Philips Snap Share and Wear (Key 007) 

I suppose the number 007 has only one connotation, well in some of the earlier films he certainly used a camera around this sort of size. It is around the size of a disposable lighter at 9x3x1.5cm. This unit comes with 64MB of memory. Now some maths an assortment of 20 images takes 1.65MB of space on the camera so I calculate around 750 images before you need to start worrying about running out of space.

The down side is that you have no idea how good or bad the image is until you transfer the images to the PC. There is a basic photo package provided on the mini CD that you can use to view your images but any photo package works and some have a lot more capabilities than the basic package supplied. Also on the CD is a manual that is in PDF format and I would suggest a quick peruse as a few of the cameras features need explaining. If you have Windows 98 then there is also a driver, users of later operating systems do not need one as Windows recognises the device as a hard disc so files can be dragged and dropped to and from it.

Another drawback of this tiny unit is the fact you do not have flash so at least a very well lit room will be required or you will be somewhat time limited to taking images outside at this time of year.

I am not a fan of ‘enhanced quality’ as to my mind a 640x480 image will always be so however, the blurb states they can become up to 1.3 mega pixel on the PC. I will however say all the images I took in good light were of acceptable quality for 640x480 and perhaps a small amount of blowing up would be possible before the jaggies become apparent. Certainly the images were a lot better than some I have stored from as little as a year or so ago taking with other 640x480 cameras.

It comes with a lanyard so you can hang it round your neck, there are only two LED’s a yellow one to say you have available memory – this flashes when it starts to get too low and a green power button that shows either flashing or solid red if light conditions are poor or total useless.

You view images through a viewfinder at the top of the unit, below this is a wheel that rotates 90 degrees to expose the lens and turn the unit on. To save battery life it turns itself off after around a minute of inactivity, you then need to rotate the wheel to off and then turn it on again. The shutter is by the press half down to focus and fully down to take image. The other end has a cap that covers the USB PC connection that you just plug in to any USB port, now you have another drive in My Computer and you can just drag the images to a folder and view them, it is also possible to view them on the camera by double clicking on the image.

The battery recharges via the USB connection and is stated to last 150 minutes between charge so in use this is probably close to inexhaustible unless you go away for long periods with no USB contact.

Links

www.philips.co.uk >consumer products >pc stuff >digital imaging >digital cameras >key 007
http://www.consumer.philips.com/global/b2c/ce/catalog/product.jhtml?divId=0&groupId=CONNECTION_GR&catId=DIGITAL_IMAGING_CA&subCatId=DIGITAL_CAMERAS_SU&productId=KEY007_00