How to Rid Your Books And Magazines Of Fluorescent Scrawls the ultimate magic marker
By Michael J. Himowitz

(FORTUNE Magazine) – If you're a compulsive highlighter--someone who leaves a trail of yellow in all her books--you've probably wished for a magic wand that would save the important info so that you could organize and find it as needed. The Siemens Pocket Reader isn't magic, but it comes close. The tiny, hand-held scanner reads printed material a line at a time--just the way you'd highlight it--then converts it into text that your computer can use in a word processor or spreadsheet.

What makes this $100 gadget really cool is that it doesn't have to be hooked up to a computer when you use it. You can carry it in your pocket or purse, scan whenever you like (it holds 40,000 characters and reads text in English, German, French, Spanish, and Italian), and then dump the whole mess into your PC when you get back to your desk.

From a design standpoint, the Pocket Reader is strictly utilitarian--a charcoal-gray bar just over six inches long, 1.5 inches wide, and three-quarters of an inch thick--with a one-line liquid-crystal display. Five buttons under the display control the reader, and on the back you'll find a panel for a pair of AAA batteries, which will last about 20 hours.

To use the Pocket Reader, grip it as you would a pencil (well, almost like a pencil, because it's a lot bigger), press it down on the page at the start of a line, and move the scanning head over the type. If you've done everything right, you'll see the text in the LCD display. Transferring the text from the scanner to your PC is simple and virtually foolproof. The package comes with a cable that hooks to your computer's serial port (there are Macintosh adapters), as well as software for your Windows PC or Mac. The program automatically downloads the text into an editing screen where you can correct errors, cut and paste the contents into a word processor, or store it on your hard disk.

On the downside, you'll have to practice--a lot--to get decent accuracy. Pay particular attention to the photos in the terse but readable instruction manual. Most people tend to tilt the reader as it rolls across the page, but you have to keep it as close as possible to upright, which takes concentration.

Also, don't expect miracles. Given infinite combinations of paper, typefaces, and work surfaces, the Pocket Reader's accuracy can vary wildly. Although it's designed to recognize typefaces from eight to 16 points high (the one you're reading here is nine points), I got the best results--80% to 95% accuracy--with pages from hardback books and glossy magazines, which fall in the middle range. Scans from newspapers and paperbacks, which use smaller type, were harder. You'll also need a flat work surface for best results--a real challenge with the left-hand pages of books.

If you do wind up with a line of gobbledygook, you can move the cursor to the last clean line of text and delete everything after it. Unfortunately, there's no way to change the text in the reader itself, so if it goofs on a critical word, you'll have to re-scan the line or trust your memory to correct the error later on your PC.

That said, the Pocket Reader does a remarkable job of cramming everything into such a small package. I love the convenience of reading something and then being able to quickly scan it, edit it on my PC, and zap it to a friend. If you're someone who likes to clip and save, you'll find this a truly nifty set of digital scissors. For information, call 888-838-0611 or surf to http://us.pocketreader.com.