You make a good point that I mentioned myself. At least I sort of mentioned it. The programs I mentioned, Picture IT, Microsoft Imager and PhotoSmart are all programs that came bundled with either Windows or one of my peripherials. The printer for example. They may already be on the computer. I am not sure about .bmp files(?) I think that is what he mentioned. The process you mention could cause some loss in image quality. I would suggest, as mentioned in my other post, going through, Start and Programs and browse through to see if you have any other imaging programs. Then look to see if any of them have Acquire or Import... and see if he can run the scanner into another program and see if he can then save directly as .jpg . That will yield the best possible quality. Also, again, check the scanners program and see if there is the selection of Preferences, Properties or Settings.