Is there any benefit to cutting the spine vs using heat to loosen the glue and remove the pages manually?

I have been doing this with old video game strategy guides for about 6 months now. To me it provides a better solution because I still have the spine and all the content which is printed very close to the book's seam. It does take a LOT longer to scan page-by-page, but I also get to keep the single pages instead of throwing them away.

I have also tried using an exacto knife but the results aren't as clean. I am still waiting for a better solution and your comment certainly does make me think.