How to Do Everything With Your Scanner- P21 pptx

The idea behind Plug and Play is that you can add new peripheral devices— such as a scanner—to your computer without the need to perform any special technical analysis or procedure.. The

Plug and Play

The standard today for installing scanners and other peripheral devices to your

PC is something called Plug and Play—or Plug and Pray as the punsters have

dubbed it Plug and Play is a special proprietary design for Intel expansion

boards, which are the components that plug into slots inside a PC and allow it to

connect to outside devices

The idea behind Plug and Play is that you can add new peripheral devices— such as a scanner—to your computer without the need to perform any special technical analysis or procedure (It’s not always perfect, hence the Plug and Pray jibe.)

The Plug and Play software in your computer automatically searches for new hardware Then it checks to see if the correct device driver is installed This feature is useful to know about if you think you might have accidentally un-installed or corrupted the driver for your scanner or aren’t sure you un-installed it correctly

To activate the Plug and Play feature:

1. Click the Start icon on your Windows taskbar and select Settings, Control Panel to open the Control Panel dialog box

2. Click the Add New Hardware icon This initiates the Add New Hardware wizard The wizard will search for new hardware, which means any hardware a driver is not presently installed for

3. When prompted, select the manufacturer and model number of your scanner The Add New Hardware wizard will search for the driver on the system, or prompt you to enter a disc with the driver

4. Install the driver disc if necessary, and complete the wizard to reinstall your scanner

Step 4: Check the Status of Your Scanner

Most of us experience a small sense of relief when we install a new peripheral—such

as a scanner or printer—and get it to work just right Scanner manufacturers know this, and most of them offer you little breadcrumbs along the installation path These might include icons that appear on your Windows taskbar, and special wizards that facilitate your first test scan

Most scanning-software installations automatically add an icon to the Windows taskbar at the bottom-right corner of your computer screen, like this one:

This icon lets you know your scanner is correctly installed Sometimes these taskbar icons even let you know if your scanner is correctly connected and activated

For example, the Visioneer One Touch scanners display a red X through the scanner icon if the cabling has come loose or the scanner has otherwise become disconnected

Some scanners also have a special wizard that takes you through the process of your first scan, step by step These wizards are usually directed toward novices;

however, it’s a good idea to use this wizard the first time, even if you’re a scanning pro The wizard is usually designed to help you diagnose problems that might have occurred during installation, as well as orient you to the scanning process

Troubleshooting the Installation Process

From time to time, a perfectly good, undamaged scanner refuses to perform its scanning duty This means it’s troubleshooting time Here’s a checklist of possible killjoys and culprits:

Make sure the scanner is plugged in. Seriously It’s easy to forget your scanner

needs its own electrical power source.

Is the cable connecting your scanner to your computer loose? Even if you thought you’d plugged in the cable connection to your computer, check again It’s one of life’s great mysteries as to how a cable suddenly comes loose on a device you haven’t moved or jostled

4

Is your computer an older one, with serial as well as parallel ports? If your computer is an older one, it might have connections for older-type serial ports as well as parallel ports These two types of ports are really easy to confuse, because they both have 24-pin connectors Today’s scanners uniformly use parallel, USB, and FireWire connections—serial ports are dinosaurs Check to see if you’ve accidentally connected your scanner to a serial port, and if so, reconnect it to a parallel port

Did you restart the computer after connecting the scanner? If you’re using a parallel port, you need to restart the computer before it will recognize your new scanner To do this using Windows, choose Start, Shutdown to view the Shutdown dialog box, click the Restart option, and click OK To perform a Restart using a Macintosh, choose Special, Restart from the Finder menu

Did you restart the computer after installing the software? Regardless of whether you’re using a USB or parallel port connection, you need to restart your computer after installing the scanner software

If you try all of the above troubleshooting strategies to no avail, it’s possible you have a malfunctioning scanner It’s rare, but it happens Before you take it back to the store, however, it’s worth a call to the technical support phone number provided by the scanner manufacturer You can usually find this number by checking the instructions that came with your scanner

How to Get Help

Scanner manufacturers are pretty good about supporting their products In addition to the directions that come with your scanner, you can get help from the following three sources:

The Help menu for your scanner software You can usually search the Help menu by keyword or using a topical table of contents This is usually the best place to start if you know what’s wrong, but it might be hard to think of a search request if you don’t

Telephone support Most scanner manufacturers maintain a telephone support line You might even be able to select an automated help option for troubleshooting the installation process Automated help for common problems is often preferable

Websites In addition to a phone number you can call, scanner manufacturers maintain websites to provide technical support to their customers The Visioneer customer support website is shown in Figure 4-14, and you can find it at www.visioneer.com The Hewlett-Packard website (see Figure 4-15) allows you

to search for help using a keyword This site is located at www.hp.com/cposupport

Most technical support sites provide a surprising range of services—providing quick answers to technical questions and an online library of downloadable drivers, patches, and updates for your scanner

FIGURE 4-14 The Visioneer customer support website

4

FIGURE 4-15 The Hewlett-Packard technical support website