrome and search your notes from anywhere. Here’s how to set it up:

See the blog post for instructions on how to do it in Google Chrome or Firefox, or here is a video.

Great tip!