I need to enter about 50 pages of text (typewritten, no fancy fonts)
into a Word or Excel document. I am exploring the possibility of OCR
software. Is it possible to buy a software package that does a good
job of OCR for less than $400? Less than $250 would be *great*. I
would also like to know the general price range for this software,
and--again, in general terms--what kinds of features the expensive
programs have that the cheap programs lack. Lastly, a truly great
answer would tell me whether it's possible to have this done at a
place like kinko's, but this is not necessary for payment. If you know
of software that's *great* but only available for PC, not Mac, I would
like to hear about that as well.

Comments also welcomed!

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Clarification of Question by fieldlily-ga on 14 Aug 2005 08:39 PDT

Great; thank you very much!

fieldlily-ga

Hey,

Since this just a comment, just take it as that.  It seems to me that
the OCR software business has and is still very undeveloped. It seems
a small circle online.

I'm going to post two links below, one that has been on the net
forever and is most likely the biggest around. Second is freeware
(free completly) and claims to be good.

Oh and to answer your question, last time I was at Kinko's, I don't
think they offered it.  Could be wrong -- but hey, they're open 24/7
so give'em a call.


1) Omnipage - http://www.scansoft.com  --- They have been in the OCR
business since I can remember.  I'm sure it will fit your every needs,
however, it carries a hefty price of $500.00

2) Simple OCR - http://www.simpleocr.com --- Completly Free.  You have
nothing to loose and giving it a shot.


Shall be it for me.

thanks a bunch! I will check out both of them.

Buy a Lexmark scanner/printer/fax machine it comes with OCR features
among many others I got mine from Walmart for about $100.00 it does a
very good job at character recognition.

http://www.lexmark.com/uncomplicate/product/home/39/0,7044,204816596_379811319_331705383_en_0_1,00.html

I'm sorry, that was the previous model I got this one from HSN for about $250

For PC: Microsoft Office 2003, the Picture Manager application can
perform OCR, I can't say how accurate it is having only used it on a
short document once (did a good job though).

I've never tried it, but the software of choice used by folks who scan
books for ... um, archival purposes ... seems to be ABBYY FineReader. 
There is a Mac version (ABBYY FineReader 5 Pro for Mac) that appears
to be available for around $150.  A Froogle search should present you
with a selection of sources.

Thanks, everybody, for your input! I will follow up on all of it.

Oh, and just for anybody else who reads this string in the future:
exileonmain-ga, I took your suggestion and called kinko's, and it
turns out that they *will* do OCR, although it's very expensive. But
it's also possible to do OCR yourself on their design computers, at
the more-or-less reasonable rate of 40 cents a minute. I think I will
try that route in order to get the hang of it all, and then set about
finding a machine/software solution for the office.

Thanks again!

Audrey

This is great OCR software for mac from IRIS:
Price: $130!
http://www.irislink.com/opt/uk/products/readiris/mac/index.html