The Flip
by Doxie
What is it: The Doxie Flip – a portable, flippable flat bed scanner that records up to 600dpi images on an SD card, powered by batteries. Make sure to check out the sample scans at the bottom of the review!
“the inventive new mobile, battery-powered flatbed scanner perfectly designed for photos, sketches, keepsakes, and pocket notebooks.”
Who Makes it: Doxie! Check them out, they were kind enough to send over a unit for review.
What’s in the box: The Doxie Flip was sent to me with the scanner, an SD card, an SD card reader, a soft travel case, and the press kit, including a limited edition Doxie Field Notes notebook and several items to test the scanner with.
How it works: The reason I like the Doxie Flip so much is because it is so easy to use. I really hate scanning images. It’s not fun. Sitting at the computer, cropping, editing, and finding a place to save all of them. It’s a hassle. The Doxie Flip takes away most, if not all, of the hassle involved in scanning pictures, notebooks, or documents.
It’s so easy to use. Pop in the SD card, select your resolution (300dpi or 600dpi), put in what you want to scan, and hit the green button. A live preview of what’s going on in the scanner shows up on the small screen so you know you scanned what you intended to. It’s nice to be able to sit down on the couch and fly through an entire album of old family photos with a small scanner that can sit in your lap.
The cool part about the Doxie Flip (also it’s namesake) is that the top of the flat bed can be removed, the entire scanner flipped over. You can scan pages out of a book, the pattern of any surface, the side of your friend’s face, anything really. The scanning element is sandwiched between two pieces of glass, one comes in contact with the object you are scanning, the other acts as a window so you can line everything up. It’s a cool feature that makes anything pretty easy to scan.
Why Doxie? Well, you may be thinking. I can just take a picture of that with my phone…and in some cases, you may be right. But if I wanted to convert all of my old family photos to digital copies, I would much rather use a scanner. The resolution is hard to beat, and it’s nice not having to line up the camera phone perfectly. Lighting is no longer a worry either, because the scanner takes care of that as well. The small size and lack of wires make scanning fun, especially when you can save hours of sitting in front of a computer.
The Software: Doxie comes with proprietary software that I find quite intuitive. When you insert the SD card into your computer and open the Doxie software, it finds the card, and imports the pictures when you click “Import”. They show up in a grid pattern, and you can double click each scan to edit it.
The one thing I found incredibly user friendly is the crop sliders. Fixing up a scan is super easy, and cropping takes seconds. You do not have to import the scans, save them, and open them in another program to get a finished, cropped photo. Another awesome feature which really helps when archiving notebooks is the Staple function. In Doxie’s software, you simply select multiple photos, and click the “Staple” button. You can then export the entire notebook as a PDF with flippable pages. Overall the software is intuitive, fast and easy, just like operating the scanner. 
Overall: The Doxie Flip really is an awesome piece of hardware. My girlfriend stole it from me for a few days to scan in old family photos, and she loved it. It’s easy to use, quick to edit the scans, and the quality of the images is great. At around $150, it’s not an impulse buy, but if you do not have a scanner, it’s really nice to have something portable and easy to use.
The software is intuitive, and a feature to automatically stitch smaller images into a large one is coming soon. I’ll continue to use it for scanning ink swatches, archiving Field Notes, and digitally saving family photos. Thanks again to the Doxie team for sending one over, I’m loving it.
Image Scan Gallery:
edjelley.com - Fountain Pen, Ink, and Stationery Reviews 
Thanks Ed for the review. I have a small Canon scanner that I love for it’s simplicity but it’s more conventional with the usual annoyances you mention. The features on this one look handy so I think I’ll watch the Bay for a price lower enough to justify another scanner. BTW I’m so jealous how you score the great demo’s.
No problem! The convenience factor really is high, it replaced the annoyances of scanning with a fun experience. I’m sure you’ll like it should you find one within your price range.
Thanks for reading!
Ooooh, I’m so glad you’ve posted about this.
I’m in dire need a new scanner, and I’m itching to try this one out.
As long as you plan on scanning smaller things (pictures, etc.) the Doxie is great. The stitch function isn’t there yet and full sized letters/papers still won’t fit to easily.
Thanks for reading!