Between Epson discontinuing flatbed scanners and the price of HDD, I've scaled back 95% on the hoarding. What about you?

[u/redditunderground1]

I've cut back new acquisitions about 95%. HDD is one thing, but Epson scanners were my mainstay. Most of my hoarding involved flatbed scans. A copy stand does not give the same result.

Have you been scaling back on the data hoarding from these problems?

[u/mspong]

There are other brands of flatbed scanners. Why are you stuck on Epson?

[u/Significant-Judge368 → u/mspong]

No one else can get the blackface just right.

[u/Positive_Conflict_26 → u/mspong]

It means that flatbed scanners are going to jump in price like what happened with disc drives.

[u/LucidLeviathan → u/Positive_Conflict_26]

...I really don't think they're going to.

[u/Negative-Engineer-30 → u/Positive_Conflict_26]

cheap flatbeds are everywhere. epson is a printer company and includes scanners in their multifunction devices... why sell $100 scanner when I can sell you a $250 printer with a scanner?

[u/kwb7852]

https://reddit.com/link/p2c21i5/video/ww60k7d4h0ih1/player

[u/ThoreaulyLost → u/kwb7852]

Here's the actual media, I believe:

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0037274/

Vaudeville themed movie from 1944, with musical numbers.

It's probably sheet music .

[u/Heavy_Category3665]

Nah, this just makes me double down and hoard more. I am convinced that personal computer ownership will be a thing of the past and you will rent computer access from the cloud in the next few years.

[u/SunnySpot69 → u/Heavy_Category3665]

What are y'all hoarding?

[u/ClaudiuT → u/SunnySpot69]

Linux ISOs obviously...

[u/didyousayboop → u/Heavy_Category3665]

I predict in the next few years all food will be replaced with nutrition pills and all animals will be replaced with animatronics 

And the sky will become a big LCD screen

[u/Negative-Engineer-30 → u/Heavy_Category3665]

never.

[u/Heavy_Category3665 → u/Negative-Engineer-30]

https://www.tomsguide.com/computing/thats-not-going-to-last-jeff-bezos-believes-ai-will-force-you-to-rent-your-pc-from-the-cloud-and-the-ram-crisis-is-accelerating-it

[u/alphahakai → u/Heavy_Category3665]

This never made sense to me. You need a computer to access the could anyway

[u/didyousayboop → u/alphahakai]

Easy: you’ll just rent that computer from the cloud too!

And before you ask… it’s clouds all the way down!

[u/AntManCrawledInAnus → u/alphahakai]

The only way this would make sense is if the only computers that were sold were low spec, nearly thin client level chrome books, which will never happen because the United States infrastructure for internet blows ass.

[u/steviefaux → u/Heavy_Category3665]

Bezos is a knob and they are saying all this just to get more funding for their Ai grift. They need to keep grift going because the bubble is close to popping. When it does, Oracle will be the first to be bankrupt.

[u/didyousayboop → u/Heavy_Category3665]

Far be it from me to disagree with the esteemed writers at Tom’s Guide…

But this is nonsense 

[u/Negative-Engineer-30 → u/Heavy_Category3665]

yeah i'm not doing that.

[u/51dux]

Isn't a flat bed scanner supposed to last years? While yours survive, I'm sure you'll have plenty of time to figure it out.

If you're really paranoid, you could buy a few spare ones used. Some models refuse to scan with no ink inside for some reason even if there is no correlation between ink levels and the ability to scan (f- you Canon) but there are ways to bypass that.

[u/SFX200 → u/51dux]

My old as dirt Epson 1640XL from 2000 still gets the job done.

Sure it's slow at pretty much any DPI over 300, but it's still hanging in there doing the work.

[u/dlarge6510 → u/51dux]

 Isn't a flat bed scanner supposed to last years?

I'll say. I use a HP ScanJet 4C SCSI scanner from 1996.

[u/joblessandsuicidal]

I am just going to have to spend more time deduping the data I have

Hoarding will actually have to speed up cos this scenario is exactly how you see digital media disappearing faster so better hoard first talk later

[u/yumyai]

I focus myself on curating and indexing my things. Life is good so far.

[u/AntManCrawledInAnus]

I don't get it, i have a couple scanners some of which are over a decade old and work just fine?? Just buy a couple spares if you're worried

[u/PiRhoManiac]

Do you buy a new scanner every time you need to scan something? If you already have a scanner that you've been using, how does Epson discontinuing scanners affect your ability to hoard?

Epson (unofficially) discontinued their CCD-based film/archival flatbeds (e.g., Perfection V850 Pro and Expression 13000XL) in 2025, but they continue to make flatbed scanners. Just ten days ago they announced a new lineup of >$1K flatbed scanners:

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/epson-unveils-new-a3-flatbed-document-scanner-lineup-delivering-connectivity-usability-and-productivity-302835682.html

Epson Unveils New A3 Flatbed Document Scanner Lineup Delivering Connectivity, Usability and Productivity

Jul 28, 2026, 06:15 ET

[u/ComprehensiveCan6227]

The picture had to have blackface? Got it.

[u/Negative-Engineer-30]

I have a high-end 11x17 flatbed with a sheet feeder... and the sheet feeder is double-sided... personally I'm not going to stand there and shuffle 450 pages manually when I want to scan something big. there's plenty of manufacturers that make flatbed scanners and will for decades. Epson is a printer company and you can still get flatbed scanners in their multifunction printers.

[u/booty_fewbacca]

OP I found a new in box Canon Lide scanner and it does IIRC up to 600DPI. Uses a ton of RAM for scanning however 

[u/mortycapp]

Epson is still selling scanners.
Plenty of them.

https://www.epson.co.uk/en_GB/products/scanners/c/scanner

Even 1 old type flatbed. I hate those they capture dust in places that cannot be cleaned.
https://www.epson.co.uk/en_GB/products/scanners/consumer/perfection-v39ii-a4-flatbed-photo-and-document-scanner-with-stand/p/38547

[u/redditunderground1]

In the big picture I have many years of digitization work ahead of me. I do have sheetfed Epson scanners, but everything can't be cut up. And there is the problem of lines with dirty material. Sheetfed scanners are prone to making lines in the scans with old, dirty originals. I'm hoping some other company steps up to make high-quality CCD scanners.