While photo slides are not as popular as they once were, they contain precious memories that you may not have captured in other film and photo formats. To enjoy and share those memories, you need to be able to view your old slides.
Keep reading to learn all about the best slide viewers and the features that make them a good choice for your priceless memories.
Pana-Vue 2 Illuminated Slide Viewer | Kaiser Slimlite Plano Light Box | Wolverine F2D Mighty Film to Digital Converter | Jumbl 22MP All-in-1 Film and Slide Scanner | Kodak Scanza Digital Film Scanner | |
Price | HK$ 243 | HK$ 1200 | HK$ 980 | HK$1765 | HK$ 1000 |
Amazon Review Rating | 4.3 Stars | 4.5 Stars | 4.1 Stars | 3.9 Stars | 4.2 Stars |
Type | Portable backlight slide viewer | Lightbox Slide Viewer | Digital Converter | Digital Scanner | Digital Scanner |
Slide Projector/ | None | None | Digitisation | Digitisation and TV Connection | Digitisation and Projector Connections |
Portable? | Yes, battery operation | Yes, with an internal battery using USB charging | Yes, with internal storage | Yes, with internal storage | No |
Compatible Slides | 35mm slide film, 2x2 slides | All slide types, negatives, and | 35mm, 127, 126KPK, 110, and 35mm Library (as well as snapshots of 8mm and Super 8 reels) | 35mm, 110, 126, 127, and Super 8 slides and negatives. | 35mm, 126, 110, Super 8 & 8mm negatives and slides |
Pana-Vue 2 Illuminated Slide Viewer
This handheld slide viewer is easy to use with a simple design that allows you to view your slides in seconds using a backlight with battery operation. It’s portable and makes it incredibly easy to view your 35mm slides and can also work for 2x2 slides. Plus, it only costs $30.95 on Amazon and even though it doesn’t project or digitise your slides for sharing, it’s just about the most affordable and easiest way for one person to view slides.
The magnifying glass will allow you to view your slides with ease and bring your slides to life. Plus, for people who want to view slides without bulky viewer options, this option offers the best alternative because of the sleek, mobile design that doesn’t tie you down with cords.
With a 4.3 Amazon rating, Pana-Vue Illuminated Slide Viewer's positive reviews highlight the easy-to-use design, accessibility, affordable price, durable construction, and included brand name AA batteries. Many positive reviews also say that the batteries last longer on this device than some of the competitors. While the positive reviews far outweigh the negative ones, some of the reviews highlight difficulties with lighting, including the fact that it doesn’t use an LED light.
Pros
- Easy to use with a simple viewing design
- Affordable price
- Comes with AA batteries and a Microfiber cleaning cloth
- Portable slide viewer
Cons
- No way to share slides with others
- Uses an incandescent light instead of an LED light
Kaiser Slimlite Plano Light Box
This tabletop light box film viewer offers a great way to not only view your photo slides, but to view negative film, slide film, and other old films of virtually any size. It features a built-in battery, wall charging, and a long life between charges. The bright LED backlight also features brightness control options. The viewing area for this slide and negative viewer isn’t huge, but there are bigger options available if you want to display slides for others to see.
One downside is that it doesn’t offer 3x magnification like some competitors including the Rybozen slide viewer (however, the Kaiser Diascop Mini does offer a 3x viewing lens). However, we think this option is the best way to view old slides using a backlight because it’s more lightweight and portable with easy capability for more slide types as well as film strips.
Reviews for the Kaiser Slimlite Plano Light Box praise the long-lasting and brightly coloured LED lights as well as the lightweight, ultra-thin design and portable USB charging that can work in adapters or computers. Others say that it’s better than the Medalight option, but it does cost a little more. Most negative reviews highlight issues including easy scratches, flickering light when shaken, and other durability issues.
Pros
- Built-in long-lasting battery
- Bright LED light with brightness control
- Works for slides, negatives, and other filmstrips
- USB charging
Cons
- The screen can scratch easily
- More expensive than other lightboxes
Wolverine F2D Mighty Film to Digital Converter
This digital converter will transfer 35mm, 127, 126KPK, and 110 slides and film negatives into high-quality digital JPEGs, which makes for easy viewing on other digital devices, the cloud, and on digital projectors. Plus, it doesn’t require a computer and will display your slides on the LCD screen with included brightness and colour adjustment. You also have to option to use SD cards for storage.
This option makes our list because it’s more affordable than many other slide digitization options while still offering crisp image results. Plus, it’s very easy to operate with only 5 buttons including the power button, arrows for viewing multiple slides, and an OK button.
Some of the negative reviews indicate that it’s very time-consuming to use and the quality is not as good as they had hoped. Many users have difficulty transferring digital files to a computer as well because the process is not only time-consuming but targeted at tech-savvy users. However, positive reviews are plentiful as well, and find that it’s a great choice for a combination of affordable features and high-quality results.
Pros
- Digital converter with no computer required
- LCD screen and internal storage
- High-quality JPEG images
- Works with a wide variety of slide types
Cons
- Targeted to tech-savvy users
- Very time-consuming
Jumbl 22MP All-in-1 Film and Slide Scanner
This great scanner uses a powerful 14-megapixel scanner to create high-quality JPEG images of 35mm, 110, 126, 127, and Super 8 slides and negatives. Plus, it can connect to your television to display the slides for sharing at family gatherings. It’s portable as well with a 2.4-inch colour LCD screen and included speed loaders for easy viewing.
However, this product comes at a pretty expensive price compared to other options at $224.99 if you checkout at Walmart.com. The Jumble 22MP may also be hard to find even if you have the SKU number. However, for easy-to-use results that are of exceptional quality as well as additional features including the ability to change hues and create sharp images out of your slides, it’s one of the best slide viewer options available.
Reviews often complain about the price, but in general, they praise the awesome quality results and simple design. However, they do say that the display can show dust, hair, and scratches quite easily and that it may require separate HDMI or USB adapters and software to use with some modern devices.
Pros
- High-quality results with the ability to change hue and magnification
- Television connection for sharing slides
- Works with a wide variety of slides and negatives
- Easy to use with a simple design
Cons
- May require adapters for use with modern devices
- Expensive compared with other options
Kodak Scanza Digital Film Scanner
This Kodak 35mm slide and negative scanner is one of the absolute best on the market. It offers a high-definition LCD viewing screen and plenty of adapters for connecting to projectors or computers. Plus, even includes image colour and resolution editing, SD memory card capability, adjustable brightness, and convenient tilt viewing.
We like this option better than the Kodak Slide n Scan because it’s both more affordable and less complex. While it will still be time-consuming, the 14-megapixel camera and simplified design that scans your 35mm, 126, 110, Super 8, and 8mm negatives and slides make operation fairly easy.
Reviews highlight the basic, easy-to-use design that produces decent results without spending hundreds of dollars. However, multiple reviews mention that dust can get into the machine and the digital photos, which is probably why it comes with a free cleaning brush. Finally, some reviewers are dissatisfied with calling it a scanner because it takes images of your photo slides. Additionally, you will need to buy an SD card to use it, even if you plan on transferring images to your computer.
Pros
- High-quality results
- Image colour, brightness, and resolution editing
- Adapters for connecting to projectors and computers
- Easy viewing LCD screen
Cons
- Requires SD card (not included)
- Can get dirty and show dust on slides
- Time-consuming
Slide Viewer Buying Guide
When deciding on the best slide viewer, there are some considerations you need to keep in mind. Here are some factors when choosing the best slide viewer and comparing different models.
Type of Viewer
There are different types of viewers for slides including projectors, lightbox viewers, and digital converters or scanners. Simple viewers are easiest to use and most affordable, but digitising your slides offers additional benefits including the preservation of your precious memories, the ability to use editing software, and easy sharing across social media and email.
Viewing Plan
You should consider the answer to the question, “What can I do with old photo slides?” when deciding on the best slide viewer. For example, if you want to use your slide transparencies for projecting to share at a family gathering or lecture, then you will have to choose a slide viewer that will work with a computer, TV, or projector. If you plan on using the machine to simply view your old slides without preserving or sharing them, then a light box or magnifying viewer should work just fine.
Ease of Use
Some slide viewers are easier to use than others and many digital converters are complex and designed for tech-savvy users. However, simple light boxes are very easy to use no matter what. Keep this in mind when comparing the features of the different products you are comparing.
Budget
You can find slide viewer options that meet almost any budget including ones that are around $30 as well as options that cost over $200. You can use your budget to quickly narrow down the options before considering anything else but remember that cheaper options will not offer as many features for your precious memories.
Quality
For analogue viewers, the quality will be the same as the slides, but you still want to consider if the product has a magnifier or not because that will make viewing in high-quality sharpness easier. For other digital converter options, you want to consider the type of scanning, resolution, and overall quality of the image.
Capture's Offer
While slide viewers are a great way to enjoy your old slide memories, there are many options available. Some offer simple viewing with a backlight while others convert your slides into digital files to preserve them forever. We prefer digital photos because this ensures your legacy lasts so that future generations can view, share, and enjoy your slides.
For the highest possible quality digitisation as well as affordable pricing and guaranteed security to keep your slide memories safe throughout the entire process, choose Capture to convert 35 mm, Super 35 mm, 110/220, 126, 127, 127 Superslide and 120/220 Medium Format. Learn more about Slide digitisation service!
*This article is brought to you by Capture HK.
Capture HK is the premier analogue media digitisation company in Hong Kong.
Capture HK's business covers photographs, photo album digitisation, videotapes digitisation, including VHS, S-VHS, VHS-C, S-VHS-C Hi-8, Video8, Digital8, DV, DVCAM, MiniDV, DVC and digital media digitisation, including Secure Digital (SD), Smart Media (SM), MultiMediaCard (MMC) Compact Flash (CF), xD-Picture Card, Memory Stick, USB Drive, CDROM, DVD.
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