Epson Workforce ES-60W Scanner: In-Depth Review and User Opinions

The Epson Workforce ES-60W is an affordable wireless duplex document scanner aimed at home office and small business users. This compact, portable scanner can handle up to 35 pages per minute and features a 50-page automatic document feeder for unattended scanning.

Key features of the Workforce ES-60W include:

• Wireless connectivity for cable-free operation
• 50-page auto document feeder
• 35ppm / 70 ipm scan speeds at 300 dpi
• 600 dpi optical resolution
• Scans documents up to 8.5" x 122" in size
• Scans directly to cloud services like Dropbox and Google Drive
• Supports JPEG, PDF, Word, Excel, searchable PDF and more
• Includes Document Capture Pro software for OCR

With its fast speeds, wireless operation and suite of scan features, the ES-60W provides an easy way to digitize documents and integrate into today's digital workflows.

Design

The Epson WorkForce ES-60W has a clean, compact design perfect for home offices and personal use. It measures 14.7 x 11.7 x 3.7 inches and weighs just 5.1 pounds, so it has a small footprint that will fit nicely on a desk without taking up too much space.

Despite its small size, the ES-60W has an attractive and professional-looking white plastic casing with a glossy finish. The rounded corners and curved shape give it a modern, sleek aesthetic. There are no color options available - the scanner only comes in white. However, the neutral color will blend seamlessly into any home or office decor.

The document feeder sits on top and has a gentle slope from front to back to naturally guide pages into the scanner. The ADF input and output trays both have extensions that can slide out to support larger stacks of paper if needed. Overall, it has a thoughtfully designed body that looks nice and makes scanning easy.

Setup

Setting up the Epson WorkForce ES-60W is quick and straightforward. You have a couple options for connecting the scanner - it supports both USB and WiFi connectivity.

For USB, simply plug the included USB cable into the scanner and connect it to your computer. No special software is required, the scanner will instantly be recognized by your OS.

To connect via WiFi, install the Epson Smart Panel app on your computer. This will walk you through the process of connecting the scanner to your wireless network. The app found the scanner instantly and connected it to my WiFi within a minute or two.

Once connected via USB or WiFi, you can install the included Epson ScanSmart software to access the full range of scanning and file management features. The install process is seamless and the software is intuitive and user-friendly. Overall, the setup process for the ES-60W is about as quick and painless as it gets for a scanner. The wireless connectivity is a nice perk, providing flexibility in placement and allowing multiple computers to access the scanner over the network.

Scanning Speed

The Epson ES-60W has fast scanning speeds, making it a good choice for digitizing large volumes of documents. It can scan up to 35 pages per minute in both color and mono, which is very fast for a personal desktop scanner in this price range.

The ADF can scan both sides of the page in one pass, enabling 35 pages per minute duplex scanning. This dual-sided scanning capability saves significant time compared to scanners that require scanning one side, then manually flipping to scan the other. With the ES-60W, you can breeze through large stacks of double-sided documents with ease.

The scanner also has no warm up time, so you can start scanning immediately with no delay whenever you need. Overall, the scanning speed is a major highlight of this model, allowing efficient digitization of files, books, receipts, or any other paperwork.

Image Quality

The Epson WorkForce ES-60W scanner delivers excellent image quality for both text documents and photos. It has an optical resolution of 600 dpi, which allows it to capture fine details and produce sharp scans.

For text documents, the high resolution enables the ES-60W to pick up small text cleanly without any jagged edges or blurriness. This makes it well-suited for scanning contracts, receipts, letters, and more. Even tiny footnotes and fine print will be legible.

When scanning photos, the scanner's 48-bit color depth and 4800 dpi interpolated resolution allow it to reproduce colors accurately. It can scan both prints and 35mm film negatives while maintaining vivid colors and avoiding banding or gradients. This makes it a versatile choice for preserving old photos and slides by digitizing them.

The overall image quality is very impressive for a compact desktop scanner in this price range. It can handle everyday documents and paperwork as well as the occasional photo without any compromise in clarity or color reproduction. For most home office and small business users, the ES-60W will provide more than satisfactory scan quality.

File Format Support

The Epson ES-60W scanner supports scanning to popular image and document formats including JPEG, JPEG 2000, PDF, PNG, BMP, and TIFF. This allows you to scan photos, documents, receipts, business cards, and more while retaining the original image quality.

The PDF format is particularly useful for digitizing documents and paperwork while maintaining formatting, fonts, colors etc. Scanned PDFs can be searched and are much easier to organize and share digitally compared to paper documents.

With JPEG and PNG support, the ES-60W makes it easy to scan photos, artwork, and graphics for archiving and sharing online. The BMP format is also handy for any graphic design or photo editing work after scanning.

Overall, the broad file format compatibility of the ES-60W allows you to digitize a wide variety of physical media into editable and sharable digital copies with minimal effort. The optical character recognition (OCR) functionality also helps convert scans into searchable and selectable text for documents saved as PDFs.

ADF Capacity

The Epson ES-60W has a 50-page automatic document feeder (ADF) for unattended scanning of multi-page documents. This is a decent capacity for a home office or small business scanner in this price range.

Most competing sheetfed scanners in this category have an ADF capacity between 30 to 80 sheets. So the ES-60W is right in the middle with its 50-page ADF. This should be sufficient for scanning stacks of documents, receipts, business cards, and photos before you need to reload the feeder.

Some users may prefer a higher capacity ADF if they frequently scan large stacks of paper. But for general home office use, the 50 pages should handle most jobs without any problems. Just be prepared to refill the ADF to finish scanning jobs over 50 pages.

The ADF also has a built-in sensor that detects when paper runs out. This stops the scanning process if you forget to load more pages, preventing misfeeds or jams. It’s a handy feature that takes the guesswork out of unattended scanning.

Overall, the 50-page ADF capacity hits a practical sweet spot for a personal scanner in this price range. It accommodates average scanning needs for home offices and small businesses. Power users who frequently scan 100+ pages may want to step up to a model with a larger ADF. But for most users, the Epson ES-60W has sufficient capacity in a compact and affordable package.

Connectivity

The Epson WorkForce ES-60W offers both wired and wireless connectivity options for scanning.

For wired connections, it has a standard USB 2.0 port that allows you to connect the scanner directly to your computer. The USB connection provides a simple plug-and-play setup for scanning directly to your home or office PC.

This scanner also includes built-in wireless connectivity, allowing you to scan wirelessly to PCs on your network without having to plug in any cables. It uses Wi-Fi connectivity and connects with most modern routers and Wi-Fi networks. Setting up the wireless connection is straightforward using the bundled software.

In addition to wired and wireless connections, the ES-60W also offers mobile scanning capabilities. Using the Epson Smart Panel mobile app, you can scan documents directly to your iOS or Android device over the Wi-Fi network. This gives you scanning capabilities even when your computer is not around. The app also includes features like document organization, search, and sharing functions.

Overall, the connectivity options on the Epson WorkForce ES-60W provide multiple flexible ways to get your scans into your computer or mobile device, whether through USB, Wi-Fi or mobile apps.

Pros

• Fast duplex scanning at up to 30 pages per minute in both color and monochrome. This makes it easy to quickly digitize large stacks of documents.

• Supports a wide variety of file formats including JPEG, PDF, and Microsoft Office file types. This versatility allows you to directly scan to the file type you need without extra conversion steps.

• Built-in wi-fi and Ethernet connectivity provides flexible setup options. You can place the scanner anywhere in your home or office and connect it both wirelessly or via wired network.

Cons

• The Epson Workforce ES-60W has slower scanning speeds compared to some competing models. It can scan around 25 pages per minute, while other desktop scanners in this price range can scan 35-40 pages per minute. The slower speed can become noticeable when scanning large stacks of documents.

• Connectivity is limited to WiFi only. There's no option for a wired ethernet connection. This could cause issues if the WiFi signal is weak in the area where the scanner is located. An ethernet port would provide a more reliable wired connection.

• The automatic document feeder capacity is only 35 pages. This is lower than some competing scanners which hold 50 or more pages in the ADF. You'll have to refill the ADF more frequently when scanning high volumes.