The chunky, 181g Sony Cyber-shot DSC-S600 offers remarkable flexibility despite its bargain price. Its 6-megapixel resolution and moderately wide 31mm-to-93mm (35mm-film-camera equivalent) lens, in conjunction with pretty decent low-light photos and extended shutter-speed latitude in moderate light, combine to produce a point-and-shoot camera with enough versatility to handle most picture-taking situations.

Design
The Sony Cyber-shot DSC-S600's nearly empty top panel hosts only a microphone jack, the illuminated power button, and the shutter release. One-handed shooting is possible with the optical viewfinder, which is non-diopter-correctable, but you'll probably want to brace the camera with your left hand if you're using the bright 2-inch LCD.

On the back, a slider switches between review, photo, and movie modes; there's also a Menu button; a Display Info key; and an Image Quality/Trash button. Your image-quality choices range from resolutions of 6 megapixels to 640 x 480 VGA, at aspect ratios of 4:3, 3:2, and 16:9 (HDTV). A circular control pad offers additional functions such as flash (up), self-timer (down), quick review (left), and metering selection (right).

For other settings such as changing autofocus options and activating burst mode, you'll have to drop into the menu system.

Features
The Sony Cyber-shot DSC-S600 comes with just 32MB of internal memory, so you'll want to put a Memory Stick Duo or Memory Stick Pro Duo card on your shopping list, along with some rechargeable AA batteries. This camera has no A/V port for connecting to a TV but does include a USB port for a linkup to your computer. The movie mode can shoot VGA videos at 30fps, and you can trim movie clips right in the camera.

There are no manual or semi-manual exposure controls other than standard- and flash-exposure compensation at plus or minus 2EV in 1/3EV increments. Sony supplements the automatic and program modes with six scene modes: Twilight, Twilight Portrait, Soft Snap (a soft-focus effect for portraits), Snow, Beach, and Landscape. Unfortunately, both EV settings and scene modes can be selected only within the camera menu. Exposures are set automatically between 1 second and 1/2,000 second, at apertures of F2.8 at the wide-angle setting to F5.1 at the telephoto end. An internal neutral-density filter drops into place to provide the equivalent of F5.1 and F15.3 under bright light.

In a variation on the old 16-frames-in-one feature, the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-S600 includes the option to snap off 16 miniature shots at as little as 1/30-second intervals for golf-swing analysis and other stop-action tasks.

Performance
The Sony Cyber-shot DSC-S600's performance ranged from good to mediocre. The DSC-S600 woke up, ready to shoot, in just 1.8 seconds and snapped off pictures every 1.3 seconds thereafter. The flash performed decently, requiring 1.8 seconds between shots. The burst mode captured 7 full-resolution frames at 1.5fps and could shoot 100 VGA pictures at about the same speed.

Shutter lag was a satisfying 0.4 second under high-contrast lighting but slowed to an underwhelming 1.2 seconds under low-contrast lighting, even with the aid of the red autofocus-assist lamp. The LCD was usable under all illumination but direct sunlight and could brighten in low-light conditions. The DSC-S600's red-eye correction did a fairly good job, but we sometimes noticed a pinpoint of red in the pupils of our subjects.

Shooting speed in seconds  
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Shutter lag (typical)

Time to first shot

Typical shot-to-shot time

Sony Cyber Shot DSC-T9

0.3 

1.7 

1.3 

Sony Cyber Shot DSC-S600

0.4 

1.8 

1.3 

Casio Exilim EX-Z110

0.6 

1.7 

1.8 

Sanyo Xacti VPC-E6

0.7 

2.0 

2.3 

Nikon Coolpix S4

0.8 

2.5 

2.8 

Olympus FE-120

1.3 

4.9 

2.6 

Typical continuous-shooting speed in frames per second  
(Longer bars indicate better performance)

Typical continuous-shooting speed

Sanyo Xacti VPC-E6

3.0 

Sony Cyber Shot DSC-T9

1.5 

Sony Cyber Shot DSC-S600

1.5 

Olympus FE-120

1.2 

Nikon Coolpix S4

1.1 

Casio Exilim EX-Z110

0.7 

Image Quality
Image quality was reasonable for the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-S600's class, although we noticed postprocessing artifacts even at the lowest compression setting.

Edge oversharpening stood out as the S600's chief postprocessing problem (top), while purple fringing tended to be its biggest optical artifact (bottom).

Overall, exposures were very good with detail in the shadows, and highlights were less blown out than expected for the snowy day we shot our outdoor tests. Colors were mostly neutral and muted and were biased slightly toward yellow in flesh tones.

While the ISO 1,000 sensitivity does let you shoot pictures at much lower light levels, it's even more useful under moderately dim illumination to eliminate the need for sharpness-robbing slow shutter speeds. Most casual snapshooters will prefer the grainy high-ISO pictures to shaky, dimly lit photos or none at all.