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Gaspar
03-19-2009, 02:25
Hi, currently I use my Nikon coolscan 4000 with a four year old windows laptop.
The whole thing is connected via a PCMCIA card and it works ok but intermitently and the laptop is dead slow.

I am thinking of investing in a modern mac but don't want to find myself stuck with a scanner that does not work on the mac.

Does anybody have experience using the 4000 on a current mac?

Regards
Gaspar
GMcD
03-19-2009, 03:33
Hi Gaspar

I had all sorts of problems with a Nikon coolscan 4000 with my new mac as well, until that is, on the advise of a forum member, I downloaded VueScan. Now it works fine.

Regards

Graham
rya
03-19-2009, 04:00
I use a 4000 with my 10 month-old iMac.

The Nikon software gives me a few interesting quirks but works mostly. Quitting always gives me a program crash error and I have to quit after every strip if I use the strip adapter (or else it continually ejects after the film is well out).

I tried Vuescan but found that I liked the Nikon software's handling more, but I will probably give it another try soon.

Just make sure and check out the connecting situation. Macs are now shipping sans Firewire 400.
Gaspar
03-19-2009, 04:02
Hi Graham, thanks.

What model of mac do you have and does it have firewire?
Regards
G
projectbluebird
03-19-2009, 04:09
If you get a new mac with the expresscard slot, you can easily add firewire capability. You can do it relatively cheaply too, look on ebay.

I haven't used the nikon software on a new mac, but I did have a similar problem on an older one. It didn't like scanning more than one frame at a time. I don't remember how I resolved it though... I'll try and find out.
GMcD
03-19-2009, 04:36
I have a MacBook pro and yes it does have firewire.

G.
urban_alchemist
03-19-2009, 04:53
Hi Graham, thanks.

What model of mac do you have and does it have firewire?
Regards
G

The new MacBook Pros (NOT MacBooks) ship with Firewire 800. The great thing about Firewire is it's backwards-compatible: you can plug in any Firewire 400 device using an 800 ---> 400 cable.
Gaspar
03-19-2009, 05:15
Great, thanks all for the advice. Once and if I buy a mac I will let you know how it goes.
I am thinking of getting the mac mini or the imac (pricier)