Colortrac is the only scanner manufacturer to offer you the choice of Contact Image Sensor (CIS) or Charge Coupled Device (CCD) technology.  Traditionally, most large format scanners have used CCD technology to capture the digital image. Now, the latest advances in CIS technology have created opportunities for leading edge manufacturers to design wide format scanners that offer similar performance - scan speed, image quality, resolution and image width - comparable with, or, in some respects, exceeding, the older CCD technology based large format scanners.

Ultimately the decision between CIS and CCD will depend on what you want to do with your large format documents and how much you want to spend. CBS Central is pleased to help you choose the right type of large format scanner for your application, so please give us a call or fill in the form below and let us be of assistance.

There are two imaging systems used in large format scanners - CCD and CIS. CCD is the traditional imaging system used in large format scanners and involves a combination of lenses, lights and mirrors. CIS scanners have no lenses, lights or mirrors, make greater use of digital electronics and use integrated RGB LEDs for illumination

Colortrac SmartLF Gx scanners (& other graphics scanners) use traditional CCD technology with flourescent lamps. Flourescent lamps have two disadvantages. First, they require a comparatively long warm-up time to stabalise and capture colours accurately. Second, they are classified and sold as consumables as they are expected to burn out and die after a period of usage.

Colortrac SmartLF Cx scanners use CIS technology. As this technology has no lenses, lights etc then this makes them cheaper to build, less heavy, more robust and means they can be used almost immediately after power-on.

Proponents of CCD technology will argue that CIS devices are not as good at scanning folded or wrinkled drawings as CCD scanners because their lower depth of focus means they cannot focus on bits of the drawing that are further away from the sensors. By the same token, feeding folded, wrinkled drawings through a CCD scanner is more likely to result in a stitching error, where parts of the drawing scanned by different cameras within the scanner do not line up!

Scanners that use CIS technology produce sharper scans than CCD scanners, but CCD scanners normally have a wider colour gamut (range of colours) and a higher dynamic range (ability to capture smooth gradations of tone across the entire tonal range between black and white).

This makes CIS scanners ideal for CAD users with technical drawings, where capturing a wide range of colours or tonal ranges is unlikely to be an issue. However in a reprographics, graphic art or photographic environment you should probably look at a CCD scanner.