Scanning Modes

ScoutIQ offers three scanning modes, each with their unique pros and cons:

• Database Only - The entire ScoutIQ book database can be downloaded to your mobile device so you can scan any book and access its data offline.  This is perfect for when you're in an area with poor cell reception or if you don't want to pay for data charges on your phone.  Database mode is also extremely fast - about five times faster than live mode - which allows you to quickly scan books to find profitable inventory.  You can even download the ScoutIQ app to an iPod Touch or a similar device to access the books database without paying for a mobile service plan.  It's sort of a modern approach to the old PDAs that are sometimes still used for book scouting.
• Database + Live - This is a hybrid solution that looks up books in the database first, and if the book isn't in the database it will look for it live through Amazon's API.  Although ScoutIQ has most of Amazon's titles in its database, there are constantly new titles being published that haven't found their way into our database quite yet.  When you scan a book that is not currently in the database, we'll show you the results in live time (minus eScore and Amazon's price), and also add that ISBN into the database within a few days so other scouts can benefit from a more comprehensive database.  Thanks in advance for helping to crowdsource the database!
• Live Only - As its name implies, there is no database element to live lookups.  The data will be as fresh as possible, since it's pulling directly from Amazon and not from a database that could be 12-24 hours old.  You can look up ALL product categories using live mode.  You'll still get eScore and Amazon's price (although Amazon's price will be a few hours old, potentially), but each scan will take about five times longer to load than if you were accessing it through the downloaded database.

If you are paying for Live Mode only, you won't be able to access either of the first two database plans.  If you're paying for Database + Live, you can access any of the three modes.  We recommend Database + Live when scouting to ensure access to as much data as possible.

With any of the scanning modes, you always have the ability to look up live data for each book.  Simply touch the LIVE icon on any scout screen to refresh the screen with real-time results.