Most of what you need to know about the VuPoint Solutions Magic Wand Wi-Fi PDSWF-ST47-VP ($129.99) is in the name. It's a wand scanner, which means it's portable and scans without a computer, and it has Wi-Fi, so you can send scans to your phone or tablet to check image quality on the spot. It also works as promised, which—thanks largely to the Wi-Fi support—is enough to make it Editors' Choice for wand scanners.

The PDSWF-ST47-VP ( at Amazon) is basically an upgrade to the VuPoint Solutions Magic Wand Wi-Fi PDSWF-ST44-VP that it's replacing. They both offer Wi-Fi, they come with similar programs, and they turned in similar scores on our tests.

One difference between them is that the PDSWF-ST47-VP will also work with an optional dock ($79.99) as a manual feed scanner, much like the VuPoint Solutions Magic Wand with AutoFeed Dock PDSDK-ST470-VP ($134.99 at Amazon) . VuPoint Solutions didn't include the dock for my tests, however.

Two other differences are that the newer model comes with a rechargeable battery, and, instead of a monochrome LCD for showing settings only, it offers a 1.5-inch color LCD that shows both settings and thumbnail images of your scans. It also lets you zoom in to see small areas in more detail. With some scans, that may be all you need to confirm that you got a usable image, although it's far more useful to see a bigger image all at once on your phone or tablet instead.

Basics and Setup

Like all wand scanners, the PDSWF-ST47-VP's portability is one of its key strengths. It measures just 1.1 by 10.5 by 1.5 inches (HWD), and weighs just under 7 ounces, complete with its rechargeable batteries. Its maximum resolution is 1,050 pixels per inch (ppi) using it as a wand scanner or 1,200ppi with the optional dock. For most purposes the default 300ppi should be sufficient, although I saw slightly better results for optical character recognition at 600ppi.

Setup is easy. Plug in a microSD or microSDHC card with up to a 32GB capacity and connect the scanner to your computer or to its power adapter with the supplied USB cable to charge the battery. The only complication is that the scanner doesn't come with a memory card, and can't scan without one—not even over Wi-Fi to your mobile device—so be sure you have one on hand.

If you already have all the scan-related software you need on your PC, you can skip the programs that come with the scanner. Alternatively, you can run the installation program to install Abbyy FineReader 10.0 and the VuPoint Solutions ScanDirect scan utility. In addition, depending on where you buy the scanner, it may also come with instructions for downloading Nuance PaperPort 14 for document management.

FineReader is one of the better optical character recognition (OCR) programs available. ScanDirect lets you connect the scanner to your PC by USB cable to move files from the memory card to your hard drive and also send files to Evernote. In addition, you can use it with the scanner connected to scan and send files to the hard drive. This could be useful if you get the dock, but if you try to scan as a wand scanner with the USB cable connected, the cable gets in the way.

To take advantage of the Wi-Fi capability with your phone or tablet, you can connect directly to the scanner from your mobile device by Wi-Fi, and use the browser that's already on it to view files. Alternatively, you can download the free VuPoint Solutions app for Android or iOS devices. I tested with both a browser and the Android app and found the app the better choice. Among other advantages, it lets you scan directly to your mobile device in one step, instead of scanning and then transferring the file so you can look at it.

Scanning and Results

Basic scanning with the PDSWF-ST47-VP is easy. Buttons around the LCD let you cycle between 300, 600, and 1,050ppi, choose JPG or image PDF format, navigate through the menus for additional settings, and turn Wi-Fi on and off. To scan to memory, you choose your settings, place the scanner at the top or side of a page, press the scan button, and sweep down or across. Rollers on the scanner make it easy to sweep smoothly and evenly.

Scanning to a mobile device with the free app is similar, except that you first establish the Wi-Fi connection and then choose the ScanDirect option in the app. The scanner will then send the image to your mobile device as you scan.

The software that comes with the scanner is appropriate for only two applications in our standard test suite: OCR and document management. In both cases, the PDSWF-ST47-VP scored about as well as a wand scanner can.

On our OCR tests, the combination of the scanner and FineReader read our Times New Roman test page without a mistake at sizes as small at 10 points at 300ppi and 6 points at 600ppi. On our Arial test page, it read the text without a mistake at 8 points at 300ppi and 5 points at 600ppi. Also very much on the plus side is that even though the scanner itself creates a separate file for each page, FineReader easily combines the multiple pages into a single Word file or searchable PDF file. It can even combine pages when the original scans are at different resolutions and a mix of PDF and JPG formats.

Although the PDSWF-ST47-VP doesn't come with any photo-related software, I scanned some 4-by-6 prints just to get a sense of the photo-scanning capability. As with every other wand scanner I've seen, the quality is good enough to let you scan a magazine article and wind up with recognizable images of photos, but it's not suitable for much more than that.

If you want a portable PC-free scanner with Wi-Fi, but don't want a wand scanner, be sure to take a look at the Visioneer Mobility ($75.89 at Amazon) , our Editors' Choice pick for a PC-free manual-feed scanner. If you want a wand scanner, however, the Wi-Fi support in the VuPoint Solutions Magic Wand Wi-Fi PDSWF-ST47-VP gives it the advantage over other models, letting you see your scans on your mobile device immediately, so you can easily rescan if you need to. The optional dock that lets you use it as a manual-feed scanner is a nice sweetener as well. But the Wi-Fi by itself is enough to make it our Editors' Choice for wand scanners.

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• Get Organized: Choose the Right Scanner for Going Paperless