Sony Cyber-shot DSC-W35

By Will Greenwald, CNET.com
Feb 8, 2007

Don't judge a book by its cover, and don't judge a camera by its body. While the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-W35 looks exactly like last year's lackluster Cyber-shot DSC-W30 and sports similar features, it performs better and takes better photos than its predecessor.

Editors' note: This review is based on evaluations conducted by our sister site. Review ratings on similar products may differ due to differences in regional market trends and competing product lineups.

Design
Though identical in size and shape to the DSC-W30, the 22.9mm thick DSC-W35 is a full 28g lighter than its predecessor. With battery, the W35 weighs a scant 152g compared to the W30's significantly heftier 193g. A much lighter battery accounts for some of this weight difference, as the metal cameras respectively weigh 119 and 128g without battery or memory card. Fortunately, the battery doesn't sacrifice any power with its weight; the W35's battery is a 3.6-volt, 960mAh Lithium-ion pack, just like the W30.

From the mode dial in the upper-right corner to the USB jack just below the LCD, the two cameras' designs are almost exactly the same. The controls are responsive and comfortable to handle, so we can't really find any fault in Sony recycling their design. The only problem we found was the anemic 2-inch LCD screen. We're glad that it leaves enough room on the back of the camera for an optical viewfinder, but these days a 2-inch screen just feels too small.

Features
The W35 sports all the features you'd expect in a budget-minded snapshot camera, including a 7-megapixel sensor and the almost obligatory 38mm-to-114mm (35mm equivalent) 3x zoom lens. Though you won't find manual exposure controls, the camera has a handful of scene presets for shooting in different situations, including an ISO 1,000 sensitivity mode for shooting in low light. It also has 56MB of internal memory, enough for taking 16 full-resolution photos without a memory card. If you want to shoot more than a handful at any given time, you should invest in a Memory Stick DUO card.

Performance
The camera performed quite well in our tests, considering its low price tag. After a mere 1.4-second startup time, we were rattling off shots every 1.4 seconds. With the onboard flash enabled, that time slightly increased to 1.7 seconds. Shutter lag was a peppy 0.4 seconds in bright light, though the lag increased to 1.7 seconds in dim environments. Burst mode was acceptable, snapping four full-resolution shots in just under three seconds for a rate of 1.34 frames per second.

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