Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX9V

Outstanding camera hardware with excellent features – Our family has only bought SONY cameras in recent years because of their superb image clarity, reliability, ease-of-use, manufacturing quality, reasonable price and original software features (no, I'm not a SONY salesman). Some of the excellent features that make this camera outstanding from its competitors for us have been: 1. 50 frame-per-second, High Definition (full 1080x1920 resolution) progressive videos. This means you can slow the video by half, to 25 frames-per-second, and the video still looks smooth, so you can create amazing slow-motion shots in your home movies. The resolution and depth of colour astonished us compared to previous cameras. Progressive video rather than interlaced means scenes with motion look a whole lot better. It is also very handy in being able to take still images from movies. The AVCHD codec used in video files retains a lot of detail while being very efficient.

2. Panorama mode - we had this in an earlier generation of Sony Camera, but this is one better in terms of image quality due to the new sensor.

3. Great picture quality, especially in low light due to the new generation EXMOR sensor. The compression used is not the best, so you can get some strange artifacts upon extremely close examination of photos. A lot of people wish SONY would release a firmware update that allowed image capturing in RAW format.

4. GPS tagging of pictures - we haven't really used this, so can't comment.

5. Rapid fire shooting - take 10 photos a second, then discard the bad ones, or keep the lot as a high quality sequence. I have used this again and again to capture good shots of quickly moving subjects (e.g. sports).

6. 16x Optical Zoom - very handy. The longer lense system makes the camera a bit bulkier than others, but I am more than willing to carry a bit more weight around for the extra zoom.

7. Good flash - can surprise you a bit, because the light is a mechanical pop-up, but it is very sturdy.

This camera really blurs the line between DSLR and compact camera. I discussed this camera with a friend who has an amazing DSLR, and he was jealous of all the features on this camera, but the DSLRs will give you better image quality if you want absolute perfection.

One of the best reviews on the internet is here, if you really want to go into details (http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/q311travelzoomgrouptest/) Great features (panorama mode, HD 50p movies, rapid fire shooting), excellent zoom, great battery life Image compression used is alright, but not excellent upon close examination.

Fantastic camera that performs well in low light – I've previously owned 2 compact cameras, a Kodak & a Panasonic. Both were great but let themselves down in low light and especially when zoomed in low light. This camera compensates for the low light so the images come out bright and vibrant which is really refreshing. One quirk it has is that the flash button pops up top left of the camera which is normally where your thumb is, so that's something to get used to. Very easy to use and the video quality is fantastic as well. Only negative for me is how slow it is when changing between different options on the menu wheel, such as still to video, and sometimes it's difficult to know whether the camera is recording. There is some delay when you press record. The camera is solid but not overly heavy. Brilliant image & movie quality, excellent zoom (16x optical), great performance in low light, reasonably priced Slow menu system, flash pops up where your thumb is, but worth it due to the great pictures