Topaz 2 and Silverfast Ai SLOW... help?

[justintech]

We have been using a Lino-Hell Topaz 2 scanner for years now on an old G4 running Mac OS 9.x (using linocolor).

We've wanted to get rid of Mac OS classic and so have setup a Mac OS 10.5.8 system on a PowerMac G5. We are using the Ratoc firewire adapter to connect the topaz 2 to the computer, and silverfast AI in demo mode to see if it will fit our needs.

Immediately noticeable is the huge speed difference between Silverfast and Linocolor. Silverfast takes twice as long for prescans and regular scans, even with all of the same scan settings on our linocolor setup.

I'm not sure if this is an issue with the ratoc or with silverfast.

I should note that the mac has been setup for the sole purpose of using silverfast, so nothing is running other than silverfast, and the Mac has 4 gigs of ram.

By all means this mac is far superior to the old G4 we had in it's place, yet scanning is taking way too long on the G5 with silverfast.

Is there something I'm missing or someone that can offer some advice on this?

[LSI_Heidorn]

Dear justintech,
there is a simple explanation -> 24 vs. 48 Bit Color.
When using LinoColor on a Topaz2 it uses the scanner in a kind of "Topaz1 Emulation", only working with 8 Bit per channel --> 24 Bit color.
We use the Topaz2 to its full capacity and always do our scans and prescans in 48 Bit color.
So the amount of date transferred is twice as high !
This should in practice lead to (pre) scan times that are just a bit higher compared to 8 Bit but it can be up to a factor 2.
Maybe you can also try the options->special and adjust the prescan quality.
We always prescan in a higher prescan quality compared to LinoColor, so our Prescan colors are moe reliable and more similar to the final outcome.

I hope to have explained the differences to your satisfaction, its all about quality !

Best regards,

Nils Heidorn