Available at IRISLink.com, the official website for I.R.I.S. Inc., are a whole host of state of the art software and gadgets for scanning and optical character recognition (OCR). If you need a simple way to scan documents anywhere, I.R.I.S. offers solutions with its line of products. In this review, I will tell you about some of the more outstanding products they offer and how they can help you.

About I.R.I.S.

I.R.I.S. Inc. is a large global company that is headquartered in Belgium and has offices located in Delray Beach, Florida. They are a subsidiary of Japan based Canon Inc., which is perhaps best known for their cameras. I.R.I.S. produces a line of corporate products in addition to a variety of OCR items, such as mobile scanners, pen scanners, digital pens, and card scanners.

Custom OCR software that can do such things as extract information from forms and enter it into a database are among the products I.R.I.S. creates for businesses. When you deal with companies that develop software and other items for larger corporate clients, the consumers also reap the benefits of this technology.

Nowhere is this more evident than with I.R.I.S.’s top selling item Readiris Pro.

Top Products from I.R.I.S.

I.R.I.S. offers too many OCR solutions to cover them all here, so we will focus on their top products available to consumers and businesses alike.

I.R.I.S. is on the 14th edition of Readiris, software that allows you to convert papers, PDFs, and images into searchable and editable files. Your scanner is enhanced with advanced document conversion features with the use of Readiris. The digital files created can be in PDF, Word, HTML, and Excel format as well as many others.

Without ripping pages out, you can scan newspapers, books, letters, magazines, and more with IRIScan Book 3. You instantly create a high resolution image of up to 900 dpi by simply sliding this scanner over the document you want to scan. No matter the surface you are scanning, you can scan extremely fast (about three seconds per page) due to the wheels under the scanner and the high quality optical sensor.

You can scan documents anywhere you go with the IRIScan Anywhere 3. Wherever you are, you can scan photos, bills, invoices, letters, business cards, handwritten correspondences, receipts, and contracts. This is done by keeping the scanner charged with a USB cable. It is easy to take with you and stores the documents on an included SD card, USB flash drive, or on its internal memory.

The IRIScan Mouse is a lot of fun. In a handy, lightweight, and beautiful mouse, you get everything you could possibly want out of a scanner, including fluid and fast scanning, 300 dpi resolution, high scanning format, and it is portable and small. All day long, your scanner hangs out at your fingertips. It works as a regular mouse when you are not scanning.

With IRISNotes 2, your handwritten graphs and notes are sent directly to your Mac or PC, where they are turned into editable text. You just connect the USB receiver to your computer once you are back to your computer. This is great because you just place the receiver on any type of paper, and you are ready to write.

Using I.R.I.S.’s embedded OCR technology, text is automatically retyped in your computer whenever you slide the IRISPen 7 over printed numbers or text from faxes, newspapers, letters, magazines, or any other document. You can also import and save signatures, small graphics, and logos with the IRISPen. This is the latest version in a twenty year old line.

You are able to effortlessly scan piles of papers at blazing fast speeds with the IRIScan Pro 3 Cloud multi-page document scanner. Nearly any type of paper document can be fed into it. Then, once you push the smart button, it scans and exports the files into software of your choice or a folder. Plus, in a single pass, double sided pages can also be scanned.

I.R.I.S. Prices

I.R.I.S. offers some of the most reasonable prices in the industry for the quality of product you are getting. Below are the MSRPs for their top individual and business products and software:

Readiris 14 – Pro

$129, Corporate – $599 (for three licenses)

IRIScan Book 3

$99 or $129 for the Executive version

IRIScan Anywhere 3

$129

IRIScan Express 3

$79 – (retyping device)

IRISNotes 2

$99

IRISPen 7

$99 or $129 for the Executive version

IRISCompressor

$39
(compressed PDF file converter software)

IRISCard 5 / Cardiris 5

$99
(business card scanner)

IRISDocument Server

Starting at $5521
(high volume document compression and conversion)

IRISPowerscan

Starting at $612
(production OCR and
scanning solution)

IRISCapture Forms

Starting at $7849
(scans and identifies forms)

IRISCapture Invoices

Starting at $7849
(scans and identifies invoices)

For all of the products from I.R.I.S., you get a 30 day money back guarantee. This means that without risk, you can try their products for 30 days. You can simply return the product if you are not completely satisfied, and they will refund your money.

Criticism of I.R.I.S.

I had great experiences with Readiris 14 and the IRISPen 7 that I tested out for this review. There were a few things that I noticed with it that could be better. For example, though its OCR abilities are better than most software, the Readiris software was not completely accurate. However, it does reflect the most innovative technology available, and you can be sure the OCR abilities will be perfected in the near future.

I went on the OCR discussion boards to see if I could see what others thought of I.R.I.S.’s products. For the most part, the reviews and comments I saw were full of praise. One user complained that the Readiris 14 for the Mac did not allow him to choose a scan size, but it appears he just did not know what he was doing because that option is clearly available. In this instance, though it is quite user friendly, there may be a bit of a learning curve for some with Readiris 14.

Customer Support

By email and phone, you can reach the technical support and customer service of I.R.I.S. Plus, on their website, there are user manuals, frequently asked questions, and software tutorials. Unfortunately, if you want to contact I.R.I.S., you have to do so during normal East Coast business hours.

I was curious to see how good their customer service was, so I called them five minutes before the end of working hours on a Friday. I was greeted by a cheerful representative, who to my surprise did not seem like he was in a hurry to get me off the phone. He was able to provide me with more than enough information for what I needed.

Conclusion

All of the items available from I.R.I.S. are packed full of excellent features and reflect the latest in OCR and scanning innovations. For how high tech the products are, the prices are very affordable. Plus, there are a variety of options to choose from to best fit your needs. And, best of all, with everything they offer, you can get your money back if you are not fully satisfied.

For all of the reasons above, I strongly recommend checking out the product line from I.R.I.S. if you have any scanning projects you need completed. They provide perfect solutions for keeping organized in the information age.