This tab lets you set preferences that control the behavior of VueScan.
Prefs | Crop units
Prefs | Printed units
Prefs | External viewer
Prefs | Viewer
Prefs | External editor
Prefs | Editor
Prefs | Browser
Prefs | Graph type
Prefs | Button 1/2/3/4 action
Prefs | Auto refresh
Prefs | Display raw scan
Prefs | Display positive
Prefs | Splash screen
Prefs | Histogram type
Prefs | Animate crop box
Prefs | Thick crop box
Prefs | Add extensions
Prefs | Substitute date
Prefs | Warn on delete
Prefs | Warn on overwrite
Prefs | Warn on not ready
Prefs | Warn on no scanner
Prefs | Exit when done
Prefs | Beep when done
Prefs | Beep when auto eject
Prefs | Use temp file name
Prefs | Anti alias text
Prefs | Anti alias image
Prefs | Enable density display
Prefs | Enable raw from disk
Prefs | Disable scanners
Prefs | Enable sliders/spin buttons
Prefs | Enable popup tips
Prefs | Enable sample images
Prefs | Calibration period
Prefs | Image memory (MB)
Prefs | Window maximized/iconized x/y offset/size
Prefs | Font size (pt)
Prefs | Option panel width
Use this option to choose the units in the Crop tab. You can choose pixel, mm, cm or inches.
This setting does not affect the size of output.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Use this option to select the units when displaying the printed width and height. You can choose mm, cm or inches.
This also affects the units displayed in the status area at the bottom of the VueScan window.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
If this option is set, cropped and processed images will be displayed using the viewer specified in the "Viewer" option.
Basic Option: This option is always displayed.
If the "External viewer" option is enabled, the specified program will be started with each cropped image upon completion of a scan.
The default value is "default".
On Windows, if the viewer name is "default", the file association for this type of file will be used. You can also put command-line options after the name of the viewer (e.g. "vuepro32 /fillwindow" to display images without a window frame with VuePrint). If the name of the viewer has "%1" after it (e.g. vuepro32 "%1"), the file name will be substituted at that point. If you use the %1 argument on the command line, be sure to put double-quotes around it, otherwise file names that have embedded spaces won't work.
On Linux, the viewer name can have command-line options after it, and the file name will be appended to the end of the command-line before it's run.
On Mac OS X, the files will start in the same application that would start if you double-click on the files.
On Mac OS X, you can set up the default viewer for a type of file by clicking on an image, choosing "File | Show info", choosing "Open with application", selecting an application, and then choosing "Change all".
Advanced Option: This option is displayed when Prefs | External viewer is set.
If this option is set, OCR text files will be displayed using the editor specified in the "Editor" option.
Basic Option: This option is always displayed.
If the "External editor" option is enabled, the specified program will be started with each OCR text file at the completion of a scan.
The default value is "default".
On Windows, if the editor name is "default", the file association for this type of file will be used. You can also put command-line options after the name of the editor. If the name of the editor has "%1" after it (e.g. notepad "%1"), the file name will be substituted at that point. If you use the %1 argument on the command line, be sure to put double-quotes around it, otherwise file names that have embedded spaces won't work.
On Linux, the editor name can have command-line options after it, and the file name will be appended to the end of the command-line before it's run.
On Mac OS X, the files will start in the same application that would start if you double-click on the files.
On Mac OS X, you can set up the default editor for a type of file by clicking on an image, choosing "File | Show info", choosing "Open with application", selecting an application, and then choosing "Change all".
Advanced Option: This option is displayed when Prefs | External editor is set.
On Linux, this option is used if you want to use a web browser other than mozilla to display html files.
Basic Option: This option is always displayed (Linux only).
This option is used to control the type of graph that's displayed underneath the Options panel.
If you choose "Raw", a histogram of the raw data from the scanner is displayed, including the infrared channel if available.
If you choose "B/W", a histogram of the image prior to applying the black/white points is displayed, and you can change the black/white points with small triangles under the histogram.
If you choose "Curve", a curve is displayed that is applied after the black/white points and before the gamma correction (and the "Color | Brightness" option is just a gamma multiplier). You can adjust the curve by moving the small triangles under the histogram.
If you choose "Image", a histogram of the displayed image is shown.
Note that the graph isn't displayed in guided mode.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Use these options to control what VueScan does when you press a button on the front of a scanner. The default values of these options disable the buttons.
Advanced Option: This option is displayed when the scanner has buttons that can be read.
VueScan normally refreshes the display to reflect changed options, such as cropping or other options in the Color tab.
You can disable this by turning off this option.
To manually refresh the display, use the "Image | Refresh" command.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Use this option to display the raw scan data during a scan. You might want to turn this option off if you have a slow processor or don't want to see the scan in progress.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Use this option to display the raw scan data for negative film in positive format. This isn't an accurate negative to positive conversion, but is intended to give a rough idea of what the image will look like.
Advanced Option: This option is displayed when scanning negative film.
Use this option to display the splash screen when VueScan starts up.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Use this option to specify whether the Y axis of histograms is the number of samples (linear), the square root of the number of samples, or the logarithm of the number of samples. The default is "Linear".
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
This option controls whether the crop box in the Preview is animated - it's easier to see when animated, but can be distracting. The option is set by default.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
This option controls whether the crop box in the Preview is drawn with a thick line or a thin line. It's easier to see the thick line, but sometimes easier to get fine control with the thin line. The option is set by default.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
This option controls whether the TIFF, JPEG, PDF, Text and Index file names automatically have a ".tif", ".jpg", ".pdf", ".txt" or ".bmp" extension added to the file name. This reduces the amount of typing needed when manually setting the saved file names. No file extension will be added if the file name has a period in it. This option is set by default.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
This option controls whether the TIFF, JPEG, PDF and Text file names can include the scan date and time in the file name.
For instance, if the file name is "@.jpg", the resulting file will be "Scan-YYMMDD-0001+.jpg" with YY substitured for the current year, MM for the current month and DD for the current day.
Additionally, you can use YYYY for the 4-digit year, YY for the two-digit year, MM, DD, HH, II, and SS for the month, day, hour, minute and second when the scan was started.
You need to have at least three date/time names for this to work. For instance, a file name of MMDD.tif won't be substituted, but a file name of MMDDHH.tif will be.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
When enabled, VueScan will display a warning message before deleting a page from a multi-page scan. This option is set by default.
Advanced Option: This option is displayed when Input | Multi page is set.
When enabled, VueScan will display a warning message before overwriting a TIFF, JPEG, PDF or OCR text file, and allow you to prevent the file from being overwritten. This option is set by default.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
When enabled, VueScan will display a warning message when the scanner isn't ready (or the raw scan file doesn't exist) and you press the Preview or Scan button.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
When enabled, VueScan will display a warning message when a scanner is not connected.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Enabling this option causes VueScan to exit when scanning completes.
This option is not set by default.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Enabling this option causes a sound to be played on the computer's speakers when scanning completes. This is sometimes useful to alert you at the end of a long- running scan. On Windows, this is the "Default sound" in the "Sounds and Multimedia" control panel. On Linux and Mac OS X, this is a simple beep.
This option is not set by default.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Enabling this option causes a sound to be played on the computer's speakers when auto ejecting.
This is sometimes useful to alert you at the end of a long- running preview or scan. On Windows, this is the "Default sound" in the "Sounds and Multimedia" control panel. On Linux and Mac OS X, this is a simple beep.
This option is not set by default.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
When TIFF or JPEG files are being written, but haven't yet been closed, this option instructs VueScan to use file names with a .tmp at the end. When the file is closed, the file is renamed to remove the .tmp.
This allows programs that monitor a directory for files to know when the TIFF or JPEG files are ready for further processing.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Controls whether 1-bit images (i.e. text and line art) are displayed with anti-aliasing. This results in smoother looking displays but also takes a bit more computing power.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Controls whether gray-scale and color images are displayed with anti-aliasing. This results in smoother looking displays but also takes a bit more computing power.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Enables displaying the image density when the cursor is moved over the image with the control key held down.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Enables the Output | Raw file option when scanning from disk. This is useful if you want to re-scan raw scan files at a lower resolution or bits per pixel and save a raw scan file with these changes.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Use this option to disable some kinds of (or all) scanners. This option isn't used by default.
This is useful if you want to run multiple copies of VueScan at the same time, scanning with one copy and processing raw disk files with another. To use this option, put copies of VueScan in different directories, run VueScan, set this checkbox, then exit and restart VueScan.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
You can use this option to remove the slider and spin button controls. This is sometimes useful if you want the Options panel to be quite small to maximize the image display area. This option is set by default.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
You can use this option to enable a short description that pops up in a small yellow box when the mouse hovers over options and buttons.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
You can use this option to display sample images in the Preview and Scan panels on the right side of the window.
Basic Option: This option is always displayed.
You can use this option to set the maximum number of days to use a scanner calibration. A scanner's lamp color and lamp uniformity can shift over time, so it's sometimes useful to re-do the "Scanner | Calibrate" command to compensate for this. This is only used by some types of scanners.
Advanced Option: This option is displayed when the scanner is capable of calibration.
Use this option to set the maximum amount of memory that VueScan will use to hold all the previews and scans in memory.
If Input | Preview resolution is set to "Auto", then each preview needs about one million pixels, and if Input | Scan resolution is set to "Auto", each scan needs about four million pixels. Each pixel either needs three bytes (24-bit RGB), six bytes (48-bit RGB) or eight bytes (64 bit RGBI) depending on the setting of Input | Bits per pixel.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Use these options to set the VueScan window position and size. These options are updated automatically when you move or resize the window.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Use this option to set the font size used in VueScan. The font size is specified in points, which are basically the same as pixels on most systems.
The default value is 8 points.
Note that the display will jump when you change this option.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.
Use this option to set the width in pixels of the panel containing the VueScan options.
Advanced Option: This option is always displayed.