[filmscanners] Re: Polaroid SS4000

["Arthur Entlich" <artistic-1@shaw.ca>]

Hi Ed,

To my knowledge, you will be hard pressed finding this scanner new.
Polaroid sold off the stock in their warehouse just prior to the SS4000+
coming out.  They also were liquidating them to bring in some money
during their Chapter 11 proceeding.

At that time, the SS4000 scanners were selling mainly via on-line
dealers for, as I recall, between $700-750 US, and Polaroid was offering
a $200 US rebate at that time off of that.

I don't know if there are any new units left in the channel, and I
rarely even see them used on ebay.  But you might be able to find some
new Microtek 4000t models, which are very similar, but I don't know what
the price is.

There aren't specifically any "bad" SS4000 models.  There were three
problems I know of.  The very early units has a problem with a wiring
harness which sometimes pulled loose, but these were all fixed under
warranty.  The other problem is there is a sensor on the scanner which
determines the position of the film carrier.  If this sensor gets too
much dust build up over it, the scanner gets confused and gives an
error.  Polaroid resolved this problem by providing a small brush that
attaches to the carrier and can be used every so often to keep the
sensor clean.  In some cases, prior to this brush fix, some scanners had
a large enough build up that the brush wasn't enough to clean the sensor
or the carrier wouldn't move properly, due to the dust in on the sensor.
The last situation was a problem with some of the slide carriers.  There
was a problem with the molding process on some which cased the small
plastic springs to break.  The carriers sell for about $12 from
Polaroid, if you need to replace one, or buy extras.

Other than these three situations and perhaps doing a firmware upgrade,
which you can do via a download, I know of no other specific problems
with these models.  They've been quite reliable, overall.

Art



Edward F. VanderBush wrote:

> I think I have finally settled on the SS4000 (non plus) as the scanner
> to purchase.  I am still tempted to just get a slightly cheaper
> Minolta scan elite II or something but it seems like there is an
> abundance of satisfied ss4000 users on here.  Is there any version of
> this first scanner that I need to look for?  Also, can anyone
> recommend the cheapest place to purchase one? (US only)  Also any word
> on an upcoming rebate.
>
> Thank you all!
>
> Regards,
>
> ED
>
>
>


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