Ricoh RDC-5300

Following in the footsteps of digital sound recording, digital imaging is fast becoming a standard and digital cameras are providing better pictures, more features and better value. Ricoh is no exception, offering the RDC-5300 with a 3x optical zoom for £131 less than its predecessor, the RDC-5000 (reviewed issue 61, p160), which only sported a 2.3x optical zoom.

The RDC-5300 is similar in appearance to its predecessor, which is slightly unfortunate as this wasn't one of the RDC-5000's plus points. On top of its unappealing appearance there are also practical issues to consider, like size: although at 350g it is not too heavy in weight (without the batteries), its length and shape take it well beyond being pocket sized, which is in stark contrast to the compact Canon PowerShot S10 (reviewed p174).

Ricoh includes both USB and serial port cables to connect the camera to your PC. As always, we recommend you use USB if you can, but it does require Windows 98. USB isn't only much faster, but it's also easier to use, with the camera simply appearing as a removable disk in the My Computer window; if you use the serial cable, you'll have to acquire the images using the TWAIN interface. Be warned, though, that only Windows 95, 98 and NT 4 users are catered for.

The ArcSoft software suite provides a number of printing and editing options. PhotoStudio 3 provides editing essentials, like blurring and sharpening filters, as well as some advanced special effects. PhotoPrinter 2 SE lets you adjust the layout of an A4 print, allowing for thumbnails and various photo sizes. There are also brightness and contrast controls. The software is no Adobe Photoshop, but for a bundled package it's quite sufficient.

Ricoh includes four alkaline batteries with the camera, but unfortunately there's no AC adaptor or recharger. Worse still, battery life proved to be poor: it used up four fresh alkaline batteries in under three hours of minimal usage. If you want to squeeze more life out of the camera, you'll have to switch off the LCD screen and use the viewfinder. Ricoh's recommended AC adaptor costs an extra £60, but this will prove worthwhile if you plan to use the RDC-5300 professionally, as transferring images to your PC is another power-draining experience.

The camera is fairly easy to use. You can work out most of the controls just by looking at it, and a quick flick through the manual will help you with anything you're unsure of. The OSD controls provide the basic setup requirements, as well as some good advanced features such as white balance control and a black and white mode. Adjusting both the exposure and white balance controls for indoor shots provided decent results, when the default settings for indoor shots proved slightly inaccurate.

Another good feature of the RDC-5300 is its 8Mb of internal memory as standard, and to increase the camera's capacity you just have to insert a SmartMedia Flash card. There are several options for photo compression, which you can select directly by using the PIC button on the camera. However, there's no option for uncompressed images, which means your photos will always be limited to JPEG quality no matter how much memory you have, although the amount of compression in fine mode is more than adequate for any use.

There are two main resolutions available. Choosing 1,792 x 1,200 restricts you to nine photos in fine mode, 19 in normal mode and 32 in economy mode; at 896 x 600 resolution, you can get 29, 55 and 99 photographs respectively. If you enable the digital zoom you can also achieve 640 x 480 resolution, with a maximum of 165 photos in economy mode.