A neat little feature, although why anyone would actively use it is beyond me. Text searches on Amazon Mobile–and Amazon’s iPhone-optimized site–are both easier and far, far faster. Why bother with the cumbersome “snap photo-submit photo-wait for Amazon to identify product in photo and its availability and price”?

What this application is clearly lacking and, frankly, just begging for, is a barcode scanner and real-time price comparison function. That would make it a killer app, indeed. And Snappr has proven barcode scanning on the iPhone is possible. The device just needs an improved camera for it to work….

This week, I was curious to test the performance of three all-in-ones that cost around $100. I tried Eastman Kodak‘s new $130 ESP 3 All-in-One Printer, Canon‘s $100 PIXMA MP470 and Hewlett-Packard‘s $100 HP Photosmart C4280. These particular machines are geared toward home users so they don’t include the ability to fax, and they print great quality photos. Each machine measures roughly the same size and has a lid that lifts to reveal a glass surface where documents are placed for scanning and copying.

These all-in-ones don’t include some of the heavy-duty features found in bigger, more expensive machines for businesses such as automatic feeders that suck in stacks of documents. And they aren’t nearly as fast as a company Xerox machine. But their compact size and convenient features — like memory-card slots, editing software and PC/Mac compatibility — make them useful in a home.

A year ago, Kodak took an aggressive tack when introducing its first consumer printer. Kodak charged more for the printer and less for ink compared with rivals, reasoning that people would rather pay more once for a machine than paying more for ink throughout the life of the printer.

But these companies make it very difficult for consumers to figure which ink cartridge will give them the most for their money because each uses different methods for testing page yields. The Kodak ESP 3 uses a $10 cartridge of black ink and a $15 color cartridge. The HP’s black and color cartridges cost $15 and $18, respectively, while Canon’s cost $16 and $20. (None of these all-in-ones use color cartridges that let you replace individual colors if you run out of one color.) When measuring pages printed from a black cartridge, Kodak (EK), HP (HPQ) and Canon (CAJ) claim 342, 200 and 219 pages, respectively.

Photos printed using the Kodak and HP printers looked most appealing to my eye. Their colors were natural yet vibrant, whereas some of the colors in the Canon images looked a bit too bright. And other Canon shots, such as one of my sister and me at the beach on vacation, appeared slightly muddy and not as sharp as the Kodak or HP images. Regular black-and-white documents looked fine on all of the machines. While the Kodak and HP come with better software than the Canon, I preferred the buttons and physical design of the Canon.

I got started with the Kodak ESP 3, which ships with new software that includes a Facial Retouch editing feature I first tried at January’s Consumer Electronics Show. In one click, Facial Retouch smoothes wrinkles, erases blemishes, blends blotchy skin and whitens teeth. While this tool deserves points for efficiency, it bordered a tad too much on the dramatic face-lift side, causing some subjects’ skin to appear waxy and unrealistic.

Physically, the Kodak ESP 3 looks handsome in all black. Its lid is indented with a waffle-like pattern, and its paper trays fold up neatly for storage. But this all-in-one lacks a key feature found on the Canon and HP: a color viewing screen. The Kodak, HP and Canon have built-in memory-card slots that — if used with preview screens — make photo printing a computer-free cinch. But without a preview screen, the Kodak ESP 3 can’t work independent of a computer screen to print photos from a memory card.

The Kodak ESP 3 uses a fast new type of scanner that uses LEDs to illuminate a document rather than a lamp, which takes more time to warm up. As a result, in my tests, the Kodak scanned a bit faster than the Canon and noticeably faster than the HP.

All three all-in-ones allow users to lay about three 4×6 photos on the scanning glass, and as long as they aren’t touching, these images will register as separately scanned photos. I learned the hard way that overlapping prints will be scanned as one image; this was the case with each scanner. But separating photos into a position of two horizontal and one vertical allowed me to upload three shots at a time with the Kodak, HP and Canon.

The HP Photosmart C4280 had the most trouble with this multi-photo-scanning trick. Instead of performing one scan and then assessing three images on the glass, as the Kodak and Canon did, the HP seemed to look at each individual photo, taking at least 15 seconds per photo to capture each image.

This all-in-one comes encased in a glossy white plastic with a gray lid. Its eight buttons line the left-hand side, but most act as soft keys that correspond to words on a screen rather than acting as their own buttons, making navigation a bit clumsy. And though the HP has a 1.5-inch viewing screen, it doesn’t tilt up like the Canon’s, so I couldn’t use it without standing up and looking down.

Though the HP did well on photos, I found its color copies to be a little fuzzy when compared with those from the Canon and Kodak all-in-ones. I liked that these devices can make copies without using the computer, which could prove convenient in a pinch.

The Canon PIXMA MP470 felt more solid to me than the Kodak and HP printers. Its 1.8-inch flip-up viewing screen made it easy to sit back and use, and this screen is designed to cover up the machine’s buttons when it’s folded down — a plus if you want to port it around. Its front and sides are coated in glossy black, and its lid is colored gray.

But even with its tilting viewing screen and memory-card slots, the Canon lacks an xD memory-card slot, and I was using two digital cameras — a Fujifilm FinePix and an Olympus — that use xD memory cards. Canon suggests using an adapter to remedy this issue. Another odd physical trait of the Canon is its short power cord, which measures just half the length of the Kodak cord and about two feet shorter than the HP.

The Canon came with software that added six icons to my computer’s desktop during its installation, and though it includes facial fixers like digital face smoothing, face brightener, blemish remover and face sharpener, none of these features seemed to do as much as Kodak’s one-step Facial Retouch tool.

And while the Canon’s 4×6 photos churned out about 10 seconds faster than those on the Kodak and HP machines, they didn’t measure up in terms of quality.

If photos are important to you, I suggest the HP Photosmart C4280, which includes memory-card slots and a viewing screen for quick print-outs without the hassle of booting up a computer. If you don’t mind the Kodak ESP 3′s lack of viewing screen, the quality of its photos won’t disappoint, and its lower-priced ink might drive a hard bargain. The good news is no matter which one you buy, it’ll still be cheaper than paying $100 each for a scanner, copier and printer.

• Email mossbergsolution@wsj.com

The latest versions of the devices are getting smaller in size, compared with the old ones, and have more features. You can use them to scan photos, ID cards and checks, among other things — just so the item is no more than slightly bigger than card size.

I have been testing two products: the OptiCard 821 from Plustek Technology, of Cerritos, Calif., and the IRISCard Pro 4, from Belgium-based Image Recognition Integrated Systems, or I.R.I.S.

Plustek’s OptiCard 821

I found that both scanners have a quick and easy way to organize business-card information, but their software isn’t as easy to work with when manipulating the resulting digital images. Also, the machines work best at their originally intended task, and so are better at scanning business cards than at scanning photos, for example.

The software in both devices, overall, created clear images of the names and numbers from most of the typical cards; that is, those cards written with dark ink against a light background. The scanners did a poor job when they had to read cards that were printed on dark-colored stock.

Installing the software was easy enough, and took only a few minutes. After inserting the software CD into your computer, small pop-up windows open to guide you through the process. When the installation is finished, you connect the scanner to your computer’s USB port with the cord provided.

To begin scanning, you just feed the cards into a front slot on the devices and push the scan button. The scanners pull the cards across the scanning head and spit them out the back, saving the cards in the process.

The first time you use the scanners you will be asked to calibrate them to set the parameters for color, shadows and light. It’s an easy task: You just insert a special card that comes with the packages.

The scanners’ software can recognize and categorize cards written in several languages, including Spanish, French, German, Italian, Arabic and Chinese. Scanning a business card using either machine didn’t take more than five seconds; photo-scanning took much longer.

Both machines have two buttons on the top for scanning and for further customizing the scan. The scan buttom has a few standard configurations for capturing the image from the card and transforming it into a PDF file.

The custom button begins with the same process, but then allows you to manipulate the results. When I inserted a card into one of the scanners and pressed the custom button, a window pop-up opened for me to choose details such as language, color, dimensions, the specific file to which I wanted to send the image and the storage format.

You can edit the cards as you store them and make any fixes you might have from botched scans. The images are saved in the folder you chose when you configured your scanning options. You can opt to arrange them just alphabetically, too.

The scanners come with software that can help make the scanning and organizing process more efficient, but could also be a bit confusing for some users because of all the choices.

To test the new OptiCard, which costs $150, I processed 20 random business cards with white backgrounds. I found that scanning was swift; 13 white-background cards came out perfectly or with such minor glitches that they didn’t require any editing. An additional four needed some editing but fixing them didn’t take more than a few minutes. Three cards needed major retyping, replacing missing numbers and redoing a name that got scrambled into a phone number.

I also tried scanning two dark-background cards but to no avail. One didn’t come out at all and the other had black splotches.

I found the $200 IRISCard Pro 4 slightly more accurate in scanning textual information from the same 20 cards. Only two needed minor editing — replacing a hyphen with a comma, for example — and just one card required major retyping, replacing skipped information. The scanner, however, was no better at the dark cards.

I also scanned a couple photos in both devices, but the copies were too blurry to save.

Both scanners are smaller than many TV remote controls. The OptiCard is 1.5 inches high, 6.9 inches wide and 2.4 inches deep. The IRISCard Pro 4 is 1.3 by 6.2 inches and is two inches deep. I was able to take them to work in one of my jacket pockets. I could imagine bringing the device along for a days-long seminar to keep up with card-collecting. Both are compatible with Windows PCs and Macs.

While the interface between the scanners and the user’s contact data program could offer more features to make organizing easier, these tools are worth a try. At least you can get those cards off your desk before the pile topples.

• Email me at sarmad.ali@wsj.com. Walt Mossberg is on vacation.