Don't know where you are located, but today's (Los Angeles) Fry's ad has
Nitro PDF for free after a rebate.  It's $99 software, and pretty good.  I
have it and use it often.  There's also a pdf freeware called PDF Creator (
http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/).  In fact, there are several
PDF freewares, but I've only had experience with PDF Creator.

If you need the text to be editable, you would probably need OCR (optical
character recognition) software. I haven't seen that in freeware.  It's
often included for free when you buy a scanner, but is sort of pricey if you
have to buy it.

Patti
90 Westy Automatic
*************************

On Fri, Jul 31, 2009 at 11:21 AM, Michael Sullivan
<sandwichhead@gmail.com>wrote:

> Just to clarify...I have a Dell 1600N Laser that I got used.  It has a scan
> function but when you push it, it says software not available.  I
> downloaded
> drivers, but there is not a software download available.  I use Windows
> Document Imaging(just go to start and type SCAN and it is the default). I
> scan medical claims alot and retreiving them is time consuming in this
> format.  PDFs work great, but I do not have PDF software.  So looking to
> buy
> cheap or free.  Does that help narrow it down?  Thx again guys and gals.
> Michael in San Antonio
> 91GL AT 'Gringo'
> 73 Beetle
>