A "user friendly" feature probably put there by marketing, not engineers. I expect that Full Auto and Home mode were put there for the same reason. They really are not easier, but rather crippled versions of Pro mode. EpsonScan in professional mode works great if you click the thumbnail option off. Thumbnails only recognizes 35mm and that, somewhat marginally. Just draw a marquee around the area you want to scan. There is a zoom feature that lets you set it with high accuracy.
SilverFast works fine, but has perhaps the second worst user interface of any application since the introduction of personal computing in the mid-1970s. (The worst was an early MIDI sequencing program, exacerbated by completely opaque documentation. I met the head of the programming team and he just shook his head. He did go on to develop some brilliant software.) I just don't have the patience to sort out the Byzantine nooks and crannies of SilverFast.
ViewScan has its followers, and does have a demo version if you want to give it a try. Its big advantage is that it supports a lot of obscure scanners have outlived their company support, or with no drivers for Macs, Linux and the like.
If you check scanning and printing forums, EpsonScan is the choice of most experienced users. As opposed to SilverFast, it has a simple and logical interface, with all the choices in logical order. The resulting scans are as good as the machine can deliver, the learning curve is shallow, and it is highly efficient to use.
I specially like the fact that when I have a series of exposures that are shot under the same circumstances, I can duplicate the marquee with a click and drag copies of it to each of the other frames. It carries all the settings data—a real time saver. I also appreciate that I can set the actual target size for a scan. No point in scanning to enormous resolution, then throwing away 90% of the information. If I want to make an 8×10 print at 240 dpi, I can scan to exactly that size.
