Fuji MX-2900 Zoom

High-performance digital cameras are appearing thick and fast at the moment. Take the innocent-looking Fuji MX-2700 (reviewed issue 56, p176) and the Sony CyberShot DSC-55E (reviewed issue 58, p167): both are slim and sexy, yet boast resolutions of over two megapixel and features by the truckload. They also have digital zooms, which are in fact normal fixed lenses that give the impression of zoomingæby cropping and enlarging the image.æSneaky stuff.

Enter Fuji's brand-new MX-2900 Zoom, which joins Nikon's CoolPix 950 (reviewed issue 58, p166), and Canon's older but still excellent PowerShot Pro70 (reviewed issue 54, p165) in boasting a genuine optical zoom lens that doesn't sacrifice resolution in the process. Both Fuji's and Nikon's optics are very similar, boasting 3x zooms that are equivalent to lenses on a conventional 35mm film camera of 35-105mm and 38-115mm, respectively. Canon's PowerShot Pro70 features a 2.5x/28-70mm lens. Fuji also sells an optional 0.8x converter, which transforms the MX-2900's zoom to an equivalent 28-84mm.

At the business end of things, the MX-2900 boasts a massive 2.3 megapixel CCD, which translates into an 1,800 x 1,200 maximum image resolution. Like the MX-2700 before it, Fuji continues to lead in this field, beating the 1,600 x 1,200 maximum resolution of Nikon and Sony, and the 1,536 x 1,024 of the Canon Pro70. But while high resolutions might sound impressive, they don't necessarily translate into high-quality images. The problem is that you're looking at more than 6Mb for a single 1,800 x 1,200 24-bit image, so a certain amount of compression is needed to fit more than one image on the supplied 8Mb memory card.

Most digital cameras apply JPEG compression, but some do it better than others. Fuji's earlier MX-2700 may have boasted the industry's highest resolution, but it suffered from a fixed level of compression that compromised the ultimate quality of the image. Canon's Pro70 may have a comparatively low resolution, but it excels in terms of quality thanks to its better handling of compression.

Fuji's MX-2900 solves the MX-2700's compression problem by offering three levels of JPEG compression and an additional raw, uncompressed mode that supplies TIFF files. However, at close examination, the three JPEG settings still seem to suffer from more compression artefacts than the other cameras mentioned above, with a fractional loss of detail. The raw TIFF files were also marred by what appeared to be slight noise on the chip, which is just visible even on pictures taken under bright conditions.

At the 1,800 x 1,200 resolution, the supplied 8Mb SmartMedia card can squeeze in up to 8, 17 or 35 images at fine, normal or basic JPEG compression settings, respectively. You can also take 640 x 480 pictures, or convert the large ones down to 1,280 x 1,024 during playback.

Of course, the bigger the file size, the longer it takes to get the images out of the camera and on to your PC. Images taken at the fine setting with the least JPEG compression took around three minutes to suck through the supplied nine-pin serial cable into the supplied PictureShuttle software or standard TWAIN driver. Raw uncompressed images took an excruciating 15 minutes each. This is no particular criticism of the MX-2900, but we wish more manufacturers would take Kodak's approach in fitting fast USB ports to their high-resolution cameras. Impatient Fuji owners may want to invest in an optional SmartMedia to USB or floppy disk adaptor.