Sanyo Xacti E6

The specifications of the Xacti E6 make a good first impression. It has a 6megapixel CCD, which can be bumped up to 10megapixels with a bit of interpolation, 3x optical zoom, 3in LCD viewfinder and a chassis no bigger, or heavier, than a pack of cards.

For hassle-free photography, the Xacti E6 comes with the option of preset scene modes. There’s also a Best Shot mode, which takes four consecutive shots and brackets the exposure. You can then choose which images you want to keep. Other features include manual focus and a 1cm macro for close-ups.

The shutter button is touch-sensitive, so simply by resting your finger on it, the camera will leap into action and adjust the likes of focus and exposure. More often than not the correct settings are calculated, but we still prefer the half-press shutter system employed by the majority of digital cameras.

With landscape, portrait and indoor shots, the Xacti E6 reproduced colour fairly well.

However, even when shooting outside, many of our photos exhibited a lot of noise. It’s normally only night-time or low-light shots that are affected by noise, so we were quite disappointed to see it in daylight images. The small 1/2.5 sensor crammed with six million pixels is most likely the root of the problem.

Navigating the menus is straightforward, but if you have large hands the small buttons could get fiddly. You’ll need to buy an extra memory card to take a decent number of shots, as the 16MB internal memory is enough for just three photos at the highest resolution.

The Xacti E6 is a good point-and-shoot digicam, but the image noise will be a concern if image quality is important to you. If you’re quick, the Xacti E6 comes with a free 512MB SD (Secure Digital) memory card, a Lowepro carry case and two-year warranty. This offer expires on Christmas Eve 2005.