Sony Cyber-shot WX30

Sony’s Cyber-shot DSC-WX30 stands out from the crowd not just through its tiny size, the smallest in our 2011 travel-zoom roundup, but also the comparatively small 5X zoom range.

However, as the zoom is made by German lens-legends Carl Zeiss and sports a large, f/2.6 aperture at the wide end, you can almost overlook the short 125mm (35mm equivalent) tele. Unfortunately, the lens slows down to a decidedly mediocre f/6.3 when zoomed in.

This sleek camera comes with a gorgeous 921k-dots touch-screen and only three buttons for on and off, shutter trigger, and playback, as well as the usual zoom rocker.

Everything else is operated via the touch screen on the DSC-WX30 which unfortunately isn’t the easiest to manage with large hands, due to the small size.

The touch screen is also fingerprint magnet. Get used to wiping it clean regularly, otherwise you can’t see much on the screen outdoors.

Sony is making good use of exposure bracketing and HDR technology in the DSC-WX30. The camera has two full auto modes – Intelligent and Superior – which is confusing until you learn that the latter takes multiple exposures to compensate for noise and tricky lighting, as well as selecting the appropriate scene such as landscape or portrait.

And, it almost works. The drawback is that the additional image processing slows down the camera, and the results still aren’t as good as the Nikon Coolpix S8200 that costs $80 less.

Video at 1080i however was very good, one of the best in the 2011 round-up.

Small and perfectly formed, the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-WX30 is a fun camera with a bag of tricks up its sleeve; image quality leaves something to be desired.