Panasonic KV-S1037X - Review 2022

Panasonic's KV-S1037X ($795) is essentially an updated version of the company'south KV-S1026C-MKII document scanner we reviewed a few months ago. The enhancements hither include network connectivity, support for USB 3.1, and a few other notable upgrades. I of the KV-S1037X's most direct competitors, though, is an Editors' Choice pick, Brother's formidable ADS-2700W Wireless High-Speed Desktop Document Scanner, which is slightly less expensive and a chip faster and more accurate—emphasis, though, on the slightly. Still, on the whole, the entry-level KV-S1037X is speedy, good at OCR, and reliable equally document scanners go, making information technology suitable for light-duty scanning in small offices, home offices, and workgroups. Nosotros'd just like to come across some tweaks to its software bundle.

Lean and Powerful

Measuring 5.4 past 12 by 7 inches (HWD) with its trays closed, and weighing a low-cal five.9 pounds, the KV-S1037X is a lilliputian smaller than most sheet-feed desktop document scanners, only about right for a low-volume model. Brother's ADS-2700W, for case, is 1.six inches taller only weighs about the same, and the size and girth differences between the Panasonic model and both the Epson DS-575W Wireless Color Certificate Scanner and the Epson WorkForce ES-500W Wireless Duplex Certificate Scanner are negligible, likewise. If desk space is at a premium, you'll find that these and well-nigh other entry-level canvas-feed scanners have similar footprints.

The KV-S1037X's automatic document feeder (ADF) holds up to 50 sheets, ranging in size from 1.9 past two.one inches, upwards to 8.v inches wide by unlimited inches long. Panasonic rates the daily duty cycle at three,000 scans. These volume and capacity stats are nearly right for an entry-level scanner. The ADF size and duty-cycle rating for the Blood brother ADS-2700W are, for case, the same every bit the KV-S1037X's, while both the Epsons I mentioned above accept 50-sheet ADFs just duty cycles that are 1,000 pages greater.

I'll discuss the connectivity options in more particular in a moment, just information technology's also important to notation that the KV-S1037X (like the Blood brother ADS-2700W) supports Ethernet networking and Wi-Fi, whereas the two Epson machines support merely wireless networking. In addition, like about Panasonic scanners, this 1 comes with a minor detachable guide that feeds diverse types of thick cards, such as credit cards and laminated IDs, for scanning, equally well as a carrier sail for protecting fragile documents as they laissez passer through the scan path.

Typically, depression-book machines like the KV-S1037X don't come with sophisticated bear on-screen control panels for operating the scanner. The KV-S1037X's control console (1 of the more rudimentary I've seen of late) consists of merely a few buttons running down the correct side of the front panel. These are Power, Skip (for ignoring double-feeds), Select buttons one, 2, and three (for choosing a pre-designed workflow profile, such as Browse to Folder, Scan to Electronic mail, or Scan to FTP), and a Start/Stop toggle for initiating and canceling scans. Three status LEDs—Error, Wireless, and Ready—are positioned in a higher place the column of buttons. Of the entry-level scanners discussed hither so far, only Brother'southward ADS-2700W comes with a graphical touch screen for setting upwardly and initiating scans. The ii Epson models discussed above have controls similar to those of the KV-S1037X.

To the left of the panel, y'all'll find a fable for the various buttons and lights, which includes a space for writing in the corresponding contour names for the iii Select buttons. Yous create the profiles and assign them to the individual buttons using Panasonic's Paradigm Capture Plus software or the Browse Button Setting Tool, which I'll discuss momentarily.

Connections and Software

While the KV-S1037X's connectivity options are sufficient for most small or home offices, this Panasonic model lacks the versatile mobile-device back up I'm used to seeing on virtually competing machines. It does not, for example, support either of the ii popular peer-to-peer network protocols, Wi-Fi Direct or About-Field Communication (NFC), for connecting direct from a mobile device to the scanner without an intermediary network or router. For connecting your mobile devices to the scanner, Panasonic provides an app chosen Prototype Capture Mobile.

What yous do get are USB three.1, Wi-Fi (supporting 802.11n), and Ethernet (supporting speeds up to gigabit). Blood brother's ADS-2700W, on the other hand, supports these connections and throws in Wi-Fi Directly, while Epson'due south DS-575W, while lacking Ethernet, supports NFC. In any example, not all scanning environments need or even want scanning to smartphones as an choice, then the KV-S1037X's lack of wide mobile support will not be a huge shortcoming for some would-be users.

A more crucial feature shortfall is the software parcel. Compared with what you lot get with several other entry-level certificate scanners, the KV-S1037X's software loadout has some holes. The packet lacks both document-management and business-card-archiving programs. Aside from the drivers (including TWAIN and ISIS), you get Image Capture Plus with OCR Engine, which is Panasonic's master scanning UI; User Utility, which resides in the system tray, monitoring the scanner and your PC'south connexion to information technology; and the Scan Button Setting Tool, a utility for assigning an awarding to the completion of a browse batch. For example, one time a batch is scanned and converted to the desired format, you might want information technology sent to, say, Adobe Acrobat for additional formatting and finishing. You can designate that via the Scan Button Setting Tool.

With Image Capture Plus, you can also create profiles, which incorporate data controlling all aspects of a scan task: browse resolution, destination file format, and browse destination. Prototype Capture Plus comes with a few ready-made profiles for basic tasks. You tin can edit these as needed or create your own. The "OCR" in the software'south name stands for, of class, optical character recognition, the process of converting scanned images of text to searchable, editable text for use in certificate archiving and similar applications.

While Epitome Capture Plus is not a certificate-management program, information technology tin perform some of the nuts, such equally saving to multiple file formats (with specialized file-naming conventions) to multiple specified destinations. Y'all tin even add barcoding for document indexing, sorting, and retrieval. The program can't index and annal documents past text content, unfortunately, but it can be benign for smaller, less circuitous applications.

Smooth, Steady Performance

Panasonic rates the KV-S1037X at thirty pages per infinitesimal (ppm) for scanning one-sided (simplex) pages and threescore images per infinitesimal (ipm) for two-sided (duplex) scans. Each page side constitutes an prototype. I ran my tests from inside Image Capture Plus over USB on our standard Intel Core i5 testbed PC running Windows ten Professional person.

Typically, to obtain their ppm and ipm ratings, most scanner manufacturers time scan jobs from when the Showtime button is clicked until the final page in the batch hits the output tray. They ignore the time required to save the batch to a usable file format, such as paradigm or searchable PDF; I call that portion of the overall scanning catamenia the "lag fourth dimension."

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Discounting the lag time, the KV-S1037X scanned my 1-sided 25-page test certificate at the charge per unit of 69.3ppm and my two-sided 25-page (50-page-side) test document at 133.5ipm, well exceeding Panasonic'due south ratings. When saving the same ii documents to image PDFs, the KV-S1037X churned at 33.3ppm and 68.2ipm. Not but are these speeds close enough to Panasonic'southward ratings to call them a friction match, but they're also quite close to those of the competing Brother and Epson scanners that I've mentioned in comparison throughout this review.

That's impressive, seeing every bit all three of those other machines have slightly higher scan-time ratings of 35ppm and 70ipm. To be exact, the Brother ADS-2700W came in 0.4ppm and 5ipm faster than the KV-S1037X; the Epson DS-575W was 2.4ppm and 0.8ipm faster; and the Epson ES-500W managed 2ppm faster and tied the KV-S1037X in duplex fashion.

In my next test, the KV-S1037X scanned and saved a 2-sided 25-page (fifty-side) document to the more useful searchable PDF file format in ane minute and 3 seconds. That'southward slightly behind the other machines discussed here, merely not by much. The ADS-2700W beat information technology by 13 seconds, the DS-575W by xv seconds, and the ES-500W past 19 seconds.

OCR Accuracy: No Editing Required

The ideal certificate scans are those that yous tin can pop into your document-management or other destination plan immediately, without having to open the file to correct conversion errors. Unless you're scanning documents with unusually tiny fonts, you should have no problem doing that with the KV-S1037X'south scans.

When scanning my Arial-font test page, for example, the KV-S1037X scanned without errors downward to half dozen-signal type. Also, it was dead-accurate with my Times New Roman text sample down to 8 points. These aren't the best scores I've seen; the Brother ADS-2700W, testing down to 5 points without errors with my Arial page and down to 4 points for Times New Roman, has that distinction among scanners of this class. But the Epson DS-575W and ES-500W were a bit backside, both scanning down to but eight points without mistakes on the Arial folio and x points for Times New Roman. In any instance, few documents are equanimous in type smaller than 8 points, meaning that the KV-S1037X'due south accurateness should match upwardly well for most business concern applications.

In Sum: Solid Certificate Capture

If you shop around, you'll see no shortage of snappy, accurate, and reliable document scanners these days, even entry-level ones. The Panasonic KV-S1037X is certainly among that class. When it comes to winning an Editors' Choice nod, though, information technology and its contemporaries have to face that brutally efficient Brother ADS-2700W.

Not only is the Brother model's feature set exceptional, but its speed and accuracy are above boilerplate, too. Furthermore, it lists for $100 to $400 less than several competing entry-level and midrange models. In the Panasonic's example, the higher toll gains you the power to browse unlimited-length pages (compared to the Brother model's 196-inch limitation), a mixed batch guide for scanning plastic cards and standard-size documents in the same batch, and a 3-year warranty, versus the ADS-2700W's unmarried yr of coverage.

That said, and so long as you lot don't need out-of-the-box certificate-management software, the ability to archive business organization cards, or much support for mobile devices, the KV-S1037X should serve your workgroup, small role, or domicile office well.