One thing to remember if you are looking at the Plustek scanners is not to confuse the Optibook with their new Book Reader. Looks exactly the same but there's a $300 price difference. If you didn't know there were two appliances with from the same company with the same case, photos and basic purpose (scanning books) you might freak slightly and stop looking.

The new Book Reader has a primary focus more on saving the pages as txt, PDFs, PDF text and audio files. (Yea, that last one was audio files. MP3 and WAVs to be precise.) It seems as if it were designed more for keeping the printed word readable for those of us with failing sight than the Optibooks mission was with the saving and shifting of printed information.

Between the two, the Optibook series is still the best bet for most of us scanning books. Its fairly fast, easy and simple at what needs to be done. Still, I sure would like to see the Book Reader in action. Ummmm, making my own audio books for the commute. (No, no, NO! Shut up, little voice in my head with no financial sense and a high gadget lust! Shut up! Need more coffee to drown out the voice!)