The Best New Ways to Scan Your Old Photos (WSJ)

The following article was written by WSJ Personal Tech columnist, Joanna Stern, who has spent the better part of the past decade on the gadget beat, knows phones, tablets, and laptops inside and out. In her weekly columns and lively videos, she helps people make smarter tech decisions.
 
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Excerpt:

Outsourced Option: A Mail-in Service 

If you’re not a do-it-yourselfer, you can always box up your memories and send them out to a photo-scanning service. This option can be efficient and even fairly inexpensive, but you have to be OK with handing over your most cherished memories to complete strangers for a few days. 

I gave it a shot. I organized a group of 100 shots by year, labeled them with Post-its and sent them off via FedEx to ScanMyPhotos.com, based in Irvine, Calif. Within a few days, my prints had been uploaded and the originals were back safely in my possession. A nice woman named Shannon kept me updated on the process throughout the week. 

With the $170 prepaid service, the company sends you an 11-by-8.5-by- 5.5-inch box and asks you to stuff it full—that’s around 1,800 snapshots, according to company Chief Executive Mitch Goldstone. The company makes [150]-dpi scans of the photos, at a price that comes out to about 8 cents each; for $250, or almost 14 cents each, you can double the resolution. 

Published online and in the Dec 21, 2016 (D-4) print edition of The Wall Street Journal