compact

Fujifilm's solid 10x zoom compacts priced to move

There's a good chance you're unaware of Fujifilm's FinePix JZ500 and JZ300. When the company announced its 2010 cameras, there were so many launched at once that these two were quickly overshadowed by other more technologically interesting models. However, after testing these two out, there's a good chance that the company will sell a lot of these thanks to their very good price-to-feature ratio.

Both models feature a 28mm-equivalent wide-angle lens with a 10x zoom and a 2.7-inch LCD packed into a body that's easy to slip in a pants pocket or small bag. … Read more

First Take: Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS5

The Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS5 is a step down from the company's top-of-the-line compact megazoom, the ZS7. The 12x f3.3-4.9 25-300mm-equivalent lens and body size are the same, but the ZS5 sheds the ZS7's GPS receiver, stereo mic, and ability to record HD movies in AVCHD Lite format (it records in Motion JPEG at up to 720p, though). The ZS5 also has a lower-resolution, smaller 2.7-inch LCD.

However, all those cuts lead to a $100 worth of savings, so if you don't need or want those extra features, the ZS5 is worth checking out.

CNET … Read more

First Take: Nikon Coolpix S8000

The Nikon Coolpix S8000 is a 14-megapixel compact megazoom with a 10x Zoom-NIKKOR ED glass lens on front and a 3-inch 921K-dot LCD on back. It's also one of the slimmest 10x zoom cameras currently available. Nikon was late to adding HD video capture to its compact cameras, but that feature is available on the S8000 as is a stereo mic, which is still a bit of a rarity. An HDMI output is built in, too, for quickly connecting to an HDTV or monitor for viewing photos and movies.

Other features include Optical VR image stabilization, macro shooting as … Read more

Introducing the 2011 Lexus CT 200h hybrid

In Monday's video, we got to check out the 2010 Lexus HS250h, which is a fine representative of the current hybrid vehicles that this luxury brand has to offer. A few weeks back, Lexus presented a new car to add to its hybrid legacy at the 2010 New York Auto Show--the CT200h--and this video has got the scoop on the next generation of Lexus hybrids.

In this clip, Consumer Reports reviews the production-ready version of the CT200h that was initially unveiled at the 2010 Geneva Auto Show and will only be sold as a hybrid vehicle much like the … Read more

Is your point-and-shoot destined to fail?

SquareTrade, an independent warranty provider for electronics and appliances, has been regularly releasing reliability studies for product groups it covers (laptops, game consoles, and smartphones, so far) and Wednesday, it dropped one on digital cameras. Its analysis looked at customer-reported failure data from a sample of more than 60,000 new digital cameras purchased by SquareTrade warranty customers since 2006.

As you can see in the graph, Panasonic had the fewest reported failures while Casio had the most for cameras priced less than $300. The study (which you can check out in full here) also looked at premium point-and-shoots, those … Read more

Is a $110 camera worth buying?

One of the best $100 cameras you could buy in 2009 was Canon's PowerShot A480. It had minimal shooting options and features and shooting performance was slow, but its photo quality was great for the money. That model was split into two models for 2010: the A490 and the A495.

The PowerShot A490 is about $20 less expensive than the $129 A495, but it's available in silver only, sacrifices some shooting features, and has a less powerful Auto mode. Fortunately, though, they both have the same excellent photo quality; does that make them worth buying?

It really all … Read more

What Canon sells you for $150

Like most compact-camera manufacturers, Canon offers point-and-shoots at a range of prices; its PowerShots start at $109.99 and edge up every $20 to $30. The A3000 IS sits right at $149.99. It's a good, if basic, snapshot camera designed for people who really don't want much beyond taking a nice picture.

Optical image stabilization is probably the biggest feature highlight since it's a rarity in a new camera at its price point. It also has a couple of new creative shooting modes--Super Vivid and Poster Effect--but its shooting options are otherwise bland.

I'm not … Read more

Transcend's CompactFlash cards go high-speed

Transcend, which makes flash memory cards for budget-minded buyers, announced on Wednesday two new high-speed CompactFlash models with transfer speeds up to 90MBps.

The Transcend Ultimate 600X cards are at the top of the line, able to read and write data at 90MBps by using the UDMA (Ultra Direct Memory Access) mode 6 interface. This line tops out at 32GB.

The Transcend Premium 400X cards range from 16GB to 64GB capacity and can write data at 60MBps and read data at 90MBps, the company said. The 400X and 600X cards use "premium" flash memory chips and employ error … Read more

Capacity, video throughput highlight new CompactFlash specification

Not to be outdone by SDXC's 2-terabyte capacity limit, the CompactFlash Association's latest update to the CompactFlash Specification allows for up to 144 petabytes. Also in the not-to-be-outdone, department, however, CF gets its own marketing framework for classifying video-recording capabilities. I hope it will be a little more useful than the SD Card Association's Class system.

The CF 5.0 specification combines the old 28-bit addressing with 48-bit addressing, which not only increases the capacity limit, but also allows data to be moved in larger and fewer chunks to theoretically achieve better throughput. In addition, the spec … Read more