NextEngine 3D Scanner

Ben_

So I have a old NextEngine Scanner and cannot for the life of me find the cd-dvd or even my login credentials to the site to download the software to run it. Anyone here have one and be able to help me out? 

philip_thomas

Ben - i am in the same boat. I seem to recall that the drivers did not work beyond XP!
What software were you going to use to create usable surfaces?
I am looking for something that costs less than Geomagic Raindrop, but also works better than the rubbish SW tools.
Open to all suggestions!

Ben_

Well that would suck if its the case for XP but I do have a old machine.... I usually go into MeshLab or MeshMixer for making the surfaces usable. In this case I just want some geometry that I can build up models over. I'll go and have a look at Geomagic shortly

mahir

Another option would be to use an XP virtual machine just for scanning purposes... assuming you can find the XP drivers.

mark_biasotti

Hi Ben and Philip - I too have one of the very early ones. I still use it occasionally but have found that my generation can only run on unto Win7. I have not been able to get the driver to work for Win8.1 or 10. I believe that Brad Bryker still works for the company and there is a good chance that he might be at SWW. I don't want to post his email here without his permission but perhaps you can go to Linkedin and message him there.

Mark

philip_thomas

@mark_biasotti - thank you and great to see you on these forums!!!
(we're old friends from SolidWorks days )

Ben_

Next engine got back to me and Ill be up and running shortly. Might even have instructions on how to install a old machine in Windows10. I'll keep you updated. 

Ben_

So from nextengine on getting it installed in newer windows machines
  
   1. Download ScanStudio CORE 1.7.3 
   2. Download the Desktop 3D scanner drivers 
   3. After save is complete, right click in installer and go to Properties
   4. Then click on the Compatibility tab and check 'Run this program in compatibility mode for:" and set it to Windows XP SP3 and press OK
   5. Now right click on the installer and select 'Run as administrator'
   6. Proceed to install and make sure that the 3D Scanner driver box is unchecked (if it is checked, then proceed and just ignore the errors that might pop up)
   7. ScanStudio will start with errors, but just close the software after it loads up
   8. Copy and replace the wdapi901.dll (link below) to the following directories:
          * C:\Program Files(x86)\NextEngine\ScanStudio\Driver
          * C:\Program Files(x86)\NextEngine\ScanStudio\DLL
   9. Run ScanStudio and plug in scanner


wdapi901.dll: http://nextwiki.s3.amazonaws.com/resources/application/octet-stream/3acd93407807012e451f00254b9c869c-nvwyupzonheur.dll

There are other links for the ScanStudio CORE and scanner drivers but I hesitate sharing them publicly. If you have a login for NextEngine's website you will be able to find those links for ScanStudio and the Drivers easily enough.

mark_biasotti

Hi Ben,
Great that you have this solution. I will try out tonight on my Win8.1.

 Good to connect with you too Philip. Like the direction you guys are headed. Please say hi to Scott, Lana, Jon, Michael and Joe for me. I would like to introduce Onshape into our client project queue but most of them are using SolidWorks (80%), ProE(10%) or NX(5%). For an engineering consultancy like ours it is a catch-22 in that we can influence many of the startups in SC here - but we default in servicing them with their native system.  I think the threshold is close for OS to have enough capability to do consumer and commercial products for our clients but it isn't quite there yet (in my estimation) - still I think there are projects we are currently doing that we could use OS for.  Like that you put in configurations. I would like to see you team be more innovative in advanced modeling. 

Mark

lana

Hi @mark_biasotti
Good to hear from you. Thank you for your kind comment. I hope that when we are able to turn more attention to Consumer Product functionality you could give us more feedback.

kevin_quigley

Great find Ben! We bought the one of the first run of the NextEngine scanners way back but didn't upgrade to the HD version so were stuck on the original software which only ran on XP..so we still keep an old XP workstation for that purpose on the occasional need to fire it up.

will give this a try on Monday! 

howard_di_lameo

philip_thomas said:

Ben - i am in the same boat. I seem to recall that the drivers did not work beyond XP!
What software were you going to use to create usable surfaces?
I am looking for something that costs less than Geomagic Raindrop, but also works better than the rubbish SW tools.
Open to all suggestions!

we have almost similar situation - our employee resigned and for a number of reasons we lost access to the original software of Artec. How important is it to use the original software for the scanner? Our budget is too small for this year and we can not afford to buy a license. Any suggestions for using free software for scanners? Thanks

Ben_

howard_di_lameo said:

we have almost similar situation - our employee resigned and for a number of reasons we lost access to the original software of Artec. How important is it to use the original software for the scanner? Our budget is too small for this year and we can not afford to buy a license. Any suggestions for using free software for scanners? Thanks

This is tough as commercial scanners rarely work with free software. However if you have the physical scanner then contact Artec and ask them for another software setup for your equipment. As far as cheap home built scanners go, here are my thoughts. Some are good but you pay for something in one of two ways, by money (get a good commercial scanner and it is plug and play) or sweat equity (buy a decent home built version and spend the next month figuring out how to work it) 

bill_barschdorf

Old post but I'll give it a shot.  Have a Next Engine Scanner bought it in 2011, used it for years, but have not used it a long time. Now I need to use it, go to download software and discover what we all have.  This is LAME, the company shuts down and leaves us all high and dry with a useless scanner.  Would have been nice of them to just let us keep the software active from here. SO BIG question is there any way around the software issue since it always needed verification every time you would launch the scanner.  Can the scanner still be used OR is it now JUNK?  That is assuming the software is available somewhere?  

rob_steinberg

I'm in the same situation. I even thought of arranging some sort of deal with Nextengine and doing a quick offshore rewrite. But the funder and founder are suing each other, now in the 4th year of conflict. Thus the ghost site.

But there's good news. Apple has put photogrammetry into the latest OS and iOS versions, and there are a few iPhone apps. I've tried two; PhotoCatch and Polycam. Both have a trivial learning curve, and each gave me great detail and clean, ready to print meshes on the first try. Cloud based arrays at work, for  you!!! Better than anything on your desktop. And this was with a $450 iPhone SE 2. Nothing fancy.

Each scan was far better than Nextengine at it's best. With no "place the red,blue and yellow dots", no refining and reducing and cleaning the mesh, no need to go into other sw to clean up the results. You can happily use the bricked device as a door stop.

There's also something from Epic for Android, but I haven't used it.

Good luck!!!

mahir

It's ironic that this post popped up. Now you can scan right into OS with the mobile app! I didn't even know they were working on this.

rob_steinberg

I'm in the same situation. I even thought of arranging some sort of deal with Nextengine and doing a quick offshore rewrite. But the funder and founder are suing each other, now in the 4th year of conflict. Thus the ghost site.

It's dead unless you can set up an old machine that runs Win7 and Flash. And keep it off the network for security reasons. Don't bother, though.

There's good news. Apple has put photogrammetry into the latest OS and iOS versions, and there are a few iPhone apps. I've tried two; PhotoCatch and Polycam. Both have a trivial learning curve, and each gave me great detail and clean, ready to print meshes on the first try. Cloud based arrays at work, for  you!!! Better than anything on your desktop. And this was with a $450 iPhone SE 2. Nothing fancy.

Each scan was far better than Nextengine at it's best. With no "place the red,blue and yellow dots", no refining and reducing and cleaning the mesh, no need to go into other sw to clean up the results. You can happily use the bricked device as a door stop.

There's also something from Epic for Android, but I haven't used it.

Good luck!!!

mahir

@rob_steinberg I guess not very ironic. I didn't notice you mentioned photogrammetry in iOS and OS. Good news regardless

james_v_petersen

Wow, this is an unusual link to track down. I am in the same boat as everyone else on this post. I have a Next Engine 2020i with the original WinXP machine and would like to know if getting this system up and running is possible. Is there much indication that anyone has revived their dinosaurs? I suppose that I might cannibalize the system for parts and use the set of turntables with an iPhone 3D scanner.