Sony Cybershot DSC W210 review

The Sony Cybershot DSC W210 packs a lot of power with its 12 megapixel sensor. This camera is small enough to fit in most pockets. It is available in silver, dark gray, pink and green. The Cybershot DSC W210 has a 4x optical zoom lens.

For most purposes, the 12 megapixels are likely to be overkill. Even if you’re looking to make large prints, you should find 6-8 megapixels galore, unless you’re looking to go up to poster size and beyond. If you were planning to do that, then chances are you are looking to invest in a higher quality, more expensive camera anyway.

For me, the great advantage of having so many megapixels is that Sony has included a feature called smart zoom. This allows you to increase the amount of zoom available as long as you are willing to sacrifice some of the megapixels you shoot at. In the past, I’ve even found that shooting at lower megapixels can increase the quality of the images you shoot. Other benefits include taking up less space on a memory card and faster times to upload your photos to a computer. If you activate Smart Zoom, you can zoom in up to 25x. This can be overkill as in that setting you can only capture images for playback on a computer or television screen, but there are many steps in between where you can find the right balance between print size and zoom.

The Cybershot DSC W210 fits into a group of pocket cameras that are less expensive than high-end models. The main reasons behind the savings tend to be camera design and build quality. If you don’t mind a fairly plain-looking digital camera, you can save yourself a lot of money.

In terms of features, there isn’t much to choose between this camera and some of the more expensive ones. The 2.7-inch LCD screen compares quite well and the only obvious feature I can think of missing here is mechanical image stabilization. This is where image stabilization is handled by gyroscopes on the lens or by making small changes to the position of the sensor.

Apart from this, Sony has incorporated some of the latest trendy features. These include face detection for sharper portraits and a smile shutter that automatically shoots a photo when the Cybershot DSC W210 detects that someone is smiling. I have never noticed that face detection makes such a difference in a portrait shot and only you can decide how much value a smile shutter adds to the camera for you. Something that is not often seen in a camera of this size is the ability to add conversion lenses. This can improve the telephoto or wide-angle capabilities of the camera. To do this, you also need to buy a lens adapter.

The camera can produce high definition still images, but it can only output standard definition movies.

Overall, I found the camera easy to use. Sony presents its menus in a sensible way. They are based on icons rather than text, but the text appears as you scroll through the icons.

When it comes to image quality, the Cybershot DSC W210 does a solid job. I can’t say that the images it produces are anything out of the ordinary, but overall the camera does a decent job if you’re looking for a reasonably priced general snapshot camera.

Similar cameras that you might want to see include the Panasonic Lumix FS6, Panasonic Lumix FS7, Panasonic Lumix FS15, and the Olympus FE-5000.