text:
large scanner company umax has stopped supplying driver updates free of charge online. you can no longer download software drivers; instead, they must be purchased and sent to you on a cd.
if you go to the support center on the umax website and choose a scanner to download drivers for, you are presented with the following message: "this software is not downloadable. available on cd-rom only." by clicking on the "buy now" button you can be presented with a charge ranging from us$15 to a staggering $60+ if you are a mac user.
a lot of people who already own umax scanners will be upgrading to windows xp, and will be planning on a trip to the umax website to get new drivers. (although the devices will work under xp without the standard drivers, the included drivers are not as good as those produced by umax). users have no choice but to pay for the new drivers unless they can live with the generic xp software.
this system in theory allows umax to make some extra profit on top of the scanner purchase, and allows for extra revenue every time a new set of drivers is released.
read more at the register.
matthew's opinion
this is ridiculous! a company that sells you a product should supply the drivers for that product. if a new os comes out such as windows xp, the company should support it and allow its customers to continue using the product they bought without having to fork over more cash. umax is shooting itself in the foot with this money-making scheme, and people will start to go elsewhere for their scanners.
the register article also states that someone at the umax technical support centre said the company has done this because most of its customers are still on dial-up access, and therefore a cd solution is easier. i do not believe this for one second. some of the drivers are at 36 mb+, but i would still rather download that slowly than fork over $60 for a cd.
user comments 229 comment(s)
|common sense? (8:27am est tue jun 04 2002)
i give em a year and they'll either be belly up or allowing downloads.first rule of bussiness "don't piss off your customers!" – by brian esser
|2nd rule of business (8:36am est tue jun 04 2002)
"there's a sucker born every minute" – by clueless
|yes, umax has gone…. (8:42am est tue jun 04 2002)
…completely and udderly insane. for gawd's sake, if you own stock with these clowns, sell it now! – by urgeek
|huh? (8:49am est tue jun 04 2002)
i thought all the morons that ran the failed dotcoms all stepped in front of busses and died? i guess there are one or two still breathing… – by /sm
|bullshit (9:04am est tue jun 04 2002)
sell sell sell but don't support your customers with something as simple as downloadable software so you can use your freaking scanner. this is a bad business decision!
hey umax, cut it out!! – by bentheworm
|wow… (9:05am est tue jun 04 2002)
they really have some balls. – by lumis
|just stop buying umax scanners (9:09am est tue jun 04 2002)
stores should put a big label on the umax boxes:
warning: driver is not included.
i never liked umax brand in a first place.
i got canon 660u. nice inexpensive scanner cappable to scan even my 35mm film.
|re win32 (9:11am est tue jun 04 2002)
great point. everyone boycott umax – by bentheworm
|hmmmmmmmmmmm (9:18am est tue jun 04 2002)
i can sell you the car but the keys are extra – by hmmmmmmmmmmm
|this better not catch on … (9:21am est tue jun 04 2002)
i don't care much about umax … they made crap products and i'm surprised to hear that they even update their drivers. a two bit company with a crap attitude.
what concerns me is: what if this catches on?? i don't even keep driver disks right now … i always download the latest off of the web. if everyone starts charging it will blow major chunks! let's put u-max out of business fast so everyone else get's the message … charging for drivers = bad! – by oz
|my umax experience (9:31am est tue jun 04 2002)
recently, i decided to get my old (yet very high-quality) umax scanner working in windows 2000. my first step was to get drivers, but i wasn't sure that there drivers for this scanner under win2k even existed because i had read many posts of people complaining about a lack of win2k support. after checking the umax web site for drivers, i noticed the message this article mentions and so i did a search with google. after a few minutes, i came up with several web sites that provide the drivers for free. this was not good business for umax since their drivers were never great to begin with (the win98 version of drivers caused a vmm32.vxd error, prevented win98 from booting, and the only fix was to comment out a line in the win.ini file – easy for us geeks, but not user-friendly at all).
while umax makes decent hardware and their newer drivers are much better, i will not support or recommend any company that charges for it's drivers. – by organgtool
|no more umax… (9:40am est tue jun 04 2002)
ok! thats it! no more umax scanner ever!!!!
– by anti-umax
|they're not the first. (9:44am est tue jun 04 2002)
iomega used to charge $45 for windows nt drivers. i bought their tape backup system about 5 years ago for win 95. i upgraded to nt 4 and was told i was s.o.l.. – by steven
|drivers rant! (9:50am est tue jun 04 2002)
i don't know what the problem is, but virtually nobody updates their drivers!. amd still hasn't updated their 760mpx drivers to support windows acpi enough to play an mp3 without skipping. it took via over a year to do so with the kt133. i bought a mitsumi usb cd-rw and a umax usb scanner 9 months before w2k came out and neither made windows 2000 drivers for their products.
this is really pissing me off. i wish the hardware companies would just charge more and provide decent service. the graphics chip makers seem to be the only ones taking responsibility for their products. i like knowing that buying an nvidia card means several years of new drivers. – by steven
|time to switch to linux (9:58am est tue jun 04 2002)
the linux scanner drivers are up to date and still free. more reason to switch away from windoze (costly proprietry solutions) to linux (a free and open solution). it is enough to drive me insane, that is why i am using sane (or xsane) for scanning – by linux guy
|i own a umax scanner (10:02am est tue jun 04 2002)
and if i have to pay to get new drivers, then i guess i'll only use it in linux. boycott umax!!!
– by the scavenger
|so… (10:06am est tue jun 04 2002)
the umax guy was completely comfortable saying that 60$ is a reasonable charge for updateing a driver on a mac… ? i really hope other companys dont start this practice… my comapany has a simular thing but not quite… since we sell laptops we also provide restore cd's but we wont provide them to download we will only ship them out, but the agian they are 1 to 2 cd's worth of data, not just a driver. (all our drivers have always been free) – by next362″
|open source (10:09am est tue jun 04 2002)
why don't hardware companies open the source code to their drivers (even mac and win)? it seems like they could save a little time and money. – by steven
|x-umax consumer (10:13am est tue jun 04 2002)
to : firstname.lastname@example.com
to whom it may concern :
i have owned a few umax scanners….but next time i buy, or recommend a scanner it will not be umax. the decision to charge for driver updates was not a swift move. if i worked for umax….i would be concerned and would start looking for work elsewhere. this latest decision, unless revoked publicly will cause umax scanner sales to plummet. i can't see how that part of the business can survive. bad news travels fast. it is easy to make a bad decision and ruin an image as a customer service oriented company and hard to rebuild that image and restore user confidence once it is destroyed. where else is the comany cutting corners and possibly sacrificing product quality?
– by x-consumer
|well. (10:21am est tue jun 04 2002)
i guess we won't be seeing umax in a year or two.
– by —mike savad
|well. (10:21am est tue jun 04 2002)
i guess we won't be seeing umax in a year or two.
– by —mike savad
|umax, u lose. (10:28am est tue jun 04 2002)
i will not buy anymore umax product. bye bye! – by bye love
|end of umax (10:41am est tue jun 04 2002)
hp tried this a few years ago, and it didn't fly, if umax thinks they are going to get away with it, then they will disappear from the industry.
also, the idea of open sourcing drivers for hardware, can we please get over the open source kick? open source drivers for any hardware is a technical support nightmare. how is a company supposed to provide decent technical support for a product if there are 100 different flavours of the drivers out there. most companies do not support their product if used with linux just for this reason, not only are the drivers open sourced, but also the os, and that just creates too many different combinations that a company can not deal with when providing technical support.
please think, open source is not the cure all of the computer industry, it has its place in certain niches, but it is not the answer for everything, especially if you just don't want to pay for something.
|glad i bought and hp (10:44am est tue jun 04 2002)
nuff said – by marc
|steve… (10:48am est tue jun 04 2002)
i dont really want my ms drivers open sorce so some kid can make their own version of a "improved driver" all i really need is a version of windows that crashes even more… it crashes enough for me already.
-umax out of buisness? what is wrong with you people that keep claiming people are going to go out of buisness in 1-2 years… someone said yesterday that intel would be out of buisness within a year because amd would put them out… umax has a very large retail presence, and more and more uneducated unbrand aware people buy computers… its a hassle but people wont know it till they have already bought one… it might hurt them 4-5 years down the road when they have burnt so many people but there isnt a chance in hell they would be out of buisness in a year or 2… sending them letters of dissaproval is the best thing to do… like x-consumers letter… the only thing im worried about is some other company getting this idea from them and then another… i hope it dies quick. – by next362″
|lol marc… (10:51am est tue jun 04 2002)
yea have you called hp's tech support ever? i wouldent be glad to own a hp product. when it breaks get ready for a 2 hour sit on hold. and topher is right hp tried this scam a while back them selves… – by next362″
|re: next362 (10:59am est tue jun 04 2002)
"i dont really want my ms drivers open sorce so some kid can make their own version of a "improved driver" all i really need is a version of windows that crashes even more… it crashes enough for me already."
open source linux driver works fine for me. certified microsoft vendor driver still causes my supposed crash proof windows xp to crash. (this is the fourth download of xp drivers, hopefully it will stop my weekly windows xp crash). – by hate winxp crashing
|we plan to follow suite. (11:08am est tue jun 04 2002)
umax and microsoft see the potential in driver resale. – by b.gates
|the register actually found a umax employee (11:11am est tue jun 04 2002)
it's actually amusing, the poor sot who spoke with the reg wasn't very good at english and seemed to be fairly ignorant about everything.
– by /sm
|:) (11:11am est tue jun 04 2002)
see how far window$ has come … "hate winxp crashing" is complaining about his weekly xp crash … there was a time when everyone was complaining about their hourly window$ crash. – by off topic
|scream all yout want … (11:26am est tue jun 04 2002)
i bought a logitec hand held scanner about 10 yrs ago only to find out that i was going to have to pay logitec again to get a driver update. i never bought another logetic product again. still waiting for my boycout to put them out of business. – by lauughalot
|high quality solutions (11:39am est tue jun 04 2002)
i know i'm not artist or photographer, but i found that canon scanners do rather well when put to the test, and maybe when canon and hp see what umax is pulling they will try harder to woe the disenchanted customers that umax left with their pills flowing in the breeze. i always liked canon better anyway…i'm in on this boycott thing, show the world that some things need to remain free! – by beckermanex
|re: hate winxp crashing (11:48am est tue jun 04 2002)
hint never use the microsoft drivers use the hardware vendors drivers… ms's drivers for our products cause nothing but problems… and we do not make any drivers open sorce, because like topher says… it would be a headache to support them…
laughalot is evidence of the fact that companys can pretty much make an ass of themselves and stay in buisness… – by next362″
|musteck.. (11:51am est tue jun 04 2002)
i have a cheapy $80 musteck 1200ep plus scanner and it works great!photo quality scans and is relativly fast. – by brian esser
|umax scanners suck anyway (11:55am est tue jun 04 2002)
like most other taiwanese made scanners. they're absolute crap!
stick to the japanese made scanners such as epson or cannon unless you're on a real tight budget and don't care about how slow or fuzy your scans are.
|no! (11:58am est tue jun 04 2002)
damn dirty apes! – by [h]
|hmmm (12:00pm est tue jun 04 2002)
looks like if this trend continues the "geek community" will need to utilize tools like and actually start uploading drivers there. if everyone did this, we would not have to worry about this bullshit and we would actually have a small p2p system of drivers going.
just a thought – by bentheworm
|it can't be… (12:08pm est tue jun 04 2002)
maybe they received their first bill for internet traffic from their isp ? *grin* would be interesting to know how often new drivers are downloaded per product. i always download the drivers whenever i reinstall my operating system (and thats very often), because i think there could be a new version available. it is not surprising that companies do not update drivers for their products very often because development and testing is expensive. by the way, they want to sell their new products and earn money, and they will sell less if the old products work properly forever. and we all dont want a saturation of consumption, do we ?
you don't earn money by updating drivers – at least not directly.
$60 per driver definitely is daylight robbery though. – by aiwe
|umax blows goats anyhow (12:50pm est tue jun 04 2002)
whenever a new o/s comes out, they just discontinue their scanner line and don't offer new drivers for it. try getting w2k drivers for a 1220, or xp drivers for a 2100u. sure, the 2100u works with the xp driver, but you get on half of the page yellow, the other half green.
canon writes new drivers for every os for almost all of their scanners, no matter how old. that's support! – by brian corbino
|$1.00 to get on the bus… (1:26pm est tue jun 04 2002)
and $.50 more for the driver to take you to your destination! what a concept, umax! i'm switching to epson! – by umax usux
|never bought umax (1:44pm est tue jun 04 2002)
i never bought a umax product and after hearing this news i definitely will never even think of buying their products, what a bunch of crap charging for updates to their own technology, this would be like charging money to use the keys to a new car that you just paid for. all in all i think umax made a really bad decision and they will most likely go out of business after everyone hears of this practice. charging for drivers?!? agian, what a bunch of crap – by umax = bad business
|steven- "drivers rant!" (1:44pm est tue jun 04 2002)
am i getting dyslexic in my old age? when i saw the post's subject, i thought of people cursing each other for running stop signs and weaving through traffic…
(good rant btw) – by /sm
|umax sux (1:47pm est tue jun 04 2002)
the one i had bit the dust under warranty. i sent it back 2 times for "repair" it came back in the same condition, not working, except it had fingerprints under the glass. cost me more in shipping than a new one did in the end. i spammed them for weeks. – by umaxsux.com
|re: hate winxp crashing (1:48pm est tue jun 04 2002)
my xp system has been up for 3 weeks, and the last shutdown was for a new videocard update.
is it something your doing wrong? or something im doing right? :) – by stable as usual
|guys… (1:53pm est tue jun 04 2002)
read the register post. the register found that the cd they are shipping has 30mb of software and drivers. sill too damned much if you ask me, i expect software that comes with hardware to be free.
actually, i just expect software to be free, period. probably because most of my non-game software came free with hardware… – by /sm
|doesn't matter…. (1:57pm est tue jun 04 2002)
their drivers never work anyway. but i would be pretty ticked it i paid $15-$30 for a non-working driver. they really need to figure out how to make their scanners work before charging for the required software. – by m@
|re: winxp not stable usual (1:58pm est tue jun 04 2002)
it is the ati all in wonder radeon drivers. i went to the ati website to get the latest driver (4th xp drivers already, hopefully no crash) and it is certified by microsoft (don't certify it if it crashes!!!)
everytime when window xp crashes, microsoft sends out a crash report to microsoft. the crash reports states that there is a vector redrawing problem. how many of these reports do i have to send to microsoft before this problem is fixed?
there is no such problem with linux. it is very reliable and stable. i am hoping that winxp becomes as stable as linux.
|my next scanner won't be umax (1:58pm est tue jun 04 2002)
thankfully, i downloaded the umax vistascan 3.55 drivers for my astra 1200s for windows 2000 in march. now they want $15 for the same software.
if they had wanted $15 in march, i would have gone out and bought a new non-umax usb scanner to replace this old scsi umax scanner. they don't even have xp drivers for my scanner.
i think hp also charges for some of their drivers. at least they used to offer a free basic driver for my deskjet 660c, and they charged $ if you wanted the more advanced driver.
– – by eric
|hello (2:12pm est tue jun 04 2002)
i am a sysadmin for a medium size company and i gaurantee i would not by hardware that charge for drivers and update so umax you are now on our company do not buy list – by yep
|insane charges for drivers (2:21pm est tue jun 04 2002)
lets see how quickly the drivers turn up on kazza!!!! – by theoutsiders
|the only time… (2:25pm est tue jun 04 2002)
i have come in contact with umax is in the local school system. cos donated their "old" umax scanners & i set them up. please, total cr@p. you get what you pay for, & the cos got rid of their cr@p. – by tech
|new topic: hp to can 15,000 (2:43pm est tue jun 04 2002)
damn, hp sucks. best wishes to all of you merger rah-rah guys, time to update your resumes.
– by kkkarly marx
|re: hate winxp crashing (2:44pm est tue jun 04 2002)
thought about blaming ati? – by stable as usual
|34mb of driver code? (3:02pm est tue jun 04 2002)
do they really need all 34mb of data for the drivers? cut it to under a meg per device and call it a day. make it work. cut out cute custom dialogs and bitmaps and all that.
"final driver code=34mb"
|kkkarly marx (3:07pm est tue jun 04 2002)
"hp to can 15,000" only matters to the 15k and their families. it doesn't affect the way my hp products work at all.
now, if the headline was "hp to can 15,000, files for chapter 13" then you would have something to discuss. – by /sm
|tycho (3:09pm est tue jun 04 2002)
"do they really need all 34mb of data for the drivers?"
you people don't read these posts, do you? there are not 34 megs of drivers.
i thought geeks were all readaholics, guess it's just me.
|hate winxp crashing (3:18pm est tue jun 04 2002)
well traditionaly ati sucks goats at making drivers… it took them forever to make xp and 2k drivers for our built in graphic cards in our laptops… it took about 1 year for the 2k drivers and the xp drivers are still not certified. thank god we ship nvidia on board now. – by next362″
|the richest thing about this: (3:24pm est tue jun 04 2002)
tyey actaully ask you what driver you want and what os.. then go right ahead and tell you you cant have it… then let you buy it… i guess they want to save the cash of paying phone reps to take orders for drivers…
it even has a lisence aggrement on the page…
but you cant download anything! – by next362″
|re: stable as usual (3:31pm est tue jun 04 2002)
linux drivers from ati work well does not crash. in the rare occasion ati crashes, it does not bring the entire operating system and x-windows down.
windows xp drivers from ati crashes about weekly. when ati goes down, it gives me the black screen of death (hit the reset button) or the blue screen of death (hit any key). in either case, it should not bring the entire operating system crashing down if microsoft designed windows xp to be reliable. – by hate winxp crashing
|as i understand. (3:51pm est tue jun 04 2002)
you can still download the drivers from umax in other countries… so there isnt much of a big deal.. you can grab drivers from the german or asaian sites and upload them to a driver site… like driverguide.com or something simular… hell one of us should dedicate a page for drivers for umax (just to be an ass)… i wonder if they'd try to shut you down for providing their drivers for no fee… – by next362″
|open source… (3:53pm est tue jun 04 2002)
a company doesn't have an obligation to support other people's drivers, so that wouldn't cost umax anything other than the time to ask "where did you download your driver?…not us? bye now!
open source developers could always submit their enhancements for the company to integrate into their releases. it seems like hardware companies are too lazy to write decent drivers or even design decent products nowadays. let the people stuck using their crappy products give it a try. if the whole experiment fails, i don't see how the company loses anything.
creative labs has a monopoly on commercial soundcards, but still makes really poor drivers that cause problems on about 50% of the systems out there. it enrages me how many problems i had on my live card which i paid $100 for. i expect crap when i bug no-name chinese generic components, but not when i buy the top of the line. the same goes for asus. i've bought two bad motherboards from them, despite them being one of the top mobo makers and charging more than the competition. i don't know what the problem here is. you would think these companies would figure out that frequent driver releases would make a user more likely to buy their brand when they upgrade. my biggest problem is that is seems like even if i wanted to pay more to get quality workmanship and good driver support, those options aren't available to me, especially with motherboards.
i have to praise nvidia again. their support has always been excellent and they are still releasing enhanced tnt drivers for all major operating systems. – by steven
|well… (3:54pm est tue jun 04 2002)
i dont know what too tell you hate winxp crashing… it seems your the only person whos video card is causing them so much headache… there are at least two of us that dont have crashes every week… i usually have crashes in programs that are not ment to run in xp and havent been patched yet… and those are weeks apart not days apart… my geforce drivers havent cause a single problem yet… – by next362″
|steven (4:06pm est tue jun 04 2002)
well aureal made better audio (i.e. vortex and vortex 2, least in my opinion) (till they went out of buisness), and iwill makes better mobos than asus… you should start reading reviews and basing decisions on quality not brand popularity (just like music). also, its awfully inconvient to tell a customer to f-off cause they got a driver from someone that wont help them… – by next362″
|mustek…. (4:18pm est tue jun 04 2002)
never buy a mustek scanner. the most recent drivers for mine are from 1996, the beginning of 1996 to be exact. there is one driver for windows nt 4 and one for windows 3.1, which also works with windows 9x. no native windows 9x driver or windows 2000/xp driver.
i'll never buy a mustek scanner again. – by lorddethstar
|next362″ (4:29pm est tue jun 04 2002)
i think hate winxp crashing has a poorly seated card, not bad drivers. i had windows problems with some memory that wouldn't seat properly, new memory solved the crashes. i had been blaming netscape!
as to steven's sound blaster, sb is the name, it's the one all the others emulate. yeah, their stuff isn't very high quality, but you can have a card that sounds good on decent speakers, or one that runs all the games. – by /sm
|ps (4:30pm est tue jun 04 2002)
i mean a non sb card that sounds good or an sb that runs games.
one of these days i'll learn to speak this pathetic excuse for a language… – by /sm
|hardware … (4:50pm est tue jun 04 2002)
– ati – i have the all-in-wonder radeon and while the drivers have not been perfect on 98 the whole xp package (tuner, movie player, etc.) has been flawless
– asus – has always been my mobo manufacturer of choice (along with abit). always had good support.
– creative – brutally bad drivers for the live series … anyone else have xp hang on devldr.exe during shutdown? it is the sb live driver (and it isn't a necessary component)
– umax – cheap shit – not that anyone cares because we won't be buying them anymore. – by oz
|make better products (5:06pm est tue jun 04 2002)
if they make better products then they would make more money – by assholes
|creative live! sucks (5:22pm est tue jun 04 2002)
better to have gone cheap and bought a creative sb128 pci. solid card, good drivers for all ms and costs about $20 these days. – by frugal gourmet
|umax sucks (5:24pm est tue jun 04 2002)
i will never buy anything from umax as long as i live after reading this article….who's bright idea was this anyways, its only going to piss off customers…they'll be out of business as soon as more people hear about this…its pretty shity if i have to go pirate the drivers for a scanner! – by ^webby^
|umax isn't alone.. (5:39pm est tue jun 04 2002)
i bought a visioneer scanner only to find out i needed to buy the next version of their paperport software to use the update driver when going from win98 to w2k. the paperport upgrade was great and it cost $30 and it did make the driver work. what set me off was that i still need to call support to get it to work with the usb on my motherboard with a via chipset (i needed the latest via drivers and that should have been on the faq in my opinion). get use to it geeks. if micro$oft can charge for upgrades, everyone else will follow suit. the key is to only upgrade when absolutely necessary… – by theheckler
|give it a rest… (5:48pm est tue jun 04 2002)
first of all..mustek has new xp drivers for my scanner and looks like almost all their scanners now have xp drivers available.
i also have a ati card on xp and have never had a problem with black screens or crashing.even with xp's driver it's rock solid.you have something else wrong and need to quit blaming xp.i can leave my machine on for weeks and never reboot except for software installs.same goes for my sb live card.not a single problem ever even with xp's built in drivers.might wanna take it to someone who knows pc's to get it fixed :-) – by brian esser
|re: brian… (6:04pm est tue jun 04 2002)
he will not go and get it fixed. he has been ranting for months now about "hate winxp crashing." he probably does not even have a problem…just wants sympathy and/or attention. :)
as far as the umax crap…well…that is a bunch of crap. – by xp user
|re: hate winxp crashing (6:04pm est tue jun 04 2002)
i can see your biased to hating microsoft, and u will blame them for everything. so, i will give up on trying to show you its not always(surprisingly) microsofts fault.
at least your ati doesnt freeze your whole linux system. oh, btw, ati doesnt even make the linux drivers. – by stable as usual
|note to self (and everyone else) (6:22pm est tue jun 04 2002)
1.sell these smuckboys stocks asap
2.send these smucks some mail to express my outrage.
3.find out when the next stockholder meeting is and apply for ceo, (its obviously a job soon to be open.)
4.be sure none of my friends, associates or clients spends a penny on these theives products.
5.stop ranting and go for a fresh cup of coffee.
have a good one, peace all. – by tslorb
|next362…. (6:23pm est tue jun 04 2002)
tom's hardware consistantly gives asus good reviews. anand tech also gave the board i bought a good review. so far, i think 2cpu.com is my favorite review site, although they mostly scavenge content, like geek.com. the live card also got great reviews when i bought it.
the problem, to me, is not checking reviews. the problem is that mainstream, costly, hardware makers are not bothering to develop and test their drivers.
with most things in life, the more you pay, the better quality you can get. mercedes generally have less problems than fords. an expensive toshiba vcr will usually run longer than the funai's you see on sale at wal mart. that doesn't seem to be the case with computer components.
brian esser, your rant is fun and all, but full of bs. "take your pc to someone knows pc's to get it fixed!" what are they going to do? they're going to do exactly what i did. install the hardware and install the latest vendor drivers. most of them only test for blue screens, they don't actually play mp3's on their soundcard and test for skips. they don't bother properly configuring the card for acpi, despite the fact that the majority of buyers run os's that force acpi on them. try getting tech support for a sound card issue.
every tech support asshole blames someone else just to get you off the phone. problem with your sound?…check your speakers…speakers work fine with walkman?…check your motherboard…motherboard works fine with older sound card?…call microsoft. oh, older sound card worked fine in windows…check your outlet strip…oh, older sound card worked fine in same outlet…check your screws…etc. every tech support guy i get is some know-nothing jackass who can't speak understandable english and has 20 reasons why your problem is not his problem.
unfortunately, having a system that runs perfectly is a gamble nowadays with system complexity. – by steven
|lol… (7:06pm est tue jun 04 2002)
good point steven, i wasnt saying that noone recommends asus boards… the only reason i woulden't buy a asus is persoanl experiance… you just have to take all the reviews with a grain of salt… the people who review get money "ad dollars" and free equipment to test and play with. i remember all the companys that have screwed me in the past and i always stay along ways from them… and i try to listen to horror stories about other peoples adventures.
yes building a system is a gamble. thank god i like the hustle.
ps. another crappy drive co in my opinion? logitec
|stock up on drivers now!! (7:36pm est tue jun 04 2002)
you better download your other drivers in case this catches on. – by umax sux
|copyright/eula what do they say? (10:19pm est tue jun 04 2002)
question for you:
is there anything on the cd or their site that says that you can't purchase the cd and then post it online? this might be a good opportunity for someone looking to add some traffic (for people to see ads) to their web site for essentially the price of some bandwidth and 1 cd.
personally, i feel this is a load of crap. half the drivers that come out with the shipped products need updated or patched before the device is purchased. if umax wanted to do it right and make money off their drivers, charge to log in and keep the drivers up to date. note, i'm not supporting their decision but by the time their cds are stamped, new drivers should have been produced and you've spent $15 for old drivers.
one more thing, it's not just the price of the cd of drivers, it's the shipping and brokerage charges for people outside america which should be of concern as well. – by g. frederick
|one 2 letter for (10:33pm est tue jun 04 2002)
this thats sums it up.
bs – by nataku
|this is simple to solve. (10:40pm est tue jun 04 2002)
everyone with a umax product say i want my driver free. boom its done after the first 100000 emails when there server crashes form the volume of mail. – by nataku
|www.driverguide.com (11:50pm est tue jun 04 2002)
drivers will end up there within a week of being available
username: drivers
|umax – driver $$, some nerve (12:56am est wed jun 05 2002)
umax's charging for updated drivers makes anything microsoft has done look tame! i'm literally trashing (blue barrel) 14 umax scanners and purchasing 14 new scanners by canon. i like them a lot better anyway.
mh – by mjh
|umax, hp, fujitsu & support (5:36am est wed jun 05 2002)
as mentioned before by next362 you still can download the latest drivers for your umax scanners on other sites (like uk, german etc.) – maybe umax just wants to piss off americans :)
…and hp is still charging for their drivers – see win9x drivers for "hp photosmart 315" – you can dowload driver updates or you can buy a cd – you don't have a driver anymore you can update: buy the cd – hp s**ks! (…and you cannot download the drivers on other countris sites either)
about tech support: i am doing tech support!! – and i hate outsourcing: the guys you get on the phone when you have problems with a consumer product are all paid by the number of calls. if you want decent support: buy an enterprise product (in many cases the hardware isn't even more expensive!) – you most likely will get an experienced technician. (this is at least how it works in europe)
…and because we are talking about bad companies: don't by a fujitsu harddisk. since weeks i try to get replacement (their tools leave no doubt it is broken). i finally got the number from their repair center, but the line is always engaged… – by a08
|a08 (11:23am est wed jun 05 2002)
he is correct about tech support… not all are created equal, the guys that do it here are pretty damn good at what they do, and they are all in house, and dont get paid by the call, all of them are good with dos thru winxp… sometimes i find myself asking them some questions i don't know… so i wouldent insult all of them just the majority of them, some of them can even drink as hard as me…(anyone who can do that is commendable) – by next362″
|creative labs does the same thing. (2:24pm est wed jun 05 2002)
i recently bought an audigy gamer sound card. i lost the cd within a week, and re-installed winblows (for other reasons).
i went to the web to download drivers, and guess what? only `updates` were available to download. to get the original .inf i had to pay $14.95 (us) to get them to send me a new cd. later that week i found my cd. hehe i'll sell ya one for $13.95!
|complete stupidity (4:51pm est wed jun 05 2002)
i went there last week and found that they were doing this. i was sooo pissed off. i will never buy another umax product for the rest of my life. they are more greedy than microsoft!!! – by unabomber
|heh… (5:07pm est wed jun 05 2002)
umax is not going to go out of business because they're doing this. this is an act of a desperate company that's not making any money because their products are sold for far less than they need to be in order to make money.
part of the reason umax scanners are so cheap is that the taiwanese government was subsidizing taiwanese companies who developed scanners, so that taiwan would be the #1 scanner producing nation in the world. this drove a lot of companies (visioneer, storm) out of business, because no one could compete with the low priced scanners these companies would produce. now it appears that umax is finally being required to make some money on their own…
this is what happens when consumers refuse to pay what a product is worth. same thing is happening to hard drive and ram manufacturers. ) – by chris
|are u crazy? (7:30pm est wed jun 05 2002)
u can download for free at umax… – by alex
|goodbuy umax (7:55pm est wed jun 05 2002)
my umax scanner was only 20$ after rebate, so the drivers cost more than the scanner when i update to xp? ebay here it comes…
umax, you suck!!!!!!!!!!! – by scrumax
|driver, cheap!!! (9:12pm est wed jun 05 2002)
psst..hey kid, looking for a driver?
– by al cowlins
|taiwan proverb (1:18am est thu jun 06 2002)
remember grasshopper "he who buy scanner at low price, will pay higher price for scanner driver". – by la mesa
|alex (6:21am est thu jun 06 2002)
today i downloaded the drivers for xp from the umax site after sending them an e-mail…wake up kids! – by alex
|canon is nothing better (9:37am est thu jun 06 2002)
canon scanner drivers are actually developed in parallel with their scanner models.
there's no such thing as a "newer" driver for a particular scanner, only old drivers that are bundled with the scanner when it is factory-packaged.
r&d do happen, but new drivers only work for newer models. so much for driver support, eh? – by da
|found driver download… (3:11pm est fri jun 07 2002)
vistascan v 3.7
this page has an ftp link that requires an account for
|umax sucks (9:10pm est thu jul 11 2002)
you should see their laptop support. it sucks dick. – by brian
|i will never buy again! (4:29pm est tue jul 30 2002)
umax lost my future business forever with this paying for drivers stunt. greedy bastards –
umax sucks. how can i get my message to them? – by eric stoffers
|umax has lost my business forever (4:31pm est tue jul 30 2002)
umax is done. i'll buy from them again no matter what. they obviously thought about this and put work into the whole charge system.
i hope they go out of business very soon. – by eric stoffers
|umax products are low quality anyways…. (2:59pm est wed jul 31 2002)
i've sold many scanners and umax quality has gone down hill. now they are charging for drivers! this is aweful, i am warning all customer of this product and will never sell another umax scanner in my business. – by umax sucks
|need driver – hate linsux (1:51pm est mon aug 05 2002)
while i do need a driver for umax 1200s and windows xp, i wish the ranter who loves linux so much would just go away and use his linux quietly. if he hates windows so badly, why doen't he just use linux on all of his computers.
what? did you say that not all of the programs that you want to use are available for linus? did i hear right? your favorite programs are only available for windows?
i thought so. just open source yourself the hell outta here and leave us crashless xp users alone. – by photoshop guy
|not buyin' one (12:57pm est sun aug 11 2002)
i am currenty in the market for a scanner and after reading the release i will not buy a umax. what a bunch of losers! – by emilio
|just get it warez (8:23pm est wed aug 14 2002)
i have a scanner i bought when the drivers were freeware. then this happens (not surprisingly days later the cd started being read as a music cd. dang scratches..) and i'm out of options. no i'm not. i just went out and downloaded the drivers off a p2p site. i paid good money for that scanner and i won't pay more to have drivers, dammit! – by raven
|come here quick before they shut this down too (5:15am est fri aug 16 2002)
– by engeltek
|u deserve it! (11:04pm est sat aug 24 2002)
just upgraded os and found out that upgrades are not available except through the mail on a cd for 14 bucks.i would rather wait for a new scanner, which i will. this scanner is history, and i will remember the inconvenience of this tight ass outfit when i go to purchase scanners for my company. – by boom!
|you sons of bitches (3:43am est tue aug 27 2002)
it took me two days to clean-up my computer and upgrade the os and re-instal every single software. now i want to scan something but can�t. i�m sure there are better ways to make the extra cash. i should have purchased a canon scanner, oh wait maybe i will. – by jc
|you sons of bitches (3:44am est tue aug 27 2002)
it took me two days to clean-up my computer and upgrade the os and re-instal every single software. now i want to scan something but can�t. i�m sure there are better ways to make the extra cash. i should have purchased a canon scanner, oh wait maybe i will. – by jc, canada
|well, ooooooh (10:03am est sun sep 01 2002)
i recently tried to update the drivers for the umax 2100u i bought 3 yrs ago, because i've upgraded my os to w2k. and by using some of the sites found by the comments above, i was able to get the scanner to test but received an oooooooooh message with no other assistance. needless to say, i will be searching for a new scanner and umax is not on the shopping list. thanks for all the info! – by leslie fahn
|umax my arse! (9:46am est fri sep 06 2002)
currently a large hammer sits in my hand. shortly it will be introduced to my umax scanner. i've been telling myself to buy a quality scanner for ages, and now is the time! – by the urban cannibal
|umax scanner astra 2100u driver (1:51pm est fri sep 06 2002)
i recently had a geek friend build me a killer computer (112-gig hard drive, msi gf3 ti200 gp 64mb nvidia geforce3 graphics card, etc.) and decided to upgrade the scanner driver to go with the new operating system (windows me). imagine my shock when i discovered that umax wants $15.00 for it! i would sooner buy a spiffy new scanner that is not a umax than pay their "royalty." umax can kiss my ass. – by adrian kimberly
|files are everywhere (12:43am est mon sep 09 2002)
only if you don't know what your doing, will you pay for a driver. – by look4thelinks
|u max scanners (5:08pm est mon sep 09 2002)
i bought a crappy umax astra 610p for $30 at a junk store.worked fine on win 98 but when i up graded to xp no luck from umax so i found a driver from a file sharing program (working 610p xp driver). i downloaded it and it works!
great! but i know when i purchase a faster usb or scsi scanner it wont be a crappy u-max.i hope they go belly up:-) – by jay
|uk is free, but file is corrupt! (4:44pm est fri sep 13 2002)
ok, i went to the united kingdom site for umax to get the free driver. i found it through driverguide.com, but guess what? after the download, the file was corrupt. i tried 4 times, both from the uk and from the dutch site as well. i'll never buy another umax product again, and neither will my friends of family if i can help it. if you can send it to me over yahoo messenger, please drop me a line. i need it for something important that's coming up this weekend. firstname.lastname@example.com (michelle)
– by michelle
|umax astra 2100u driver cannot be downloaded (1:05pm est wed sep 18 2002)
this is insane!. i've never seen this kind of business practice.i'll never buy stuff from umax again. let's put these stupid jerk out of business!!! – by freedriverwanted
|just pirate it (8:35pm est sat sep 28 2002)
you pay for the hardware with the expectation that you'll be able to use it. so don't pay more even if they make it difficult – by pissed
|hmmm (12:42pm est tue oct 01 2002)
someone earlier posted a comparison to cars and keys…this is more of a case where it is car and gas…see what happens when you whine to a car company about having to buy more gas when the tank gets empty. as far as a 'two-bit company' umax has been around since dos 5.0 and maybe earlier…most scanner companies use umax components…which, if memory serves, includes that precious cannon someone else mentioned. do i agree with the selling of scanner? hell no…do i think it will stop? yes, eventually…do i know of any other companies that do this? damn skippy…like the person said earlier, iomega used to do this…they still might…i don't know…with the kind of business umax does, even if everyone us were to boycott, they still wouldn't go out of business…just accept the practice and move on…oh, as for linux…try getting a driver for the new radeon video card that's about to come out…it won't come from ati and there is no guarentee the one published will work…i speak from experience on this…happend when i got my rage fury a few years back… – by devilsadvocate
|screw me, i'll screw you (11:59am est fri oct 04 2002)
well, just like the rest of you umax have fleeced me (i bought a 2100u scanner). but i wouldn't dream of downloading the driver from the link above……. – by mr working umax scnr
|don't work anyway!………….. (4:28pm est mon oct 14 2002)
just downloaded a 5mb & a 6mb update for my 6400 firewire scanner, & it's corrupt. there is something to be said for getting an update on cd. $60?
f%&*(%�$% ridiculous! does anyone know where i can get a patch so the bloody lamp goes off as per the time interval set in configuration? thanks! – by ratsalad
|umax -> others (7:05pm est tue oct 15 2002)
i won't buy any product from them.
there are many other good companies out there … – by firefox
|help! (11:59am est sat oct 19 2002)
ilive in the u.k.and have had my umax scanner for two years,it worked very well, but, when i upgraded to windows 2000, my scanner did not work,is there some way i can get this to work again?apart from having to buy a new driver from that ( crap!) company umax? – by peter anderson
|grredy parasitic oligarchy (12:42pm est wed oct 23 2002)
lost the install cd now my azz iz grazz. quick – by lawn backside
|umaxedout (12:17am est sun oct 27 2002)
installed old 1200s drivers (vistascan) and software on new win2k pro build…what a mistake. bombed os, blue screen. no uninstall available, doesn't show up in add/remove. hacked registry for all things umax, but will not recover. any suggestions before i re-format? umax piece of crap. – by bummedout
|help for this essay (10:47am est tue nov 19 2002)
please l was send an essay to use the theory of marx,durkheim,weber,simmer,habermas
,foucacult and/or giddens would say about this matter.the essay is this,why and under what condition are people more likely to buy brand names rather than their generic counterparts? please just want you to help me out of this l will be so glad if l hear from you.thanks.
my email email@example.com – by john grace
|forever tech support (3:10pm est thu nov 21 2002)
i dunno. keep things in perspective folks. i've seen companies who have nothing but 900 numbers for support. i called cannon for help, first thing they wanted was a cc# before i could speak to anyone. i wouldn't mind but it was a $2000 printer.
also, no one seems to mind when m$ comes out with a new version of windows. you paid for that, you know. it 'came with' your computer, but it wasn't free, trust me. also, have you seen m$'s plans for future support? a 'subscription' for the 'privildege' of being able to have updates?
get real folks, you think 1200dpi scanners at $100 today, vs 300dpi scanners at $5000 5 years ago was an accident or something? tech gets better, sure – but think about it this way… if you buy a $60l lexus, there's lots of room in that markup for cd player, extra warranty etc. in a $12000 honda (still a great car) it's just not there in the price.
you want the support you got with your $3000 computer back in '97 for a scanner you probably paid $150 or less for. get real – do you have any idea what it costs when support picks up the phone (them?)? it runs anyplace between $12-$60 depending on what's going on and most of the time it's a customer induced issue.
i'll be the first to admit i dont like the 'charge for drivers' thing. i also don't like having no toll-free number.
i also understand that these are better than those folks stuck with visioneer and mustek scanners – who're just sol right now. – by toliver
|i purchased the umax cd for xp (6:03pm est fri nov 22 2002)
i $$ purchased the cd from umax for my astra 1200s and it still don't work. i will call them and see what they say. umax seems to be going down hill.
i noticed hp is also requesting that cds must be purchased $$ for driver updates!! really a ripe off!!
– by pat
|dollars for drivers (11:08am est tue nov 26 2002)
anybody here make a living at writing software? is there a problem here? everybody is entitled to a percentage, hopefully, those who are directly involved. fifteen bucks to get a cd with a working piece of code? not so bad. you'll pay that much in shipping for a free cd or dvd from a club. i say, spread the wealth amoung the poor slobs creating the important stuff, like a driver. – by spider
|others joined! (3:34pm est wed nov 27 2002)
well, put hp, creative labs (who put me on a download list the other day that never did dnld – for a $200 card) and now a few others are charging for driver cds. you people need to wake the heck up and sniff the pansies. i know if i was a computer company making a measly buck on everything i sold (they essentially do anymore) and some snivveling pathetic lamer called me in because he didn't know the difference between left and right click i'd not be too jumpy to help them out.
sure there are realistic problems out there – drivers that bite, download sites that don't, built-in help that doesn't, etc.
overall, though if you want quality support go get yourself a $1000 unit. even then it might not be that great. i paid $29,000 for my new car, and people want from support for a $59 scanner what my dealership won't do for me for a $29,000 automobile.
waaaahhhh!! – by toggleswitch
|does anybody really do some thing? (7:59pm est tue dec 10 2002)
does anybody send this link or those comments to umax? – by kg
|i work for umax (3:29pm est fri jan 03 2003)
i'm a phone/email tech for umax. i agree with you all. this job sucks. imagine spending 40 hours a week telling people you can't help them. i will not be here for long. i'm at work now.. i'll post another message later with details on why umax sucks ace! – by bob
|just screwing the na market… (8:31pm est sun jan 05 2003)
do you know that if you go to umax uk, you can download the exact same drivers for free…discriminating idiots…. – by oiler_head
|umax charges for driver updates (8:41pm est wed jan 15 2003)
here at viking waters, we used to recommend umax to our clients because of their excellent post-purchase support.
lately the support has sucked and the software upgrade policy has changed that. we havn't recommended umax for quite a while.
hopefully, market pressures will either kill a bad company or spank it sufficiently to mend its trifling ways. – by allan kalar
|u-max-pissed (10:12pm est wed jan 15 2003)
try this. the 2nd link works for me. – by evil joenk
|umax rant et al…. (8:06am est thu jan 16 2003)
no problem here… i did a global search and found free downloads from both korea, and the uk in minutes…
regards – by mike
|umax xp driver (8:23pm est mon jan 20 2003)
looking to get a new scanner. anyone recommend a umax. pretty sure i will be shopping elsewhere. – by love my umax
|umax sux (11:26am est fri jan 24 2003)
16:27 24/01/03
i am so annoyed by umax's policy that i a going to buy a scanner from one of their competitors as soon as possible, bye bye umax fools! the drivers from umax are pants as it is.
there are a few here anyway
– by david
|vistascan 3.55 available here (2:49am est mon jan 27 2003)
download and enjoy! fuck umax's cheap ass bullshit!!! – by elite_haxs0r
|umax – sell short (5:04pm est sun feb 02 2003)
my experience is the same as everyone else's. when i called, they said the fee was for the support and service call i would need loading the new driver. if its so damn hard to load a driver, then something is really wrong. i agree with everyone else and will never do business with umax again, nor will the 800 employees at my company. we are throwing all our scanners in the trash and buying hp! – by theeyes
|umax – profit max! (4:43pm est tue feb 11 2003)
both these sites are still active for driver downloads free of charge.
|umax blows goats! (7:22pm est thu feb 27 2003)
there are a lot of other scanner manufacturers out there today. screw umax and the idiot that decided to start charging for a product that should be vendor supplied until the purchaser friggin' dies or chucks the scanner in the trash. i'll toss mine before i give them $15.00 for driver software. – by toam
|scan this!!!! (4:50pm est fri mar 07 2003)
i "threw out" my umax scanner today…and bought an hp. umax…you suck… for the price of two updates i could have bought a new scanner! shwing!!! – by dontfwme
|quick buttons / winxp (8:37pm est mon mar 31 2003)
anyone know how to get the quick buttons to work on the umax 2100u with winxp? i used to use the email and custom button all the time… now i can only use windows drivers with the scanner wizard what the heck?
– by mikman
|links for vistascan v3.7 (10:55am est fri apr 04 2003)
rs/umax/vscan37.exe – by gus
|screwmax! (7:33pm est sat apr 05 2003)
umax blows! – by odogg
|thanks gus! (11:47pm est sat apr 26 2003)
you da man!! i was so pissed about usux that i wanted to rage about it. it looks like i came to the right site! i will never buy anything from them again, bur thanks to you, i can use the piece of crap that i am stuck with.
thx again,
e – by emo
|umax insult to injury (10:08pm est mon apr 28 2003)
not only did i have to pay for a driver after upgrading to win2k, but it wouldn't install properly. i used the work around given in the read me file and i got a fatal system crash. couldn't even launch in safe mode, and i lost everything on my hard drive! avoid umax like the plague! – by joe kano
|hello everybody! (10:01am est thu may 01 2003)
o.k. i see you guys are really angry. yeah, i know, i have tried to mail and e-mail to umax support. the answer was: try to download the latest aspi driver!!!
what a bullshit! i have and astra 1220s and i have the follownig problem: windows xp have found it, the vistascan 3.55su+xp update works normally. normally – i mean this, if you would like to scan from adobe photoshop 6 i become an memory allocation error! there a line umaxdrv.ini that was before 0, now it is 1, i tried it to corecct manually, but if i would like to scan from photoshop 6 i become every time the same memory erro. i tried it to make non-writable, but it's the same. normally form start – vistascan 3.55 – vistascan.exe – it works, but i would like if it would work in photoshop… has someone a good idea, some tips?
thanks! – by peter orban
|hello everybody! (10:02am est thu may 01 2003)
o.k. i see you guys are really angry. yeah, i know, i have tried to mail and e-mail to umax support. the answer was: try to download the latest aspi driver!!! of course this is not the problem.
what a bullshit! i have and astra 1220s and i have the follownig problem: windows xp have found it, the vistascan 3.55su+xp update works normally. normally – i mean this, if you would like to scan from adobe photoshop 6 i become an memory allocation error! there a line umaxdrv.ini that was before 0, now it is 1, i tried it to corecct manually back to 0, but if i would like to scan from photoshop 6 i become every time the same memory error. i tried it to make non-writable, but it's the same. normally from start – vistascan 3.55 – vistascan.exe – it works, but i would like if it would work in photoshop… has someone a good idea, some tips?
thanks! – by peter orban
|sup yall (1:59pm est sat may 31 2003)
i have to do do scanner shopping and after spending money for a new computer, printer and camera now a high price disk i hope umax folds. and thats from the heart. peace! – by t.
|drivers umax 1220s (3:26pm est mon jun 02 2003)
que se metan los drivers en el culo – by mudo
|get open source! (9:04pm est mon jun 23 2003)
umax should do its homework: os's like linux are freee and all (supported !) drivers are free–everything is free (except tech support, but there are oodles of forums out there)–and, as various cities in germany, as well as the pentagon (yes, that pentagon) are switching over to linux, umax et al better follow suit – by deleeuw
|free drivers (12:51pm est thu jul 10 2003)
the drivers are free all over the internet, just go to the list below:
this is the umax ftp site
or go to the uk umax website, all the drivers for the scanners are there.
|umax (3:23pm est thu jul 10 2003)
i would like to go against that majority just to be a…well…but how the hell can i? rediculus charging for updates. – by who cares
|umax me lo mama! (2:03pm est mon aug 04 2003)
esos hijueputas van a quebrar! los odio malditos! iran al iniferno junto a bush! no saben tratar a los clientes! – by chicanito
|umax 1220p xp driver (12:38am est sat aug 16 2003)
well this nifty paperweight will be replaced asap. i will never pay for a driver. ( other than the one that comes in the original product box. – by uncle jim
|umax's ftp has the drivers (4:33pm est tue sep 16 2003)
umax's north american ftp server has the drivers. i don't know what they're doing, but it sure smells of bullshit. here's the url to the latest vistascan:
in that directory, you'll find pretty much all versions. as of this writing, i see 2.4 – 3.81.
hope that helps.
|that's enough !!!!!!! (6:49pm est tue sep 23 2003)
after an hour of going to all of the links here and getting errors every time trying to get an astra 1200s to work – i have had it. this scanner will be tossed from the car window on my way to get a new one. you can be sure that it will not be another umax. i have bought highend scanners from them for the last ten years. this low end scanner that has no support is a warning not to be using their products. i have to assume they will continue this trend presumably to the high end models. it's not a matter of price so much as time and aggravation. i should have known not to use a pc for scanning but i thought that at least the damn thing would work – even with the supplied drivers. a revolt by all graphic professionals will come too late for me – never again !!!! – by ex-umax user
|i agree that umax is trying to do a profit (3:20pm est fri sep 26 2003)
umax is just trying to make a profit for their own drivers? unbelievable!! not acceptable. that's fine, i am just going to pick this piece of crap scanner and toss it in the trash. perhaps they will realize their losses when people start advising others not to buy umax hardware. i am getting a new scanner… yes.. an hp or sony where i can donwload drivers for free!! – by ec
|umax 2100u (10:26am est thu oct 09 2003)
my story goel like this. man buys scanner for computer w/ win 98 os. works fine. man upgrades to win2k and the scanner no work. contact company and buy $15 driver software on cd. get the cd and install, but no work. call umax and spend 1.5 hrs w/ tech trying to get scanner to install but no work. ask for refund since $15 software no work, but they say that software non-refundable and the telephone service support should have costed me $25, which they granciously waived. thanks for waiving your $25 fee for support for your $15 driver cd that did not work. assholes. according to their logic, i made out in the deal by saving 10 bucks. needless to say, scanner still no work and i will never buy again! – by umax sucks
|astraslim 1200se (10:36am est fri nov 07 2003)
does anyone knows wher to get the driver foc – by bpe
|umax (11:26am est wed nov 26 2003)
umax not the man..its still suck a year later – by coo of umax
|astra 1200s (4:20pm est tue dec 16 2003)
thanks to this forum, i have found the drivers i need and i am happy not to have to shell out more cash. umax will never be reccomended by me again. i hope they go out of buisness, and they should with this support. – by me
|umax drivers (10:57am est tue jan 13 2004)
i sure wish i had read this earlier.
i just purchased a new computer and was told my 2100 would not work without a new driver. i bought a driver cd for 14.50, but i have not been able to get it to work.
i am surely going to buy a new scanner! – by no more umax
|drivers (4:25pm est sun jan 25 2004)
– by blodwyn / zof
|haha. umax, u sux! (5:53am est wed mar 10 2004)
would anyone please forward this to umax, and let them know how much they sux!!! has anyone noticed this? it has almost been 2yrs since the first post. – by screw u, umax
|umax software (6:52pm est thu mar 25 2004)
i have acquired a dell computer from some friends which has the astra 3400/3450 scanner withit. after installing a new harddrive in it, i realized i did not have the software to reprogram the scanner. i think it is bull that they sell their equipment to larger distributors of name brand computers, but you have to buy the software to reinstall their products on the same computers you already have. – by carol shaffer
|scsi drivers (5:25pm est mon apr 12 2004)
funny right 2 years and nothing has been done….i have tried every driver and scsi host adapter out there for an old vista s8….lol…got it for free…and had the scsi controllera and cables…but to no avail…lest it not work…oh well…it makes a great boat anchor…bought a cannon for $100…much better…just upgrade its cheaper than trying to use hardware that is >2years old….and you did not originally purchase it….right
– by djcsc
|umax you just lost another one !!! (10:36am est sat apr 24 2004)
i couldn't agree with you more !!! i for the past several years supported umax. but after there greedy little change in driver options. i am now epson all the way!!! way to go "@ss h0les" at umax. keep up your greedy work. you will find yourselves belly up by 2005 !!! – by dan l. tnt ent.
|toggle swith…are you on glue???? (10:44am est sat apr 24 2004)
listen "toggle swith" (wwaaahhhh)…. if you had a brain, you would take it out and play with it. it's called customer service !!!!! it doesn't matter if it is a $59 scanner or a $29,000 car. it's called servicing what you sell !!! get it ????? maybe you can afford $$$ to fork out on b_ll sh_t drivers. but some people can't. why in the heck would you want to put good $$$ to bad???you wake up and smell the "pansies"… it's @ssholes like you that makes bill gates proud !!!!! – by tnt productions
|astra 1200s and xp (9:00pm est fri may 14 2004)
well, sucker me! i bought the bloody cd for us$14 + shipping (that's quite a lot when converted to cdn$). won't even install! response from umax was to call them (at my cost of course) in texas for tech advice. forget it. i'll just buy an epson or hp or canon scanner. what a bugger of a company! – by dl
|umax sucks (9:20pm est fri may 14 2004)
the the scaner is good but umax company sucks. money for update driver…yeah..rite… – by u good max sucks
|umax obviously wants to annoy consumers (2:49am est fri jun 04 2004)
i was shocked to find umax charging for drivers for their products. i was happy to find this site where many people have voiced complaints. i too will never buy umax products again as a result of their evil corporate greed. i've got an old astra 1220u and need drivers. i'll use it till it konks, then get a scanner by a company that knows the power of consumer rights. – by ratfink in canada
|umax scanner (10:33am est sat jun 05 2004)
i fell upon this site while looking to solve my scanner problem which happens to be a umax. i will not pay for upgrades,so it looks like i will look for a scanner company with free upgrades. if i can't fix the problem with this scanner i won't go back to umax and will tell whoever i can not to buy a umax,buy a scanner with free upgrades. – by joyce f casto
|umax xp driver work around. it worked for me!!! (10:30pm est mon jul 26 2004)
what you have do to is disable the xp driver that is controling the scanner. to do this your computer must have the the umax software already installed "vistascan 3.75". step 1: right click on my computer and go to properties. then click on hardware, followed by device manager. find "imaging devices" and double click on "umax 3400" you then click on "driver" followed by "update driver". you are then going to choose "install from a list or a specific location" followed by "don't search. i will choose the driver to install" you will then see the windows xp driver "umax astra 3400" (don't choose this one) and "usb scanner" (this is the one that you are going to choose) click next, you will get a message from windows that advising you that this software has not passed the compatibilty crap (don't worry) continue anyway. once finished, reboot, and use your umax astra 3.75 sofware. enjoy! – by mark
|umax driver updates (2:54pm est mon aug 02 2004)
the cold hard fact of it is that this is becoming a common practice among businesses other than umax. unfortunately, driver development costs money. maybe some of the more unscrupulous people ought to give a little extra thought to upgrading to an os unnecessarily. if you don't mind paying $100 – 300 for the newest greatest (yeah right) microsoft os, then it shouldn't bother you to pay $20 or less for a driver update. same goes for the mac users. i mean, if it said the os is supported on the box that the scanner came in, then "no" they shouldn't charge for drivers, but that just isn't the case. they support any os they promise to support on the box, and that is a fact. we americans need to get the idea out of our heads that we deserve anything in this life for free. maybe microsoft should spend $15 of the $280 they charge for xp and give you the driver for free. it boils down to bad upbringing. i don�t know about the rest of you, but i was raised being told that nothing in life is really free, and nobody ever promised me that life is fair. bottom line is that there is nothing wrong with charging for something that you paid for. umax pays people for driver development, just like any other company. drivers don�t develop themselves. btw-if half of you people complaining took the complaining time and did a little research, you would see that you can download the drivers from driverguide.com for free and the install documentation is free from the umax knowledgebase on their public web site. – by avatar
|audio drivers download (8:51pm est sat aug 14 2004)
looking to load drivers for crystal wdm audio codec – by joe b.
|really obnoxious umax (12:01pm est wed aug 25 2004)
since i upgraded to mac osx panther, i can not use my astra 2200…
i completely agree with matthew or others who call for a ban on umax scanners unless they make cheap drivers available for people who bough scanners a few years ago. a car is usually supported for at least 10 years…
third party developers know far in advance what are going to be the new os, and therefore can plan what upgarde will be needed soon or later.
i never expected everything for free but all this foolish marketing trend to constantly forcing non-necessary updates on people is getting out of hand.
most people just do not have the money to keep-up.
rikuniaku97 – by rikuniaku97
|umax driver updates (10:56pm est wed sep 08 2004)
you claim the updates are on driver.com for the 2100u? where? i tried to download what they claim is for win 2k for umax 2100u…didn't work!!! – by wasted 3 hrs on this
|drivers (7:18pm est sat sep 18 2004)
seems like they have most all
|drivers (2:39pm est thu oct 28 2004)
i have made two decisions: first, if i have to pay for the xp drivers for my umax scanner, i will and second, i will never buy a umax product ever again. i will convey this message to all computer users i know. they should support the new operating systems without additional charge to their customers. – by cspell
|umax xp driver ? (8:21pm est sun oct 31 2004)
this is bull shit !!!, i don't give a
a shit about umax !!, i spent 2 hours
of time on line trying to get my 2000u
up and running " umax's said "you need a xp driver or your fuced " well my 2000u is in my parking lot smashed to shit ! im done with umax !!! fuck them – by mountainboy
|drivers (6:45pm est sun nov 28 2004)
i got 2 of the umax scsi scanners for nothing. and now i have to pay $18.50 for the cd.
i download a version of the but it was missing files and failed.
these would be great scanners because of their larger size, dpi, and the built-in filters for printed documents but $20 for something that otherwise cost me nothing is bs!
some companies are just don't get it.
– by drz
|astra 2000p drivers (9:41pm est tue dec 28 2004)
in the back of my mind i know i'm wasting my time but is there anyway i will get my umax drivers working? i seem to have them in the imaging devices, driver manager files but i still can't access my scanner???
what a joke of a company…
– by madd jenn
|frustrating company (6:16am est fri mar 25 2005)
i really can't understand how umax can make such a mad decision to start selling upgrades.i was wondering how many stupid people sat together to make that decision.
if i was working at any umax related company,i would start looking for a new job,for i think that where umax is concerned,it can now be considered businesss suicide.they have to be trying the easy way out to get out of business. – by kvb.
|1200s + uta under xp … no work (5:41am est sun apr 24 2005)
never again an umax-scannner!
i was very enthusiastic about mine when i bought that scsi-product a couple of years ago.
pity umax … and others who'd follow their "style": once but never again!
|download driver (10:33am est sun may 08 2005)
download driver scanner umax astra 3400 – by didik
|umax garbage (7:04pm est mon may 23 2005)
just thought i would add my two cents worth to this site. i too will never, and i repeat never buy a umax product again. charging for drivers that don't even work correctly in the first place is really pathetic. a company that will charge for updated drivers in one country but will provide the same drivers free through another country is even more pathetic. there are much better scanners on the market now that do provide occasional updates free of charge. i am throwing this piece of garbage umax scanner in the trash and will go spend my money with a reputable company like canon or epson. – by mr. d
|umax not so bad (9:22pm est sun may 29 2005)
i have spent all of $7.00 on 2 umax scanners (s6e and 1200s) and it has been a wonderful training tool on bizarre software. after only several reboots and reinstalls i have a 1200s working on a windows 98 se computer. unfortunately i can't print to a networked lexmark z11 on that os, so i have to copy the resulting picture file to another computer using xp. at least the scanners work like scanners. i only paid $5.00 for the windows 98 se computer, anyway. needless to say, i won't be sending umax $15 for a driver update. – by the madman
|without the 'l' lucifer also starts with a u… (4:42am est thu jul 14 2005)
downloaded multiple patches, hours and hours wasted. still persisting to get the scanner i already paid for to work.
it's a fax and a michael bolton moment from office space.
umax products suck.
– by majestic
|durrnit (1:45am est thu jul 28 2005)
we buy wholesale elctronics at auctions and then test, give them any maintenance needed and then sell them on our site well we got our hands on a umax astra 1200s from a school auction, i looked up the manufacturer from google to download the software as usual, and i saw you had to buy the driver! i was fuc&*ing pis&*! i cant belive you have to buy the driver. no they wont be in business for long…. – by steve
|umax drivers (11:37am est thu aug 04 2005)
well i have read all of these comments, from what i can tell most of you guys want to get your software for free. you can download the drivers for free from all over the net. when you install the drivers you will be met with windows xp digital signature not found message if you select the umax driver to use for the scanners. if this message scares you away from using the umax drivers then you will be stuck with using the microsoft drivers. any complaints regarding the use of the microsoft drivers should be maid to microsoft. also keep in mind that microsoft wrote the code for windows xp. microsoft made changes to windows xp to improve the operating system. the changes they made then required that scanner and other manufacturers pay some technician to write drivers so all of you people will still have your devices supported. the people they paid have families and house payments that must be made. then there are the people on the support lines who are there to help you with thsi installation, they answer the phones and assist you with the installation. once agai these are people who need to get paid. if you want things for free then you are in the wrong society. the only place i have even seen things offered for free was on the star trek tv series, i seem to recall the got rid of money and the notion for paying for things. if you want some thing for free go back home and live with your parents, and just live off of their savings. see how long that will last. i paid for the drivers and i received the free support. they were very helpful. i also found out that the single cd for vistascan contains all the drivers for every astra scanner that is supported on windows xp and 2000. $14.50 for the umax drivers for all their scanners. i think this is a deal.
grow up and join the adult world, then maybe you can understand economics. if you give everything away for free you then devalue money. devalue money and you get another depession. – by fred
|other umax issues (4:34am est sat aug 06 2005)
i own a umax 610p and my motor went bad. the drive came loose from the shaft and it spins freely.
i would simply repair it, but i don't have a bit small enough to drill a hole thorugh both the drive and shaft and put a pin thorugh it.
so instead i must resign to buying a new motor. but i can't find one…. no problem. go to tech support, right?
they closed their e-mail. i keep getting mailer-daemon notifications that the e-mail adress is invalid.
the one i have is:
does anyone have another i should go to or know where i can get a new motor? – by rene'
|umax is sucks! (12:52pm est tue aug 09 2005)
take company is a peace off shitt! – by rogerio from brazil
|umax it all but overwith. (6:01pm est tue aug 30 2005)
this scanner is going in the garbage truck today. umax you might as well go with it because your already heading that way. might as well get it over with. – by david w wolfer
|thanks umax (4:28am est tue sep 20 2005)
i heartly thanks umax for not providing software upgrade for free . till now i was unsure whether to buy a umax advnced scanner or an hp but now i am for sure going for hp high end scanner. – raj vardhan varma – by raj vardhan varma
|idiots (9:14am est tue sep 20 2005)
you are all a bunch of whiney idiots. it isn't umax's job to host your data on the web for you. maybe they would supply them free if all of you had enough brains to write your own drivers and didn't mind doing it for free. some of you need to learn to spell and some others just need to get green cards, like raghead varma up here. – by geiser
|dummy (9:17am est tue sep 20 2005)
yes, i agree. cheap bastards should buy new scanners and stop being so darn cheap. very small minded people seem to the ones that mainly post here. – by driver lover
|agreed (9:18am est tue sep 20 2005)
yes, i agree with geiser and driver lover. write your own drivers or don't be so darn cheap. – by ben franklin
|hp? (9:22am est tue sep 20 2005)
i think they should provide free drivers, but hp sucks too, but worse. i've been through all this before and still ended up back at umax because they have better scanners. it really isn't so bad because theydo provide free driver downloads, just not for 7 year old scanners. if you aren't so cheap that you refuse to let go of your 7 year old scanner, umax is still a good place to get your scanners. don't be so cheap people!! it's embarassing. – by embarassed
|matthew (9:25am est tue sep 20 2005)
i think matthew ought to realize the drivers are still for free download from other sources and supply them for download on his site. oh yeah, he would actually have to care to do that. all he wants to do is write bad things about people. – by matthew's momma
|we're all programers (4:25pm est thu oct 27 2005)
it's not about being cheap, it's just about what's right. downloading drivers is a standart for all hadware companies. all of them. from mouse, to scanners, to dvd-burners and digital video-cam. the services offered after you bought a product often makes the difference on wether or not you will go for this company again.
and for those telling us to program our own drivers, most of people don't know a f@ck about programing. can't ask the people to do such a thing!
in conclusion, i say it is umax that is cheap, since all the other companies offer a service that umax decided to cancel. – by lolo
|oh you nitwits (8:21am est mon nov 07 2005)
write our own drivers or don't be so cheap? don't be stupid. (i especially loved the moron who claimed free drivers would trigger a depression. failed macro econ 101, did you?)
it has nothing to do with cheapness. the industry standard is to provide driver support, at least for a few years. i bought a umax 1220u in 2000, and two years later it was obsolete due to lack of driver support. that's hardly reasonable, and it's markedly different from the competition.
and that's what it boils down to. since that happened i've bought nothing but epson scanners, and guess what? none of my epson scanners have been obsoleted.
and yet, somehow epson's driver programmers still make their house payments, and no sign of a depression.
umax may feel justified in charging for software for older products. they can certainly do that, so long as they are aware that the competition isn't and it may cost them business in the long run.
for what it's worth, the drivers (that umax charges for) don't work very well anyway, so perhaps their driver programmers ought to be looking for other work. – by by-tor
|adult friend finder adultfriendfinders adultfriendfinder matchmaker da (4:19am est fri nov 11 2005)
– by adult friend finder
|if i ever get a hold of this driver… (2:13am est wed nov 30 2005)
i will let people download for free, that is it. will break umax legs myself. – by braziliangirl
|umax sells crap with an attitude (4:45pm est sat dec 03 2005)
i purchased a umax powerlook ii some time back and had nothing but trouble with it from day one. scans never represent the true image color, see what i mean at
when i contacted umax the tech person said it would cost more to fix the scanner than to buy a new one.
and as for the software, magicscan and binuscan, the first is a cheap imitation of good scanner color-correction software, and the binuscan never did work properly.
i will never again purchase a umax product, nor would i ever recommend them to anyone, not even my enemies. – by dan williams
|all umax products to the dump (10:45pm est wed dec 07 2005)
i am taking all my umax products to the dump, period. never going to buy another umax product. telling all my friends and businesses to avoid them. – by chairman goodchild
|umax finally delivers! (2:45pm est sat dec 17 2005)
(just kidding) i waited a full year for umax to come around and wise up to its costumer responsibilites/good will and provide the free driver and patch but it ain't happened. anybody know a good, relatively cheap scanner with slide, copier, etc. additional functions? – by sonny grotto
|thanks (8:20am est sun jan 08 2006)
this is an excellent site thanks for the information! – by andy
|twain driver (12:51am est fri jan 13 2006)
i will never purchase another canon scanner again. i purchased it new and i have had so many problems w/it! a twain driver error does not allow me to use it. looking on the net, it appears that i'm not the only one. i have spent countless hours trying to fix it. i give up and i'm going to buy another that is not canon. – by ana
|comment to fred on ecomomics (5:37pm est sat jan 14 2006)
it is a well known fact that repeat custom is an essential part of profit…if you piss off all your customers..where will the repeat sales come from???? umax are cheap and you know it…maybe you got money to burn but i haven't – by pissed & scannerless
|umax charging for drivers (7:53pm est mon feb 13 2006)
i was shocked to find umax charging for drivers for their products. i am happy to find this site where many people have voiced complaints. i will never buy umax products again as a result of their evil corporate money sucker. i will never buy a umax product ever again. – by i will never buy uma
|umax charging for drivers for their products (8:05pm est mon feb 13 2006)
i was shocked to find umax charging for drivers for their products. i am happy to find this site where many people have voiced complaints. i will never buy umax products again as a result of their evil corporate money sucker. i will never buy a umax product ever again. i am taking my umax products to the garbage dump – by max charging for dri
|driver charging (9:28am est tue feb 21 2006)
umax are still here :-( – by lplates
|umax xp drivers (6:38am est wed mar 15 2006)
driverguide.com and other driver sites have the xp update for free download, just go there, i got it the ver3.55 release that umax wants you to pay for and it works great, but the fact that i started getting yellow lines after 2 years of having it. can't figure out how to get rid of them started happening when i was running win95-98 and now they wont go away, ive tried taking it apart and cleaning the lamp etc… must be a bulb problem cuz the edges of the scanner bulb seemed kinda burnt looking or greyish when a bulb burns out. if anyone knows a fix to the yellow bands on your scans with the astra 2000p lemme know i could use it haha. – by b10nary
|where to get drivers (1:28pm est fri mar 31 2006)
– by alex
|hello (8:24pm est mon apr 24 2006)
his cock was 5in longer than dads
girl with small dick
pump cock pic
free dick enlargement
– by bill
|what? (4:49pm est fri may 12 2006)
longer than dad's girl small dickpumpcockwhat?….i can't believe the site admin let that post! just shows what type of people post here and tells us a lot about the people that run the web site too. when/if other companies do the cost analysis and figure out how much they are losing by providing free drivers (because it diminishes sales when people keep their old scanners working instead of buying new ones) (yeah, cheap bastards just like your selves) they'll be charging for drivers too. i personally have never had a problem finding free drivers in other locations and never had a problem browsing a support site and following instructions. i can tell you if of you speak to techs like you post your comments, which is most likely, you are probably generating a negative response. grow a brain. call a friend that knows how to use a computer. downlaod a free driver. visit the umax.com support knowledgebase (it sucks, but you can use it if you try). between those two things, there is no reason anyone should have to pay for a driver. have a coke and a fucking smile and life will be grand. better yet, support the economy and buy a new scanner that was made for your operating system. umax sucks? maybe they suck because cheap bastards like your selve's are holding your hands out like downtown ripple bum whinos instead of purchasing new scanners like you should. think umax sucks? you're all gonna die stupid. i think that sucks much worse – by downtown bum
|pay for drivers dorks! (5:04pm est fri may 12 2006)
i've never had to buy a driver for any product in my life. if you aren't smart enough to run a search for a free driver download, then you might as well buy the driver cd….dorks!
– by abettergeekthanyou
|what? (5:07pm est fri may 12 2006)
smashing concept brother! now that's using your noodle! – by downtown bum
|cheap!!!! (11:00pm est wed may 31 2006)
umax!!! guys you are cheap, so cheap to provide your customers with with free driver update…for this reason you lost my business, i rather purchase a new scanner from another provider, that purchasing your driver cd…bad bad for business…. – by admaroc
|umax astra 610p downloads for windows xp (5:03pm est wed jun 07 2006)
i am so disappointed that umax is not supporting windows xp users on their download site. therefore, if this is the way umax respects their customers, then i have absolutely no respect for any of their products and will seek business elsewhere. afterall, my money is still green.
see-ya, umaxed-out! permanently) – by technology teacher
|yet another "umax" sucks rant (1:31pm est thu jun 15 2006)
here at work, we got an older umax 2100u scanner…the damn install disks don't seem to work with w2k. i, too, have done the song and dance with umax.
i'll never, ever, never purchase any umax product. they suck and they're stupid too! not providing free install and driver kits. idiots – by dc
|well i just got suckered! (6:46pm est mon aug 07 2006)
i guess umax is going to add to landfills–after all–why buy a scanner driver from them when you can get a new one for about the same amount of money. just toss it!
this is a shame…someone should report them to the epa—hmmm think i will right now. – by jg
|umax (12:34pm est sun aug 20 2006)
yes, umax are now on my black list. i hope i never meet anyone from umax, as i do not fancy the prison sentence that will possibly follow. – by rancidporkfat
|there is one thing every body can do (11:26pm est fri sep 15 2006)
stop buying umax products, and let that company go to hell.
since this company has such low morality, and boycott it!
shame no umax! garbage of humanity! – by george
|umax 3.55 drivers (7:53pm est wed oct 04 2006)
here is a link that has all you need to update your umax drivers. i needed updates for my 1220u and it worked perfectly.
just follow the instrucyions.
i have no axe to grind with umax my unit is 6 years old and any problems have always been solved by googling it.
hope this helps some of you. – by dlddemon
|umax 3.55 drivers (7:56pm est wed oct 04 2006)
sorry here is the link…
– by dlddemon