Slides - which slide scanner to buy?
 

have a lot of slides i want to archive onto cds.
i need advice as to what machine to get to do the job.
i am a complete novice in this area so have no idea where to begin.
so if any of you have ideas, please pass them on.
thanks.

Don't buy those crappy $100 negative/slide scanners -- those don't focus, have awful colors, pick up lots of dust and noise, and make the images look worse than decade old prints.

Look at one of those Epson V-series flatbeds, preferably one of the ones that has Digital ICE to remove dust/scratches from your prints.

ta LS. will look into the epson v series.

have a further question: after buying a slide scanner, which application should i use (if need be) to enhance the scan? ie remove dust, alter contrast etc.

Remove dust, scratches, etc really needs to be done by the hardware. There is not any software that has magic "remove dust and scratches" filters. The hardware does it by hitting the image (be it slide, negative or event a print) by zapping it with both infrared and regular light sources from various angles. Algorithms decide what is image and what is noise/damage.

In software, GIMP (your favorite) and Photoshop (my favorite) have the various clone and "repair" (PS:heal) tools. You fix each speck of dust and each scratch one by one.

"You fix each speck of dust and each scratch one by one."
right, either the hardware gets the job done, or i won't bother with scanning the slides!
ta for your input, me ol mucker.

That's pretty much how most of us feel.
Removing dust manually can prove not only time consuming, but sometimes almost impossible.