I just wanted to thank you, Shades, for this brilliant idea to use IrfanView even for that, especially in bulk mode scanning. I've got an old Canon scanner and a quite new Canon copier/printer/scanner (no feeder), and both devices come with scan softwares which as soon as you want to scan more than one page become almost unusable.
VueScan is around 40 Euro in a very rudimentary edition and around 100 Euro in its full edition, depending or your VAT rate; some time ago I had been interested in that software but finally didn't buy it after reading some user complaints about the developer's alleged rudeness but that very probably was a big mistake because in-between Euro prices rose by almost 50 p.c., Euro losing a third of its value against the Dollar - it comes with lifetime updates so waiting to buy made/makes no sense in the case, and the only really competitive software - from what they say -, Silverfast, you must buy for each scanner separately.
But there also is PaperScan, which is 150€ plus VAT and which I didn't try out either - their rudimentary version is free, does not do bulk of course.
But is there any scan software which does bulk in fixed time increments?
I have the following scenario: That 3-in-1 Canon office thingy without feeder but which is at some meters from my computer (connected by LAN, not USB). Need to scan in bulk, with some seconds in-between, number of seconds depending on the material to scan, perhaps between 5 and 8 seconds after each scan or between 12 and 15 seconds including the scan.
So I currently often copy instead of scanning, in order to avoid to running around in a quite frenzy way for any one scan. I am aware that I probably could try to solve that problem with some macro program clicking on the right screen buttons every "n" seconds, but it's evident that some program which would do the next scan automatically even when there is NO feeder available, after a given delay instead, would be ideal for my means - IrfanView does not do it alone, but in combination with the right macro tool, it could be ideal free tool for that. (Since it's scanning, not copying/printing, not being ready for the next scan here and there would not harm.)
EDIT June 10, 2017
What I described above, I got some days ago. It's called ScanPapyrus and it costs 30$. It works well with both of my scanners, incl. the Canon ColorNetwork ScanGear for my ImageRunner 2520 (which has no internal bulk scan functionality). In ScanPapyrus, you set up the seconds between scans, and it will trigger a new scan every such seconds: No running between copier/scanner/printer and pc anymore. I'm more than pleased with this tool and recommend it warmly.
