In summary
This entry-level digicam from Kyocera was the cheapest 4-megapixel, 3x optical zoom camera on sale when we went to press. It’s reasonably compact and easy to use and it’s supplied with a neat carrying pouch. The EZ 4030’s body is conventionally designed and rather chunky, but it’s well built for its type and, unlike some competing models, has a tripod mount. . . [more]
Full review
Quality rating (out of 10)
Build: 7.5
Ease of use: 8.0
Image quality: 7.5
Storage capacity with supplied card: 6.0
Value for money: 9.0
This entry-level digicam from Kyocera was the cheapest 4-megapixel, 3x optical zoom camera on sale when we went to press. It’s reasonably compact and easy to use and it’s supplied with a neat carrying pouch. The EZ 4030’s body is conventionally designed and rather chunky, but it’s well built for its type and, unlike some competing models, has a tripod mount.
The feature suite is generous, with four stills resolution settings (including high-res 3:2) and three quality settings. The mode dial has portrait, landscape and close-up settings plus a scene mode that adds night landscape, night portrait, museum and backlight settings. ISO, white balance and flash are also adjustable – although no custom white balance is provided. The self-timer has two-second and 10-second options and +/- 2 EV of exposure compensation is provided in 1/3 EV steps.
Three metering modes are supported, along with two AF zones, and users can choose from three colour modes (vivid, black & white, and sepia). Sharpness is also adjustable in-camera. The burst mode captures five shots at 0.6 second intervals at all resolution settings and it took just over 40 seconds to process a high-resolution burst.
A green light on the top panel provides status information on battery power, focusing and image processing. It turns red for flash, self-timer and video capture, plus card and battery warnings.
Shots taken with the test camera were generally well exposed, with accurate colours and slightly elevated saturation. Default image contrast was rather high and highlight detail was lost in bright outdoor shots. Lens performance was surprisingly good; pictures were sharp edge-to-edge and colour fringing was only seen in extreme conditions. The white balance pre-sets produced close-to-accurate colours but the auto setting was unable to correct for incandescent lights.
Low light exposures without flash were noisy at all ISO settings, with abundant stuck pixels at ISO 200 and above. Flash coverage was excellent at all ISO settings. We measured an average capture lag of 1.7 seconds, which reduced to 0.3 seconds with pre-focusing. Power consumption was higher than average. [22]
Specifications
Image sensor: 5.27 x 3.95 mm CCD with 4,000,000 square pixels effective
Lens: 5.6-16.8mm f2.8-4.9 zoom lens (36-108mm in 35mm format)
Zoom ratio: 3x optical, 3.3x digital
Dimensions (wxhxd): 95 x 65 x 34 mm
Weight: 165 grams (without batteries)
Image formats: Stills ““ JPEG (Exif 2.2); Movies ““ Motion JPEG (QVGA@20 fps) with sound
Shutter speed range: 2-1/2000 second
Focus system/range: 50 cm to infinity; macro to 15 cm
Exposure metering/control: Centre-weighted, average and spot metering; full auto plus eight scene modes
White balance: Auto, sunny, cloudy, tungsten, fluorescent
Flash modes/range (ISO auto): Auto, on, off, red-eye reduction
ISO range: Auto, ISO 100, 200,400
Sequence shooting: 5 shots at 0.6 second intervals
Storage Media: 16 MB internal memory plus SD/MMC card slot;
Viewfinder: optical
LCD monitor: 1.8-inch TFT
Power supply: 2x AA NiMH batteries or 1x CR-V3 lithium battery
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