Document scanners have traditionally connected to computers via USB, but over the past few years a growing number have begun to use Ethernet or Wi-Fi as well. The Kodak i1190WN Scanner ($995) from Kodak Alaris incorporates all these methods, as well as direct, peer-to-peer wireless connectivity. It is essentially the Kodak i1190 Scanner with added Ethernet and Wi-Fi, and at a higher price. If you need its high-end capabilities and you already have a document management system in place to deal with the images you produce, it's a fine scanner. Just be sure to have your IT department standing by to help with its tricky networking setup.
Design and Features
At 9.7 by 13 by 6.3 inches (HWD), the i1190WN should be easy enough to fit on a desk. It weighs 7 pounds. Its automatic document feeder (ADF) holds up to 75 sheets and supports duplex (two-sided) scanning. It can scan both business cards and thick plastic cards in addition to paper documents.
In form and features, the i1190WN is basically the same as the USB-only Kodak i1190. They both are very similar to the Editors' Choice Kodak i2420 Scanner ($999.99 at Amazon) , except that the i1190 models use CMOS-based contact image sensors (CIS) to scan, rather than the CCD sensors found in the i2420 and most sheet-fed scanners. CIS scanning elements cost manufacturers less than CCD sensors, helping to keep down the price of CIS scanners. Another benefit is considerably reduced power consumption and, as a result, low cost of ownership. CCD scanners are generally better than CIS models for high-quality scanning of photos and art, but CIS is more than adequate for document scanners like the i1190WN.
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To the right of the i1190WN's feed slot is a four-line color LCD with four controls: a Power button, and up, down, and right arrows. The up and down arrows are used to navigate through a series of nine preset, customizable scan profiles, and the right arrow to launch a scan. Many document scanners offer a similar scheme, though few also display the names of the profiles the way the i1190WN does. By default, the profiles offered when using Kodak's Smart Touch—one of two included scan utilities, along with Kodak Capture Pro—are Color PDF, Black and White PDF, Black and White RTF, Color JPG, Black and White Single-page TIFF, Black and White multi-page TIFF, Email Black and White PDF, Custom Color PDF, and Custom Color File(s).
You can configure and even rename the profiles from within Smart Touch, which you can launch by right-clicking an icon in your Windows taskbar. The right arrow button is a one-touch control to launch a scan when you have chosen a profile. The i1190's display is larger than the one on the i2420, which identifies the profiles only by number. I launched scans from both the one-touch button and Smart Touch; the advantage of doing so from the utility is that you can see all nine scan profiles and names at once.
Software
Aside from the drivers (TWAIN, ISIS, WIA) and the aforementioned utilities, no other software comes with the i1190WN. For example, you won't find Nuance PaperPort 14 and OmniPage 18, two highly rated programs for document management and optical character recognition (OCR), respectively, which are included with the Kodak i2420. This is not a huge problem, though, as many companies seeking a scanner of this caliber will already have a document management system in place. Unlike the Kodak i1190, which offers a surprisingly wide selection of Mac software, the i1190WN is not Mac compatible.
Setup
Unless you're just using the i1190WN over a USB connection (which sort of defeats the purpose of getting this model), setup can be tricky, and you may have to follow Kodak Alaris's suggestion of working with your IT department to get it operating over a network. First, you install the included software. You are given a choice between Normal and Custom installation; I tried Normal at first, and found to my surprise that the scan utilities didn't install. I had to install Smart Touch separately from the Custom menu, but it took me a while to realize this; I thought the icon for it might have been hidden. If you scan to a document management program or use a Web-based image capture solution (like Kodak Info Input), you may not need Smart Touch, but it will be useful to enough users that it should be installed automatically.
I made my first successful wireless connection when launching a scan from my iPhone using the Kodak Alaris ScanMate+ app over a peer-to-peer connection. ScanMate+, which scans to PDF, offers a small range of configurable settings, including resolution, color (including grayscale and black and white), and one- or two-sided scanning, but lacks the versatility of, say, Smart Touch.
To set up other scanning methods, whether Ethernet, USB, Wi-Fi, or wireless peer-to-peer, you must run a utility, Setup and Connect Scanner, that appears in your app list in Windows 8 or 10, or as a program in Windows 7. Using this utility may require advanced networking knowledge (since the scanner doesn't appear on the network automatically), and on more than one occasion settings I entered didn't take. I tried setting up the scanner for wireless scanning on several occasions without success, and finally got it running with the help of members of the Kodak Alaris team, which also pointed me to some helpful setup videos on the scanner's support page. If your i1190WN is intended for multiple users over a LAN, you will want to get your IT department to install it.
Performance
In scanning our standard 25-sheet test document to image PDF format using Smart Touch, the i1190WN effectively matched its 40ppm rated speed for simplex (one-sided) scans and 80 images per minute (ipm) for duplex scans. (I timed it at 38ppm and 76ppm, respectively.) These results are for its raw scanning speed, measured from the time the first page starts scanning until the last page hits the output tray, which is typically how the manufacturers measure scanning speed). I timed the Kodak i1190, which has the same rated speeds, at 34.9ppm and 67ipm for simplex and duplex scanning, respectively, in our official tests, which add in the time between when you launch the scan and when the paper starts moving, and the time spent saving the document after the scanning is done. The Canon imageFormula DR-C240 ($596.00 at Amazon) , rated at 45ppm and 90ipm, turned in official speeds of 40ppm and 79ipm.
In testing the i1190WN, I used a Windows 8.1 laptop with an Intel Core i5 processor that I have used in testing Wi-Fi functionality on other scanners. Times may vary considerably depending on the connection type—I used a direct peer-to-peer wireless connection, although it also supports 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi and Ethernet as well as USB 2.0 and 3.0. Scanning speeds using this laptop are not directly comparable with those of the i1190WN, which I tested over a USB 2.0 connection using our standard testbed, but the i1190WN's speed over a USB connection should be very similar to that of the Kodak i1190, as they are essentially the same scanner.
In scanning and saving the same 25-page, 50-image document to searchable PDF (sPDF) format, the i1190 averaged 1 minute, 34 seconds. That is a good time for a document scanner, although well off the pace of the Canon DR-C240, which scanned and saved the same document to sPDF in just 47 seconds. If speed in scanning to searchable PDF, which for many businesses is the preferred format for document archiving, is paramount, the Canon DR-C240 and the Epson WorkForce DS-760 ($1,244.69 at Amazon) —which we timed at 1:15—are both better choices than the i1190WN and the other Kodak models mentioned in this review.
Using Smart Touch's built-in OCR function, the i1190WN did well in scanning to RTF format. It recognized our Times New Roman and Arial test pages at sizes down to 8 points without error, and had mixed results with our less-standard fonts.
Conclusion
The Kodak i1190WN Scanner, essentially the networked version of the Kodak i1190, adds Ethernet, Wi-Fi, and direct wireless connectivity to the mix. It lacks most of the bundled software that comes with the Editors' Choice Kodak i2420, and comes in at a higher price. The i1190WN is best for a business that already has document management software, or uses a cloud-based image capture solution, that needs a networked scanner. In this context, it's a more than capable machine.
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