Buy Now...

click image to enlarge

The Samsung Galaxy 2 compact digital camera measures 13x7x3cm and weights 285grams. The lens can expand up to another 5.5cm when fully zoomed. 21x optical zoom needs a firm base or better still a tripod. However just because it has got it, try getting the image you want without the zoom you will be pleasantly surprised with the results even in low light. The flash when required is efficient without being over intrusive as it can never be closer than 5cm behind and to the left of the lens.

There are just three buttons on the top of the unit. Flash to manually lift the flash, on/off and the shutter release with zoom control around it.

See also: Digital Cameras

more

The right side has a micro USB socket behind a door and the anchor point for the supplied leather wrist strap. The face has only the lens, the left side has nothing and the base has a door behind which is the solid 2000mAh battery, a micro HDMI socket and a micro SD card socket.

So with that over you now know all the controls are on the screen, in shooting mode the top right has battery state, below this a camera button then a mode button and near the base of the right side a video button.

Press the mode button and you have four choices Auto – always the place to start -, Smart, Expert and My Modes. Swipe down from the top of the screen to see a row of icons that normally are found on a recent Tablet.

If you press the Home button in the top left corner your camera is now a 10.5x5.5cm viewable screen the last .5cm on the right has the standard Back, Home and Open Apps choices.

By default when on Wi-Fi the top part of the screen shows current Weather, below this a Google search line and at the base six icons, Camera, Gallery, Dropbox, Samsung Apps, Play Store and Apps.

In the space available I cannot go into more details about the various other features but I will give a link at the end so you can check them out.

This unit NFC, the possible automatic upload to Dropbox and it comes with lots of free extra storage, transfer by removing any micro SD card or using the supplied micro USB to USB cable to transfer images in that way. For some reason this unit does not take a drive letter but it is listed under devices and you can then use drag and drop.

The possible maximum resolution is 16.3MP and when shooting video it can take full HD 1920x1080 at 30FPS.

The lens is wide angle and can capture more than you think at close quarters because it is 23mm.

When shipped there is just under 3GB of available memory, 2GB of RAM and it supports up to 64GB in the Micro SD slot.

The supplied Android is V4.3 and apart from Wi-Fi it also has the latest Bluetooth 4.

Finally the images I took were excellent even when I was a total novice just shooting almost blindly, the screen lets you accurately see what you are taking and it copes well with strong sun except when right on the screen.

So if you want a camera with the ability to search the WWW and get emails etc. then this should be on your shortlist. Mine was White but I see it is also available in Black.

The Samsung Galaxy Camera 2 is available from the link below for £339 with free delivery.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00HR87KP6?ie=UTF8&tag=gadge0a-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634

http://www.samsung.com/uk/consumer/mobile-devices/galaxy-camera/galaxy-camera/EK-GC200ZWABTU