SilverFast 8.8 r14 update issue

[saiguy]

Just took the newest update for SF8.8 Ai. Updated my 3 versions, Nikon 9000, HDR Studio & Epson Expression 11,000. Trying to create a new IT8 transparency on the Expression 11k I encountered this issue.

Doing a prescan with maximize frame on the Expression 11k, I get only a white screen. I peeked under the lid near the end of the prescan and saw the top lighting was active. Then I tried the IT8 function to see if it would recognize the target, a 35mm target, but no luck.

I then ran an IT8 reflective scan which worked as expected.

Will send a ticket to LSI. So this is a heads up, and maybe some one of you will try this out for yourself and report findings. The carousels of 35mm slides I am to run now contain many "super 35mm slides" so called. The ADF film holders crop/obstruct the larger film slides, so hoping this gets sorted out soon as I can only scan them on the flat bed without being cropped.

If I hear back from LSI I'll report same here. thanks,

cheers

[saiguy]

So I tried to send a support ticket to LSI regarding the above, but could not find a viable avenue to pursue it.

If I need to revert to SF8.8 r13, do I need the revert all 3 of my LSI apps, as I have learned the hard way they all need to be in sync as they share some prefs's/ folders?

What fun all this Tricknoledgy,

[Mark D Segal]

I ran through the IT8 profile creation process with the same version of SilverFast you are using, but on my Epson V850 and it worked fine. No issues.

Here is a link to their contact page for tech support:

SilverFast Tech Support

[saiguy]

I discovered the problem. I had a ruler on the platen that covered the area where the scanner does its internal calibration. Live & learn 

[Mark D Segal]

That's funny! Sometimes the most elementary things.............

[Garnick]

I discovered the problem. I had a ruler on the platen that covered the area where the scanner does its internal calibration. Live & learn

As a RULE, I would suggest you shouldn't do that!     However, I had an issue a couple of weeks ago after I had downloaded and installed the Silverfast driver (demo version 8.8.0r14) for the Nikon Super Coolscan 4000 ED.  Once it was installed I tried to open Silverfast for the V750 and it would not find that scanner.  Tried everything I could think of, but to no avail.  It would also not recognize the Nikon scanner nor the driver for the Epson Expression 1680.  The V750 and 1680 are the most important ones, so I had to find a fix somehow.  I could have reinstalled those two drivers, but luckily I had backed up my Boot-Clone Drives the day before, so I cloned that back to my main work drive (Macintosh HD) and everything was working as expected (without the Nikon Scan driver installed).  I have no idea why that happened, and now I am hesitant about installing the 8.8.0r14 update as well. 

What say you Mark?

Gary   

[Mark D Segal]

Do you own SilverFast licenses for all three scanners? When you commissioned the update to the latest version were you offered the drivers for all three scanners, or only one?

Normally, the updater updates all your SilverFast drivers in one sequential set of operations because there are shared resources.

[Garnick]

Do you own SilverFast licenses for all three scanners? When you commissioned the update to the latest version were you offered the drivers for all three scanners, or only one?

Normally, the updater updates all your SilverFast drivers in one sequential set of operations because there are shared resources.

Hi Mark,

I assume you are replying to my post, but not at all certain, since you seem to be referring to something I didn't write.  Please confirm Mark

Thanks,
Gary

[Mark D Segal]

Hi Mark,

I assume you are replying to my post, but not at all certain, since you seem to be referring to something I didn't write.  Please confirm Mark

Thanks,
Gary

I was referring to what you wrote. I don't understand your software context from the way you put it. Do you have SF8.x licenses for all three scanners in any dot release of version 8, or is one a demo of the current dot release and the other two SilverFast licenses, or are the other two using some other software? I'm trying to understand what could have been inconsistent to prevent all of them from working, because I've never had the experience you encountered when I've upgraded four licenses at a time.

[Garnick]

I was referring to what you wrote. I don't understand your software context from the way you put it. Do you have SF8.x licenses for all three scanners in any dot release of version 8, or is one a demo of the current dot release and the other two SilverFast licenses, or are the other two using some other software? I'm trying to understand what could have been inconsistent to prevent all of them from working, because I've never had the experience you encountered when I've upgraded four licenses at a time.

OK, I did get somewhat off topic, so this is what I have.  Both the Epson V750 and the Expression 1680 are licensed with version 8.8.0r8.  Of course since the Nikon Scan is a DEMO (version 8.8.0r14) it has no license as such.  I agree that my hesitation about installing the 8.8.0r14 update for the V750 and the 1680 is probably misplaced, but it was the Nikon Scan DEMO v. 8.8.0r14 that caused the total SNAFU with the other two scanners.  I suppose that might be due to the fact that it was not an update as such, and therefore caused a conflict with the other two scanners for which the drivers had not been updated.  I suppose that if I were to update the V750 and the 1680 to the 8.8.0r14 version before installing the Nikon Scan DEMO there might have been no conflict and all drivers would have worked properly as expected.  Not sure about that, so perhaps you can shed some light on it Mark. 

Gary   

[Mark D Segal]

That's the kind of scenario I had in mind, why I asked those questions. Insofar as those dot-release updates are free, you should get them up to the latest available. I would do that first, and see whether you get all three scanners working on a common SilverFast platform after doing that. Make sure to have your license numbers handy just in case you need to do any software and licensing reset that could require entering them again. Normally they aren't needed, but you haven't upgraded in quite a while so no harm having them on hand just in case. When you select to upgrade one of the licensed versions, the application searches for other licensed scanners and tells you it needs to update all of them. Then you know you're on the right course. It will download two installers, one for each license.You then proceed to install each one of them. From there, things should work normally. Let us know - and good luck with it.

[Garnick]

That's the kind of scenario I had in mind, why I asked those questions. Insofar as those dot-release updates are free, you should get them up to the latest available. I would do that first, and see whether you get all three scanners working on a common SilverFast platform after doing that. Make sure to have your license numbers handy just in case you need to do any software and licensing reset that could require entering them again. Normally they aren't needed, but you haven't upgraded in quite a while so no harm having them on hand just in case. When you select to upgrade one of the licensed versions, the application searches for other licensed scanners and tells you it needs to update all of them. Then you know you're on the right course. It will download two installers, one for each license.You then proceed to install each one of them. From there, things should work normally. Let us know - and good luck with it.

Yes Mark you are quite correct, I haven't updated the two scanners for more than a year.  I always download the updates and then install at my discretion.  Since I haven't done an update for so long I seem to have forgotten one aspect of the procedure.  As far as I recall it was not necessary to have the scanner(s) tuned on in order to do the update, and as you have mentioned, the updater for one scanner would update both with little interruption in the procedure.  Please set me straight if I've missed something.  Oddly enough I have no updates on file beyond V. 8.8.0r8, which I installed in May 2017.  This seems rather strange, since I have Silverfast set to automatically check for updates.  Not sure what happened there, although it did advise me about the availability of latest version, which I downloaded and have not yet installed.

Thanks Mark,
Gary         

[Mark D Segal]

Hi Gary - right. I assume you are on OSX? (But possibly the procedure is the same with Windows). When SF8 is doing updates the scanners do not need to be turned on. You commission the update in "Check for Updates" in the Service Dialog tab as the application starts-up (illustration below). You can do the same checking from their website. You do the install procedure one after another in the usual way you install software on OSX. Just Do the installations for both scanners, then try them all, including the Nikon 4000 to make sure it all works.

[Garnick]

Hi Gary - right. I assume you are on OSX? (But possibly the procedure is the same with Windows). When SF8 is doing updates the scanners do not need to be turned on. You commission the update in "Check for Updates" in the Service Dialog tab as the application starts-up (illustration below). You can do the same checking from their website. You do the install procedure one after another in the usual way you install software on OSX. Just Do the installations for both scanners, then try them all, including the Nikon 4000 to make sure it all works.

I am on OSX High Sierra, MacPro 2010/12.  I get the updates through the Service Dialog, download them and then install at my discretion.  However, I had completely forgotten to install the latest update, even though I downloaded it as soon as it was available.  You mentioned that the updates for two or more scanners will be done "one after another".  I assume by that you mean that the updater for one scanner will also update the other scanner with a minimum delay while it searches for more scanners.  Is that correct?  In other words, after I have updated the 1680 I would not have to start the updater for the V750, since it will be updated along with the 1680 once the updater has located another scanner software.  I cannot believe I have forgotten this in such a short time, but I want to make sure I am doing it properly before I start the procedure.

EDIT:  I have almost come to the conclusion that I should probably try to sell the Nikon scanner and perhaps recover a few $$$ if possible.  I've always taken very good care of it and it's in excellent condition, but of course I am aware that it might be a difficult sale.  The Silverfast driver for the Nikon scanner is beyond my budget at almost $600 CDN, which is in my opinion far too costly compared to the volume of work it would be generating at this point.  And of course the fact that the V750 does a pretty darn good job on 35mm film, negative and positive.  I've tried VueScan with the Nikon but was not impressed for various reasons.  Also, when I do eventually upgrade to Mojave the 1680 will not be supported by Silverfast, but I will boot into High Sierra to use that scanner.         

Gary 

[Mark D Segal]

No not quite. When you launch the upgrade process, it looks for all the installed SilverFast licenses on your computer. In your case 2. It will then download two installers, one for each license. You then launch each installer one after another like you would do for any software in OSX.

[Garnick]

No not quite. When you launch the upgrade process, it looks for all the installed SilverFast licenses on your computer. In your case 2. It will then download two installers, one for each license. You then launch each installer one after another like you would do for any software in OSX.

Thanks for the clarification Mark.  I wasn't sure about that and couldn't recall the actual procedure due to my tardy approach to upgrades recently.  For some reason I seemed to recall that whenever I upgraded one scanner it automatically upgraded the other.  One of my favourite sayings is one that I coined, from necessity I suppose.  It goes something like this - "My memory isn't what it used to be.  As a matter of fact it never was."  I think that sums it up rather well, unfortunately!

Gary

[Mark D Segal]

Thanks for the clarification Mark.  ...............

Gary

You are welcome. I hope it all works out for you.

[saiguy]

In my experience Mark is spot on about SF8 updates. They do share some folders and if not in sync you can get crashes. I have 2 licenses, plus HDR Studio. When I go to update, SF will download the Nikon and Epson updates. You install them separately. But it does not include a HDR Studio installer. So I open HDR Studio, go to Service Dialog and download and install it from there.

Garnick. I choose the download & install option. It only takes a minute to install each one. This can help you avoid your memory issue. BTW, I like and can relate to your coined quote.

cheers,

[saiguy]

Gary, a copule more thoughts. The Nikon 4000 I would think is a very good scanner. You said it is in good condition. I suggest you call LSI sales, make sure you are talking to Kitten, tell her your story and ask if you can get a loyal customer discount. You might be surprised.

If the 1680 scanner will not work on the latest OSX, do you really need the newest OS? Mark himself is still on El Capitan, which does have a rep for being VERY stable.

Also if you update your SF licenses to 8.8 r14 first, the Nikon 4000 demo might then work. After all it will likely put stuff into those shared folders, which is why you may not have been able to access your other versions.

As a total aside. My Nikon 9000 quit working yesterday giving Nikon FS errors. I talked to Kitten in a panic and asked if a Tech Support person was available and that I was willing to pay for same. She said Mr. Boris was on a call and would have him get to me when finished. In the mean time, she sent me the TeamViewer app, asked what the code #'s where so Boris you check into my situation. He took over my screen shortly later, scooped up some log files, had me open the Epson scanner, etc. and looked at a lot of stuff. Said he would send the info to Germany and call me about 9am next day. This morning I had an email, support ticket from the the Director of Support, Testing master, name Sonke Noack from Germany. He asked me to check into some things, etc. Turns out that when I changed out the old firewire cable and the thunderbolt adaptor to a different old firewire cable everything was working again.

My point here is that I have always been very impressed with LSI and how they treat there customers.

[Mark D Segal]

Yes I agree, Sonke knows his stuff and is very helpful.

The Epson 1680 scanner is compatible with SilverFast 8.x and with all recent OSX systems. Please see the attached screen grab from the SilverFast website.