Decide what to buy

After our best mobile phones of 2008 post last week, we’ve moved onto digital cameras.

Whether you’re after a nice compact or a DSLR packed full of features, we’ve got the highest rated and the most popular in both categories on Decide What to Buy.

All ratings are by consumers who have all bought the products. They voted the £182, 13 megapixel Sony CyberShot DSC-W300 as the top compact digital camera of 2008.

There are great reviews on this camera with comments like:

“the picture quality is amazing”

“Brilliant little touches to the camera, like the musical slide show playback and the photo doctoring within the view back, love this camera!!”

It also gets great scores for categories like image and build quality:

And the compact that everyone’s looking at in the run-up to Christmas? It’s the 10 megapixel Panasonic Lumix DMC-FS5. It came out a few months ago but people still love the fact that it’s packed full of features. It’s currently around £125.

When it came to SLRs, the highest rated was the £478 Canon EOS 450D. With the same image quality score as the CyberShot DSC-W300, this camera really impressed its owners. One reviewer said it was “outstanding”.

The most popular SLR is the Olympus E-420. It’s a nice upgrade from last year’s E-410 and has face detection, shadow adjustment technology, 3.5fps continuous shooting rate for up to 9 Raw images and a one-touch white balance function. It’s around £350.

Here are the rest of the favourites:


TOP COMPACT DIGITAL CAMERAS

TOP FIVE MOST POPULAR COMPACT DIGITAL CAMERAS IN LAST 30 DAYS:

1. Panasonic Lumix DMC-FS5

2. Nikon Coolpix S710

3. CASIO Z200

4. Olympus FE-350

5. Canon IXUS 980 IS


TOP FIVE HIGHEST RATED COMPACT DIGITAL CAMERAS OF 2008:

1. Sony CyberShot DSC-W300

2. Canon Digital IXUS 90IS

3. Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ5

4. Fujifilm Finepix Z20

5. Fujifilm Finepix F100

TOP SLR CAMERAS of 2008

TOP FIVE MOST POPULAR SLRs IN LAST 30 DAYS:

1. Olympus E-420

2. Canon EOS 50D

3. Nikon D300

4. Sony Alpha A700

5. Canon EOS 1000D


TOP FIVE HIGHEST RATED SLRs OF 2008:

1. Canon EOS 450D

2. Sony Alpha A350

3. Nikon D90

4. Sony Alpha A300

5. Nikon D60

Mums can be tricky customers when it comes to Christmas presents. It’s very easy to find them gifts that they’ll need but will they be something they actually want?

We’ve come up with a few suggestions to help you out on your quest to find Christmas presents for Mums:

For Mums who like to look their best - These Babyliss 2099U straighters (£28) have great reviews and they’re pretty cheap too. One reviewer even claims “i have tried expensive straightners..such as ghds and since trying the babyliss, i will never go back to any others”.

For DIY mums - Let’s face it, some Dads are useless at DIY so in some households, it will be Mum who does all the handy work. Make it a little more fun with this Rolson 25 Piece Pink Tool Kit (£20).

For Mums who love to cook - they can create hundreds of different types of breads and cakes in this Morphy Richards 48245 (£50) bread maker. It’ll save them loads of time as it mixes and does all the kneading too - that leaves more time for extra cakes in my book!

For Mums who love to take photos - Get this Panasonic Lumix DMC-FS3 (£87) compact digital camera. It’s not too expensive, has great reviews and owners say it’s especially easy to use. So even if your Mum isn’t a tech whizz, she shouldn’t have many problems with this.

For Mums who need a break - All that housework can be such a bore. Treat your Mum to this Domotec Roomba 560 Robot Vacuum Cleaner. It’s a little pricy at £199 but it will single handedly tackle all the rooms in your house, switch from carpets to hard floor mode and even take itself back to its charger to be charged up before getting back on the case again!

For Mums who love pink - If your Mum is still girly at heart, there are loads of pink gifts from pink laptops and MP3 players to pink mobile phones and cushions. Find them all here: www.reevoo.com/pink

For Mums on the go - Get them a mobile so that you can always keep in contact. With all the free minutes deals around at the moment, you could even talk for free. This Nokia 2630 phone is not only stylish but it’s also user-friendly (prices vary according to contract). One reviewer says, “Everything is easy to use and the design is very nice and compact”.

For Mums who like to be organised - Why not invest in this family calendar (£8)? There are five columns which can be used for different members of the family so she’ll never have to miss a football or music class again.

For healthy Mums - All Mums want to make sure their families eat healthily. With this Philips HR 1861 juicer (£63), she can make tasty juices and ensure everyone gets their daily intake of fruit and veg. This juicer has great reviews too. One reads, “Best juicer around for the money. Powerful motor and large feeding tube. Looks great on your worktop…Highly recommended.”

Presents on a budget - Everyone likes music, get her a CD that she’ll love. At the moment, the Mamma Mia Movie Soundtrack is particularly popular and it’s a bargain at £7.

Right, hopefully that’s helped you out a little bit. If anyone else has any other ideas, just leave a comment.

It’s summer time! Well, it’s a little hotter than usual. Anyway, it’s definitely time for us to be reaching for our cameras and taking snaps of our holidays, family and friends. If your camera is about as useful as a chocolate teapot, chances are you’ll be looking around for a new one. We’ve taken all the stress out of the process by having a look at what consumers think about the cameras they’ve bought. After someone buys a camera through one of Reevoo’s partners, they get an email questionnaire to fill out about the product. They’re asked all about image quality, features, ease of use and so on.

We’ve taken these scores and comments and compiled a list of the top 10 compact digital cameras, as rated by consumers who have bought them.

So here are the results:
1.    Sony Cybershot DSC-W130
2.    Casio Exilim EX-Z1200
3.    Sony Cybershot DSC-T9
4.    Sony Cybershot DSC-T2
5.    Fujifilm Finepix F100
6.    Kodak Easyshare M1033
7.    Canon Digital IXUS 80IS
8.    Kodak Easyshare Z650
9.    Casio Exilim EX-S600
10.  Canon PowerShot A640

And here are the scores for all the categories:

Top of the bunch is the Sony Cybershot DSC-W130. It has great reviews and at £114, it seems to be the best all-rounder for the money. But if you want to pay a little extra, the Casio Exilim EX-Z1200 has top scores for both image and build quality and its 2.8 inch screen did prove very popular with owners.

The most expensive camera was the Kodak Easyshare Z650. Consumers loved that it looked like an SLR but they did say that the lens cap pops off all the time.

Every camera has good and bad points so have a look at the scores and then check out the reviews to see if you can find the best camera for you. You can find digital compact camera reviews, SLR reviews or simply just browse through all of the camera reviews over on Reevoo.

"Buying decent cables is addictive once you start you’ll want more, it
could be detrimental to your bank balance. The wife doesn’t get it and
wants me committed" Chord Crimson Subwoofer

"It worked well for nearly 5 weeks. It stopped working completely after 5 weeks" Hotpoint RLA84

"Gear system bad, Brakes worse. Seat hurts bum" Universal Boys 24" Dual Suspension Bike

"I think all toys with wheels should come fitted with a bell" Pink Nebulas Scooter

"It’s very much a lady’s camera (or thick-skinned man’s)" Fujifilm Finepix Z5

Casio has decided that we all need a bit of big screen love in our cameras so their new EXILIM EX-Z150 comes with a whopping three inch LCD display. Pretty out of the ordinary for a low-end model. But if you thought the huge screen would create a clumpy camera, you’d be wrong - it’s only 20.1-mm, tapering down to 18.9-mm and it’s slim and stylish exterior comes in silver, black, red, pink and bright green.

To add to the goodies, they’ve also packed in:
- 8.1 megapixels
- 4x optical zoom
- CCD-shift image stabilisation
- 28-mm wide angle lens
- 17.9MB built in memory
- face detection function

If that wasn’t enough, you can use SDHCs, SDs, MultiMediacards and MultiMediaCardplus memory cards. There’s also ‘YouTube mode’ which is a setting that will give you 640 x 480 quality at 30fps (frames per second) for up to 10 minutes at a time.

We’re not sure when the EXILIM EX-Z150 will be available, or how much it will be but we’ll let you know when we do.

If you want to look through other Casio reviews, you can read them all here.

[Far East Gizmos]

Today’s Gadget Watch is for all you camera lovers and it’s one of my favourite gadgets so far. It’s a bendy tripod that you can attach to your camera, called a Gorillapod. It’s really frustrating when you can’t take the perfect shot because your tripod won’t stay steady or because it won’t fit into hard-to-reach places but the Gorillapod solves all that.

It has three legs that can wrap around anything, even trees and lampposts, so you can get angles that you never dreamed of obtaining with a traditional tripod. Great news for happy snappers.

There’s a compact version and a larger SLR/camcorder version, priced at £14.95 and £34.95 respectively. You can read 21 reviews for the compact version over on Reevoo and you can pick them both up at Paramount Zone.

If you’re still looking for a camera, check out the camera reviews to help you to decide what to buy.

Thank goodness, a sensible invention after yesterday’s online lock post. I have to say that I’m even going to invest in this one. Some clever people have come up with the ultimate accessory for snorkelers – the world’s first digital camera swim mask. Anyone else who’s felt the pain of finally finding a lionfish and then trying to take a photo of it while the current is dragging both of you in opposite directions, will want to grab one too.

The handy 5MP camera has integrated crosshairs so that you can line up your nemos perfectly and it can cope with up to 15" of water. A shutter button allows you to swap between photo and video mode and downloading is even simpler - just plug the thing into a USB port. You can hold up to 30 hi-res shots if you just rely on the in-built 16MB memory but the microSD slot means that you can pile on some extra MBs.

Until they make one for divers who like to venture into deeper waters, I think this is a pretty good start. You can get your hands on one at Hammacher Schlemmer. Those of you looking to invest in a camera for solid ground should check out the digital camera reviews at Reevoo.

The only thing I’m dubious about is the quality of the mask itself. I guess there’s only one way to find out…

[Gizmodo]

It’s official. Women may like to spend money on expensive handbags and shoes but when it comes to the living room, boys shell out the most cash.

According to the latest research from Reevoo, kitting out a bachelor pad with huge plasma TVs, top of the range laptops, games consoles, high-end stereos and other gadgets puts the bill up to £4,678.97.

Reevoo looked at the highest rated products with over 30 reviews to compile the research. According to shoppers, the best wide screen plasma HD ready TV is the Panasonic TH50PZ70B which can be nicely accompanied by the top DVD recorder, the Sony RDR-HX510. Just these two cost over £1,500.

Every man’s need and desire to put as little effort into living as possible has been accounted for. There’s the Proline TTR 65 P mini beer fridge which can be plugged in right next to your sofa so that cold beer is only a short stretch away, the Hewlett Packard Pavilion DV9605 laptop, so you can check up on your stocks and shares while you’re watching the footie and an Xbox 360 Elite for when you run out of DVDs.

Other items to complete the perfect bachelor pad include the Philips HD7810/60 coffee machine, the Blackberry Curve 8310, and the Miele G1222SC
dishwasher, so that you don’t have to get involved in any of that mucky washing up.

So girls, next time you get an earful off him indoors, direct him to this handy bit of research before you head for the shops.

Here’s a full list for those who want to create the perfect pad:

Panasonic
TH50PZ70B 50 inch HD ready plasma screen TV £1,351.00

Xbox 360 Elite
games console £250.00

Panasonic FZ50 digital
camera £306.00

Sony DCR-SR 32E handycam
camcorder with 30GB hard drive £259.00

Blackberry Curve
8310 mobile phone £274.99

Denon D-m 35 DAB hi-fi
mini system £150.00

Apple iPod touch 16GB black
£229.00

Wharfedale
Diamond 9.1 bookshelf speakers £129.00

Hewlett Packard Pavilion
DV9605 laptop £699.99

Pure Talksport DAB
radio £40.00

Proline TTR 65 P mini
fridge £69.99

Philips HD7810/60
Coffee Machine £50

Miele G1222SC
dishwasher £493.00

Philips HQ8150 electric
shaver £78.00

Sony RDR-HX510 DVD
Recorder £299.00

This week’s Green Piece is all about a humble backpack. Designed by Voltaic, it’s made from the fizzy drinks bottles that we recycle. Not only does this process save on materials, it also uses a lot less energy that if it was made out of something like nylon.

Think that’s it? Oh no, this is a backpack with a difference. It’s got solar panels sewn into it so that you can save even more energy by charging up your gadgets on the go. You can charge your smaller gadgets like MP3s, cameras or PDAs but the best bit is that Voltaic have managed to create a backpack that can also charge your laptop. Great news! Now if we only lived in Spain…and you have a spare £190 lying around…

Last week’s Technical Image Press Association (TIPA) awards gave Nikon chiefs something to celebrate. They nabbed the most sort after awards with the D3 model coming top in the ‘Best DSLR – Expert’ category and the D300 receiving the ‘Best DSLR – Professional’ prize.

If you have problems with low light performance, pick up the D3. Judges were very impressed with the results, even when used at  ISO 6400. The D300 is one for those of you that like your equipment to keep up with your adventures - It was commended for its “solid design, excellent handing and robust build quality” and its speedy autofocus system.

Canon did pip Nikon to the post with their new EOS 450D which picked up the ‘Best DSLR – Advanced’ award and the Panasonic LUMIX FX-500 topped the ‘Best Compact Digital Camera’ category.

I’ve checked out the camera reviews on Reevoo and at the moment, the top rated DSLR is the Panasonic FZ50 Black with 9.1/10 from 43 impartial reviews and the top rated compact digital camera is the Casio Exilim Zoom EX-Z1200 with 9.2/10 from 55 impartial reviews.   

You can check out more SLR reviews and compact digital camera reviews from Reevoo. As it’s nearly summer hols time, I’ll be doing a Top 5 digi camera post soon. Until then, you can see reviews for lots of photography equipment here.