The Exilim EX-Z1000 was introduced at a time when we all thought the megapixel race was over. It is like calling a truce only to unleash another image resolution war. If you intend to take pictures at the maximum resolution (which could be the main reason you are buying this camera), you'd better invest in a high-capacity memory card. One grouse we have, though, is the nearly unusable ISO 3,200 setting in replacement for optical image stabilization.

Design
The Exilim EX-Z1000 is a looker and should strike a chord with fashion-conscious folks. Decked with rounded corners, the 10.1-megapixel camera is a joy to hold while the matte surface reduces the occurrence of fingerprints--though we can't say the same for its 2.8-inch LCD monitor.

What you get on the back of this Exilim are basic controls which include Menu, Best Shot, Playback, Record, Display keys and a directional pad. Like its brethren, you won't find a dedicated movie-recording button on this shooter. Instead, you'll have to go into the Best Shot menu to take a video.

By leaving only the essential functions on the rear of the camera, it contributes to a "cleaner" look. Though these keys can be miniscule, they provide a nice tactile feedback which we like.

Powering up the camera will push the 3x optical zoom lens almost 2.7cm out of the chassis. Nothing to worry about, but if you prefer internal zooming glasses you'd be better off with models like Nikon's Coolpix S5 and S6. The good news is there's considerably less chance for your finger to encroach into your pictures, especially when it wraps near the lens when holding the camera.

We're nitpicking, but we'd really like to see an on-camera connector (and DC-in) so we can do without the cradle on our trips. To bring the docking station along in an already brimming suitcase is just plain torture.

Features
If you are a firm believer that "the more pixels there are, the merrier", then this 10.1-megapixel Exilim is tailored exactly to your needs. That said, if you've been following our Web site, you should have realized that the number of megapixels shouldn't be the only reason you want to buy a camera. A lot of it depends on what you're looking for and what you require from a digicam: If it must have the highest resolution and yet be pocketable, then yes, most likely you'd be looking at the Z1000. But if image quality is of utmost importance to you, you should be browsing for digital SLRs instead.

Another less significant advantage of having a high-resolution camera is pseudo zooming capabilities. If the 3x optical zoom doesn't get you close enough to your subject, you can take a picture at the highest resolution, crop out unwanted details and still end up with enough pixels to create a decent photo--just don't depend too much on it. On the same topic, but from another perspective, Casio claims that between the zoom range of 4.3x and 17.1x, there won't be any deterioration of image quality by enlarging a specific portion of the image, thus putting the 10 megapixels to good use.

The 2.8-inch monitor isn't entirely used for previewing and framing pictures. In fact, it's a 2.5-inch screen with the rest of the space being utilized to display the camera's menus. You can select from two different layouts: The Panel style where the most commonly accessed settings are arranged in a column on the right for quick navigation or the Normal option which shows the same information in all four corners of the screen.

It's not all about high resolution on this Exilim, and we see some neat features including the quick zoom function which provides a shortcut zoom from wide-angle to telephoto (3x optical zoom) with a single key press. There's also the Zoom Continuous mode which takes two images with different zoom settings concurrently.

Performance
It took only 1.6 seconds to power up this Exilim and shutting it down is just as fast. We clocked the time-to-first-shot at 2 seconds and managed to shoot thereafter every 2.1 seconds without flash. With forced flash, shot-to-shot timings faltered to 4.9 seconds; with red-eye reduction, it was every 5.4 seconds. Shutter lag was close to negligible during our tests.

You can select three continuous shooting modes on this Exilim. At normal speed, we took a total of 35 frames per minute (0.6fps) which wasn't too impressive. However, the Z1000 does offer a high-speed setting which snaps three images in a second. There's also a continuous flash option which is similar to the high-speed setting, but with the addition of flash for all three shots. However, it was slightly slower by 0.3 seconds. Testing was done with an Imation 1GB high-speed SD card.

Image Quality
Image quality was generally good and, in fact, better than what we had expected. Chromatic aberration was kept to a minimal though we did lose some details in the highlights. We selected automatic white balance for most of our shots and it was able to detect and produce neutral tones in our images. For those times that the automatic setting didn't work, we were able to opt for the preset options which included Daylight, Overcast, Shade, Daylight fluorescent, Daywhite fluorescent and Tungsten. There's also a manual white balance setting available.

You can select sensitivity settings of between ISO 50 and ISO 400, and in the High Sensitivity Best Shot mode, ISO goes up to a maximum value of 3,200. Our test images turned out decent up to ISO 400, though we saw the start of noise forming at that level. ISO 3,200 sounded nice, but our pictures were practically unusable due to noise.