I've had good experiences with the Metrologic Voyager series. Again, expensive. Programmable typically means you can change parameters such as requiring certain code specifications or allowing all codes through. Bar codes are very customizable, so a configurable barcode scanner is handy. Also a lot of barcode scanners act as keyboards, so you can configure them to send start and stop characters or sequences so software can discern between the barcode scans and keyboard input. The reason they are expensive is because doing laser barcode scanning at a distance with poor contract barcodes is non trivial, and they have to do it in a manner that puts up with severe abuse at the hand of cashiers and clerks. Also, because they can. I've taken a few apart (have the parts around here somewhere, let me know if you'd like pics) and they're pretty interesting, and contain a lot more than a micro and a laser scanning assembly. I don't think they have bad engineers - I just suspect that to do barcode scanning well you have to deal with a lot more than the ideal laboratory case. -Adam On Wed, Feb 11, 2009 at 3:32 PM, Vitaliy wrote: > Hi guys, > > I'm looking for an inexpensive USB 1D barcode scanner, preferably the type > that you can put on a desk/workstation, with automatic scanning option. > There are many contact-type scanners, but I need one that can be operated > from a distance (1" - 6"). > > Any suggestions? > > Vitaliy > > -- > http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive > View/change your membership options at > http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist > -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist