The VuPoint Solutions Magic InstaScan Portable Smart Scanner PDS-ST420-VP, is VuPoint Solutions' variation on a portable manual-feed scanner that doesn't need a computer to scan.It happens to be.

• Pros Scans without a computer. Battery powered. Includes optical character recognition program and Evernote utility. • Cons Comes without required memory card.

Have to move files to a computer to confirm scan quality is acceptable. • Bottom Line The VuPoint Solutions Magic InstaScan Portable Smart Scanner PDS-ST420-VP offers easy, fast manual-feed scanning without a computer.

The VuPoint Solutions Magic InstaScan Portable Smart Scanner PDS-ST420-VP, is VuPoint Solutions' variation on a portable manual-feed scanner that doesn't need a computer to scan. It happens to be one of the better looking scanners in that category, but, far more important, it's also one of the more capable, which is what makes it one of the better choices if you need portable scanning without a computer. One other plus for the PDS-ST420-VP is that it runs on batteries, which means that unlike some competitors, including the, you don't need a power outlet or a USB connection to a computer for scanning.

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That makes it particularly useful if being able to scan without a power source is part of your definition of true portability. Basics and Setup The PDS-ST420-VP is easily small and light enough to fit in a laptop bag or briefcase, at 1.6 by 10.6 by 2.6 inches (HWD) and just over 1 pound 1 ounce complete with batteries. As is typical for the breed, there's almost nothing to set up. Just insert the four supplied AA batteries and plug in a microSD or microSDHC card. Note that VuPoint Solutions doesn't include a memory card, however, so if you don't have extras around, be sure to order one with the scanner.

The microSD card slot supports cards with up to 32GB memory. You don't have to install the software, but you can if you want to. VuPoint Solutions supplies three programs and a fully automated installation routine that will let you install any or all of them. The choices are Abbyy FineReader 9.0 Sprint for optical character recognition (OCR), as the only applications program, plus an Evernote connector for sharing files on Evernote, and a Direct Scan utility. The utility lets you scan documents directly to computer files over a USB connection as an alternative to saving them to a memory card and then copying them to your computer later. In my tests, it worked as promised, with no difference in speed compared with scanning to a memory card.

Scanning Scanning with the PDS-ST420-VP is also easy, and typical for the category. Straightforward commands on the scanner's front-panel menus let you choose between color and black and white modes; JPG or image PDF format; and 300 pixels per inch (ppi), which is the scanner's optical resolution according to VuPoint Solutions, and 600 or 900 ppi interpolated resolution. The default when you turn the scanner on is color, JPG, and 300 ppi. To scan, you turn the power on, make any changes you want in the settings, and insert a page into the scanner's front slot.

Wait a second or two, and the scanner will sense the page, grab it, and scan. Timing for manual-feed scanners isn't very meaningful, since you can spend more time manually feeding the pages than waiting for the actual scan. But it's worth noting that the PDS-ST420-VP is relatively fast. Using color mode and JPG format, I timed it at 8 to 10 seconds for the actual scan of a document page, with the same speed regardless of resolution. Scan Results With Abbyy FineReader as the only application program the scanner comes with, the only two applications I could test it for were optical character recognition (OCR) and document management. The scanner did acceptably well in both cases, but keep in mind that the lack of either an automatic document feeder or duplexing (two-sided scanning) limits its potential score for either task. The combination of the scanner and FineReader did a reasonably good job at text recognition.