Ricoh A4 MFP vs Canon A4 MFP "Who Wins with Scanning"?

In recent days I had the chance to get additional information about the Ricoh SP5200 A4 MFP and the Canon 1750if A4 MFP.  My last blog titled Ricoh A4 MFP or Canon A4 MFP "That is the Question" mentioned some of the plus and minuses for each system.  So, let's consider this as a follow up for the additional information I've been able to find out.

Scan Speed
Ricoh touts a scan speed of the SP5200 series over 30ipm at 200dpi, while the Canon 1750IF has a scan speed of 52ipm at 300dpi.  When it comes to scan speed we'll give the advantage to the Canon 1750IF since the Ricoh SP5200 will slow down even further when scanning at 300dpi.

Document Feeder
The Canon 1750if will hold up to 100 originals compared to 50 originals for the Ricoh SP5200 series. However, Ricoh does have a "batch mode" this is used when the user has more than 50 originals.  Thus you could scan 100 pages but would have to baby sit the scanner.  At this time I'm not sure if the Canon has a "batch mode" for scanning.   Advantage to Canon 1750IF again.

Searchable PDF
It's standard on the Canon 1750IF and searchable .pdf is not even an option on the Ricoh SP5200, you'll need to buy a third party solution. Canon  1750IF Advantage.

Scanning of Mixed Size Originals
Let me start with the Ricoh SP5200 series first, you can't load mixed letter and legal documents in the scanner and expect to have letter and legal size .pdf's when they are scanned.  We tried this at the office and they all scanned as letter documents when we opened them up with Adobe Reader. You would either have to copy all letter size and then make a setting change on the MFP to scan legal size.

Personally I see the market for these types of the devices the Canon 1750if and the Ricoh S5200 series for legal, title, mortgage, health and municipalities.  Why even bring a device to market that can't Scan mixed sized originals.  Seems Ricoh choose to use an inexpensive document feeder that is not capable of reading documents larger than letter size. Could this be directly related to the Ikon aquisition, meaning that Ricoh is not enabling R & D like they did before the Ikon aquisition?

On the other hand, I put this out there for a few Print4Pay Hotel members to see if the Canon 1750IF is capable of scanning mixed size originals and I'm waiting to hear back from them (we get all of our information from guys and gals on the street who are selling these devices).  However from viewing the brochure of the Canon 1750IF it seems that there is a sensor on the rear end of the document feeder tray.  Thus, the Canon 1750IF should be able to scan mixed size originals.   Major Advantage Canon! UPDATE!! I've heard back from two Print4Pay Hotel members and both stated that the Canon 1750if will scan mized sized orginals.

Scanner ease of Use
This is going to be a tough one, however I'm a big fan of "the bigger the better" and the Ricoh SP5200 series does have an impressive LARGE COLOR LCD user interface.  The Canon 1750IF has a monotone black/gray display and the LCD is half the size of the Ricoh SP5200 series.  Take if from me the large color user interface on the Ricoh is a pleasure to use.  Advantage to Ricoh.

Scanning is a large part of every day use of these types of devices.  Typically if I scan more than 50 pages every time I walk to the device, then I'd rather have a machine that can drop the documents in and then walk away.  Same with speed, under 2 minutes to scan 100 pages or over three minutes on the Ricoh device.  But there will be users that don't ever scan 50 pages at a time?  Thus the 100 page document feeder may not play a critical role in the assessment of the device.  The same can be stated for mixed size documents, there may be some companies that just scan letter and have no need to mix letter and legal.  And then how about searchable .pdf?  Yup, it's a nice feature, and yup I would like to have it, but what about the everyday user that just wants to save the image and will never ever do a search when they open the document.

When it comes to speeds and feeds the Canon 1750IF looks like a clear winner, IF the user has a need for all of those features. IF not, then both systems are a lot alike.  We'll need to sit down and see what's best for the user, what makes the best sense, will it be ease of use of features that are never used. You can then look at cost per page, and total TCO.

I had fun with this and I hope you enjoyed it also.

-=Good Selling=-