HP Photosmart C618

In the digital camera arena, we're watching some of the world's greatest corporate think tanks stretching the envelope of imaging technology. As a result, with every new evolution, the final quality of digital images increases. The latest manufacturer to throw its hat into this technological feeding frenzy is HP, with its Photosmart C618. After previous efforts with the fly's eye Super CCD technology built into Fujifilm's FinePix 4700 Zoom (reviewed issue 73, p187) and Epson's advanced interpolation functionality integrated into its PhotoPC 3000Z (reviewed issue 74, p186) showing marginal improvements, I was interested to see what HP had up its sleeve.

As you'd expect with any new launch, HP's marketing types have been in overdrive. Their claims can however be broken down into two key areas. Firstly, the Photosmart C618 features a technology that HP calls the 'custom photo lab'. Secondly, the Photosmart C618 can get your digital images onto paper without the need for a PC. Both these points will be discussed in detail later.

Straight out of the box though, the Photosmart C618 appears standard and unimaginative. On the whole the camera has a well-constructed and reassuring feel. In terms of build quality my only real gripe is that the catch on the battery flap is a pain to use.

Ergonomically, the Photosmart C618 is a little cramped. My right hand and its digits easily operated the zoom, shutter and menu buttons. Unfortunately, my left hand didn't have such an easy time as I just couldn't seem to get comfortable. Although these physical difficulties proved a marginal hindrance, in all other respects the camera is very easy to use.

Unlike Fujifilm cameras, which have a myriad of modes selected by a wheel on top of the camera, the Photosmart C618 has just four possible modes. The menu that allows you to control the Photosmart C618's functionality is well drawn, colourful and exceedingly easy to comprehend. Indeed, as a testament to the design effort which went into the system, I hardly needed to look at the camera's manual. Seldom has a 2in LCD panel been put to such good use.

Despite boasting a 3x optical zoom Pentax lens and an SLR feature set, the Photosmart C618 can be used as a simple point-and-shoot camera, without reducing potential results. Rather than expecting the user to grapple with the complexities of exposures, apertures and the rest, the Photosmart C618 claims that it can do all the calculations and work it out for you. The 'custom photo lab' functionality can, HP asserts, adjust to different lighting conditions and sources - ensuring that your digital images don't suffer degradation in terms of highlights, shadow, colour and contrast. This feature set extends to compensating for cast effects, which things like fluorescent tubes can inflict on an image. The Photosmart C618 can easily recognise the type of light it's working under and filter out that light signature discolouration.

Indeed, during testing, these claims were borne out to pleasing results with the combination of the Pentax optics and the 2.1 million pixel CCD giving the Photosmart C618 an overall impressive performance. Considering the Photosmart C618's comparatively low price point, its colours were well resolved and detail was crisply captured. As for the fancy light analysis, under several lighting conditions, including fluorescent and incandescent, I tested the camera and found the compensating effects to be true to HP's word.

One major criticism of the Photosmart C618's function is that it's rather slow to process very large images, particularly if you're partial to taking TIFFs at 1024 x 768 resolutions. In that case, rather than snapping rapidly through a sequence of shots you'll find yourself waiting between pictures whilst the image is rendered into memory.