The WorkForce Pro WF-4630 ($299.99) is not the primary multifunction printer (MFP) we have got examined it really is constructed round Epson’s new, exceptionally touted PrecisionCore era. It is the primary we have got visible, though, that in reality grants at the promise of PrecisionCore, with impressively rapid speed. Add withinside the low going for walks price and the lengthy listing of multifunction printer functions, and the WF-4630 ($245.03 at Newegg)(Opens in a brand new window) is a pinnacle desire for a workhorse MFP in a micro or small office.
The constructing block of PrecisionCore era is a print chip that may be blended with different print chips in a unmarried printhead. Each chip provides greater ink nozzles, which shall we the printer placed greater ink on paper immediately to print pages faster. Printers with handiest chips, just like the Epson WorkForce WF-3640 ($480.sixty six at Amazon)(Opens in a brand new window) , do not do plenty to differentiate themselves from conventional inkjets. On the opposite hand, printers with 4 chips, just like the WF-4630, stand proud of the % with extensively rapid speed.
The Basics
Aside from variations in speed, the WF-4630 gives maximum of the equal functions because the Epson WF-3640. It can print and fax from, in addition to experiment to, a computer, together with over a community, it could paintings as a standalone copier and fax machine, and it could print from and experiment to a USB reminiscence key. It additionally gives a 3.five-inch shadeation contact screen, with a well-designed set of menus.
You can use Ethernet or Wi-Fi to attach the printer to a community, letting you print from iOS, Android, Windows Phone, and Kindle Fire gadgets via a Wi-Fi get entry to point. It additionally helps you to print via the cloud and experiment at once to any of numerous cloud services (Box, Dropbox, Evernote, and Google Drive), assuming the community is attached to the Internet. If you join with the aid of using USB cable to a unmarried PC instead, you cannot use the cloud-primarily based totally functions, however you may nevertheless print from a cell tool with the aid of using the usage of Wi-Fi Direct to attach at once to the printer.
Paper Handling
The WF-4630’s paper dealing with is nice defined as simply brief of outstanding, with a 250-sheet the front drawer and an 80-sheet rear tray, for a 330-sheet general capacity. That makes it smooth to hold styles of paper loaded and transfer among them effortlessly, however it is now no longer pretty as appropriate for heavy-obligation wishes as 250-sheet trays might be. Very plenty at the plus side, there may be additionally a integrated duplexer (for 2 sided printing).
For scanning, the printer gives a letter-length flatbed and a 35-sheet automated record feeder (ADF) that handles as much as criminal length paper and additionally duplexes, turning the web page over to experiment the second one side. Duplex scanning blended with duplex printing helps you to replica each unmarried and double-sided files on your desire of unmarried or double-sided copies.
Setup, Speed, and Output Quality
At 13.five with the aid of using 18.1 with the aid of using 16.6 inches (HWD), in spite of the output tray closed, the WF-4630 is a bit larger than you would possibly need sitting in your desk, and at 31 kilos five ounces, it is heavy sufficient which you may need a few assist transferring it into place. However, setup is general fare. For my assessments, I related it to a stressed community and mounted the drivers and software program on a Windows Vista system.
On our commercial enterprise packages suite (the usage of QualityLogic’s(Opens in a brand new window) hardware and software program for timing), the WF-4630 got here in at an impressively rapid 10.2 pages in step with minute (ppm). That makes it almost two times as rapid because the further priced HP Officejet Pro 8620 e-All-in-One ( at Amazon)(Opens in a brand new window) . It’s additionally almost two times as rapid because the Epson WF-3640, at five.4ppm, which makes sense, considering the fact that its printhead consists of two times as many print chips.
Output high-satisfactory for the WF-4630 is a piece of a blended bag. Text high-satisfactory normal is the nice I’ve ever visible from an inkjet in its default mode, with crisp, readable characters even at small font sizes. Unfortunately, the tops of the characters in a few textual content strains have been offset barely from the bottom, maximum possibly due to sweeps of the printhead now no longer being exactly aligned. The problem cropped up so hardly ever in my assessments that it should not be a trouble for common commercial enterprise use, however in case you want really pinnacle-tier textual content, even an occasional glitch can break the effect.
Graphics high-satisfactory is effortlessly suitable sufficient for any inner commercial enterprise want, however with a few apparent banding in huge regions of darkish colors, together with black, darkish green, and darkish red. Using the matte presentation paper that Epson recommends for maximum picturegraph printing, the output turned into on the excessive cease of the high-satisfactory you will assume from drugstore prints. If you assume pictures to have a smooth finish, however, you could now no longer just like the appearance of the matte paper, wherein case you may use one in every of Epson’s smooth papers.
Another plus for the WF-4630 is its low going for walks price. Based on Epson’s claimed yields and ink costs, the price in step with web page works out to simply 1.6 cents for monochrome and 8.2 cents for shadeation. In comparison, the price in step with web page for the Epson 3640 is 3.2 cents for monochrome and 11.four cents for shadeation.
The Epson WorkForce Pro WF-4630 gives a lot, no matter the choppy output high-satisfactory. If you want continually suitable textual content, or a better paper capacity, you will be higher off with the Epson WF-3640, our Editors’ Choice for heavy-obligation MFP for a micro office. However in case you assume to print sufficient pages for the WF-4630’s low price in step with web page to feature as much as a widespread savings, and also you do not thoughts an occasional line of textual content with the pinnacle barely offset from the bottom, the WF-4630 may be an outstanding suit as a workhorse printer in a micro or small office.
