Product ReviewsDigital cameras
This digital compact boasting a Cmos sensor comes not from one of the industry giants, but Ricoh, the niche player that has brought us some of the most strikingly original designs, including the upmarket GR-D and GX cameras, as well as the more consumer-orientated R7 and R8 compact models. Although not billed as the replacement to the 10-megapixel R8, the CX1 packs a 9-megapixel stabilised Cmos sensor and shares a similarly retro-styled front plate and the same versatile 10x zoom, the equivalent to a 28-280mm in 35mm terms, as the R8. Several modifications to the layout at the back are an improvement over the earlier offering. For a start, the small, multifunction joystick now falls naturally under your right thumb and has been placed closer to the shooting dial on the top plate, making it easier and quicker to move between the two. A column of chrome buttons nestles neatly alongside a new 3in TFT boasting 920,000 dots. The screen is incredibly rich in colour and detail but, like most compacts, the resolution is lowered for composition. Still, we've no concerns with legibility in bright daylight. Under the hood is where most of changes have been made, and the inclusion of a Cmos sensor has brought with it a number of user benefits. Faster image processing brings burst of up to a genuinely useful four frames
A new multi-pattern white balance mode enables the CX1 to divide the scene into a matrix of 32 x 27 sections and make corrections in each. From our tests, colour accuracy in mixed lighting was impressive, especially with skin tones, but it didn't completely eradicate colour casts from incandescent light sources. Also new is a Dynamic Range Double Shot mode. As the name suggests, the CX1 will take two exposures, one for the shadows and the other for the highlights, in an attempt to reduce the contrast in a scene. Four steps from mild to strong will increase the effect, and, by and large, it works well. Operation is slowed down somewhat, though, due to the additional processing required, and you can't select an ISO setting or use other shooting modes at the same time. In this respect, it's less flexible than, say, Canon's iContrast option, but it can give a superior result. A fancy-sounding Pixel Output Interpolation algorithm is said to increase the dynamic range in other modes and reduce blown highlights, but the effect wasn't noticeably obvious from our tests. Neither was there any noticeable gains in noise suppression from using a Cmos as opposed to a CCD. While not particularly gritty, images shot above ISO400 show the tell-tale colour blotches and typically lack the detail of physically larger sensors. At ISO400 and below, image quality is very high, though, and the combination of the lens, sensor and processing produces a very delicate and attractive drawing style. Our only real gripe is the lack of HD video clips - it has a pretty average VGA option. Despite that, our overall impression of the CX1 is very positive. Not only does it have the style and build to compete with the big names, but Ricoh has proved it can deliver on features and picture quality, too. By Kevin Carter
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