Re: Could be worse
I have an Epson V700 which works well enough under TWAIN on linux, but the original Epson software - which will only run on my wife's old Core Duo (not Core 2 Duo!) Mac mini - does have certain features which make it much more convenient when scanning multiple negatives or transparencies, if a lot slower than my linux boxes. In particular, the ability to set auto exposure / colour correction parameters for each pre-scan thumbnail and then "leave it to it" saves a lot of fiddling about in the GIMP (or whatever) afterwards.
M.