Pentax Optio A10 Review

It's tiny, but it still manages to squeeze in a top-of the range 8-megapixels of resolution and a 3x optical zoom lens into its solid little body.

Its design is typical of the range, but it's light enough to carry around with you, and with 24MB of internal memory you won't be too reliant on the memory card.

There's another headline feature in the Pentax Shake Reduction function, which allows you to shoot rock solid images from moving cars, on the decks of ships, or in low light without the need for a fl ash. The reason we love it so much is that it works really well, and makes a massive difference to the eventual look of your photo album.

And that album should be a cracker, as this snapper produces top-notch images 90 per cent of the time. The high resolution CCD picks up lots of detail, and it's possible to print the images out easily up to A4 without too much of the unsightly digital noise that can be an issue with some 8-megapixel compacts. The real star of the show though is the colour reproduction - when the A10 gets it right, it's very, very good in this respect.

The only real issue is that the A10 occasionally over-exposes images, which therefore come out lighter than the actual subject - particularly problematic with large expanses of sky.

That aside, there's nothing to complain about, and the A10 is a joy to use. If you are looking for something small and easy to handle, but offering great image quality, this should be near the top of your wish list.