The Xerox DocuMate 152i ($299) is a desktop document scanner that is affordable for what it offers. It doesn't have the features, or the speed (especially in scanning to searchable PDF) that we've seen in some other models, but it had strong optical-character-recognition (OCR) performance in our testing. It's a worthy choice as a document scanner for a student, a home office, or an individual on a budget.
Design and Features
The DocuMate 152i is compact, measuring 12.9 by 12 by 17.6 inches (HWD) when open, but with a 5.5-by-5.5-12-inch footprint when closed. It weighs 6.3 pounds. The automatic document feeder (ADF) can hold up to 50 sheets of paper, and it can scan up to legal-size documents.
The front-panel controls include those labeled Simplex and Duplex, an On/Off button, plus a button that lets you cycle through the 152i's scanning profiles, which are numbered 1 to 9. The current profile number is displayed on the scanner's single-character LCD.
Settings and Software
There are nine preset, customizable OneTouch profiles for the DocuMate 152i. Default scan profiles are Scan, Search, Print, Email, Fax, Edit, Archive, Photo, and Magazine, with appropriate file types and destinations for each. The Visioneer OneTouch utility, accessible by clicking on an icon on your taskbar on your PC, displays the nine preset scan destinations. You can customize a profile by opening it in OneTouch; complete instructions are in the OneTouch user manual that's supplied on disc.
Similar Products
Bundled software includes the aforementioned Visioneer OneTouch scan utility, Nuance PaperPort for document management, Nuance OmniPage Pro for optical-character-recognition (OCR), Nuance PDF Converter Pro, Visioneer Acuity for image enhancement, and the aforementioned drivers for scanning from within applications. In addition to initiating scans from the scanner or your computer using OneTouch, you can also scan from the included programs, as well as almost any program that has a scan command by virtue of the included TWAIN, ISIS, and WIA drivers.
Speed
The DocuMate 152i has a rated speed of 25 pages per minute (ppm) for simplex scanning and 50 ipm (images per minute, where each side of a page counts as one image) for duplex scanning. A scanner's rated speed is based on the time actually spent scanning the pages (what I call the raw speed), while our official timings measure from when we give the scan command until scanned document's file is saved. The 152i's raw speeds for both simplex and duplex in testing were nearly a match for its rated speed, while our official timings were 22.7ppm for simplex and 44.2ipm for duplex.
As is generally the case, the DocuMate 152i is slower in scanning to searchable PDFwhich adds a text-recognition stepthan to image PDF. It took 2 minutes 22 seconds to scan our 25-sheet, 50-image test file to searchable PDF. That's more than twice as long as it took to scan to image PDF, but is still a pretty typical time for a scanner of its rated speed. Still, we have seen a few low-price scanners that were much faster in testing. The Fujitsu iX500 ($649.99 at Amazon) took a mere 1:05, and the Canon imageFormula DR-C225 ($494.99 at Amazon) , our Editors' Choice budget desktop document scanner was nearly as fast at 1:09. The Epson WorkForce DS-510 ($628.65 at Amazon) finished in 1:22.
OCR Testing
In OCR testing using the Edit setting in OneTouch, the DocuMate 152i did well, reading both our Times New Roman and Arial test pages at sizes down to 8 points without error. It did reasonably well in scanning to some of our less common test fonts. As the Documate 152i lacks a business-card program, we were unable to test its ability to read business cards.
Conclusion
The 152i is the successor to the Xerox DocuMate 152, a top pick when it was introduced nearly a decade ago. The DocuMate 152i is faster and more moderately priced than the Xerox 152, has a larger ADF, and adds Nuance PowerPDF, although unlike its predecessor, the 152i lacks a business-card-reading program. But while the Xerox 152 was impressive in its day, and the 152i adds more capabilities, the state of the art of document scanners has continued to advance even as their price has dropped.
Both the Fujitsu ScanSnap iX500, and the Canon imageFormula DR-C225 are much faster than the DocuMate 152i in scanning to searchable PDF. Both include business-card programs. The Fujitsu iX500 can scan wirelessly, while the Canon DR-C225 does even better at OCR than the Xerox 152i. That said, the DocuMate 152i's compact form factor makes it easy to stash when not in use. It met its rated speeds for simplex and duplex scanning to image PDF in our testing, and fell in the middle of the pack in scanning to searchable PDF. Overall, the DocuMate 152i offers good value for a low price.
The Xerox DocuMate 152i is a budget desktop document scanner with solid speed and good optical-character-recognition (OCR) performance.
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