The Ricoh Caplio RR230 has a 3x optical and 2x digital zoom, with a focal length equivalent to 33-98 in 35mm camera format. The 10-80cm macro range is a little disappointing though, as the RR120 allowed us to snap at only 8cm from our subject.

The camera offers a choice of two image resolutions - 800 x 600 and 1,600 x 1,200 - and three compression levels: super-fine (least compressed), fine and normal.

Image quality and resolution settings are displayed along with macro and flash modes, memory card, timer and battery life information on a small LCD on the top of the unit.

As most of this information is also displayed on the 1.6in display, however, it's hard to see the need for the top-mounted LCD.

The display itself is grainy and unclear, even when you adjust the brightness settings, but renders any movement of the camera smoothly.

It sits alongside a four-directional touch control, which lets you navigate the simple on-screen menus and gives quick access to macro and review modes.

A mode dial on the top of the unit offers five settings: manual shooting mode, shooting mode, playback, movie mode (you can shoot movie clips at 320 x 240 resolution) and set-up.

Output quality was disappointing. Saturated colours in our test shots had a blue tinge to them and contrast was highly stepped. There were minor chromatic aberrations and compression artefacts in blue skies, even on the lowest compression setting.

A 2.1megapixel image comes off any CCD at 6MB and the Ricoh compressed its 2megapixel files to less than 400KB, so it's not surprising there are artefacts.

This camera has a measly 8MB of internal memory and you will need to buy your own card for the Secure Digital slot. It may be cheap at £149, but the RR230 proves the old adage that you get what you pay for.

Contact: Ricoh 020 8261 4031
www.ricoh.co.uk

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