i've been scanning from my EPSON ETj-4750 for years; recently i open the create from scanner and my printer is identified but when I hit "SCAN", the details pop-up doesn't load (it is completely greyed out).

Hi, ​@RLNSccrFan, first thing to understand is that Acrobat, itself, cannot scan. Rather, on the Mac, it uses Mac’s “Image Capture” to do all the scanning. [It uses some software called TWAIN to integrate Image Capture software within Acrobat. On PCs, it’s a tad better in that it uses your scanner’s software. However, Jobs stopped using TWAIN for that to limit computer virus activities and only allows Image Capture and custom plugins from scanning (or scanning software) manufacturers.]

FWIW, I consider this a good thing because Image Capture is, IMHO, the worst scanning software I’ve encountered. 

What caused the change you’re experiencing, I’m not sure, but take advantage of this to get better quality scans.

Try this experiment: Go into your Applications folder and find Image Capture. Once you open that up, you’ll recognize the various tools and scan your document. [Hint: save it in TIFF format in some convenient location on your Mac. You’ll see why a bit later.]

Now, Open your Epson scanning software that came with your scanner. If it’s been a long time since you purchased your scanner, you should update your sofware from here (https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://epson.com/support/epson-software-updater&ved=2ahUKEwjUppzHnZOUAxXIKEQIHYhVMcQQFnoECB8QAQ&usg=AOvVaw39Qs4KnEYOkRfoF82jLMnY).

Use the Epson software on the same document. As it might be new to you, it still should not take too much time to work it out. Again, save the document as a TIFF.

If you drag the TIFF documents onto your Acrobat icon in the Dock, because these are TIFF format, Acrobat will automatically offer you the option to OCR them. Other formats (e.g., JPG) will not do that. Also, if you have a multi-page document, Acrobat will offer to compile them into one PDF.

Now, compare the two. You might consider to export at Word documents and in Word, you can look for red lines under the text meaning a misspelling. You’ll probably find them under both, but I wager you’ll find more with the Image Capture image.

For more information on scanning to get better text, please see this blog I wrote for Adobe some time ago.

https://community.adobe.com/t5/adobe-community-professionals/scanning-clean-searchable-pdfs/m-p/4785435?page=1#M89

Good luck!