HP Photosmart R817 Review
Product overview
- Launch price:
- £250
- Launch date:
- 1st May 2006
- PhotoRadar rating:
- User rating:
- In brief:
-
- Crammed with clever features, the Photosmart R817 ends up looking slightly stupid due to the unpredictable quality of its output
Technical Specification
- Accessories: R07 lithium-ion rechargeable battery, AC adapter, Camera dock, Wrist strap, USB cable
- Battery life (approx images): 250
- Battery Type: Lithium-Ion Rechargable
- Camera Type: Compact
- Case Included: No
- Colour: Silver
- Connectivity: USB;USB 2.0
- Dimensions: 91 x 29.8 x 57
- Display Size: 2
- Effective Pixels: 5.25
- Exposure bracketing: 3
- Exposure Modes: Aperture-priority;Automatic;Beach;Landscape;Manual;Panorama;Portrait;Shutter-priority;Snow;Sunset
- Flash: Yes
- Flash Features: Auto;On/Off;Red Eye Red.
- Flash Modes: Auto;Off;On;Red-Eye Reduction
- Focusing Modes: Manual
- Image Formats: JPEG
- Image Sensor Resolution: 154
- Image Sensor Type: 1/2.5inch CCD
- ISO Settings: 100;200;400;50;ISO Auto
- LCD Display?: Yes
- Manufacturer's Description: Get closer than comparably priced 3x cameras, with 5x optical zoom (40x total, 8x digital) - up to 70 percent more zoom than 3x lenses. Take exceptional photos at 5 MP resolution that make beautiful prints and enlargements. This stylishly small camera is made with durable stainless steel and fits easily in your pocket. View photos and menus easily on a bright, 2-inch image display. Exclusive HP Real Life technologies provide the easiest path to brilliant photos. Remove red-eye in the camera, get photo-taking tips, and automatically bring out details normally lost in shadows. Stitch and preview panorama shots right on the camera, and save high-quality VGA video stills to print. Easily take better photos in a variety of settings using 15 optimized shooting modes, including action, sunset and more. Express your creativity using the ultimate in robust manual controls. Get sharp focus for the best shot automatically with multi-zone focus.
- Max Aperture: 2.8
- Memory Card Included: No
- Memory Types: Internal;MultiMedia Card;SD
- Metering Modes: Average;Centre weighted;Spot
- Min Aperture: 8
- Movie Mode: Yes
- Optical Zoom: 5
- Software Provided: CD-ROM featuring HP Image Zone and American Greetings Create and Print Greeting Cards software
- Warranty Length: 1 Year
- Weight (kg): 0.19
- White Balance: Auto;Daylight;Fluorescent;Manual;Shade;Tungsten
- MPN: L2031A
- Price (GBP): 250
PhotoRadar review
Less like a camera and more like a computer
HP seldom builds flimsy kit and the Photosmart R817 lives up to expectations, with a sturdy metal case and a complete lack of protruding knobs and buttons that would risk getting knocked off.
The overall design is a good compromise of having enough buttons to carry out most adjustments without resorting to the menu system, without overdoing things, while the menu system itself is pleasantly intuitive.
Building on its rich computing heritage, HP has designed this model to be less like a camera and more like a computer with a lens on the front. As such, the R817 is rich with in-camera processing facilities, including 'adaptive lighting' to boost detail in lowlights and automatic red-eye removal which builds on the red-eye flash mode.
The camera itself is quite basic, offering 5Mp point-and-shoot simplicity but with a generous 5x optical zoom lens, equivalent to 36-180mm.
A healthy 32Mb of built-in memory is useful for 169 shots at basic VGA (640x480) resolution mode, although this reduces to just nine shots at the best quality 5Mp setting. Power is supplied from a Li-ion rechargeable cell and the camera comes complete with docking station for easy charging and photo transfer to your PC.
Performance
Our test shots were a moveable feast, especially in terms of sharpness, which seemed to vary on an almost shot-by-shot basis. Thin diagonal lines, like telegraph wires, took on a decidedly jagged appearance, suggesting a lot of in-camera sharpening rather than relying on the quality of the lens itself.
Contrast and colour rendition proved lifelike and accurate and image noise was good at lower sensitivities, still reasonable at ISO200 but dire at ISO400. A particular niggle was that the layout makes it all too easy to hit the movie capture button by accident, instead of the shutter release.
Bristling with high-tech features, our review sample nevertheless struggled with some of the basics, like producing pictures which are consistently sharp.
Posted by Matt Harris on Wednesday, 15th July 2009 at 03:58pm GMT.
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