I originally bought a Sony DSC-S950, for around half the price of this camera, but I returned it the same day due to a faulty flash bulb. I decided to upgrade to the W290, because I wasn't very happy with the S950 - it felt cheap, and lacked features.

I've put together this list of pros and cons of this camera. Don't let the seemingly long list of cons scare you though, as they are all quite minor and not even important enough for me to rate this camera anything less than 5 stars. I just felt it was necessary to list everything I could think of. Sorry, I couldn't properly review the HD Video capability, because I don't have the HD cables (see below), and my computer seems to be too slow to properly play back HD video.

Pros:

-BRILLIANT colors! I am very very impressed with the colors in my shots, especially when shooting outdoor scenery shots (which is primarily what I purchased this camera for).

-Night-time shots using a tripod turn out very well also, giving as much detail as one could see with their naked eye.

-Smile shutter, as mentioned in previous reviews, works flawlessly. One thing that doesn't seem to be mentioned anywhere, is that when it's in Smile Shutter mode, it will continue to snap photos automatically as long as it keeps detecting smiles, which is very cool. So if you are taking a group picture, and you're one of those people that likes taking 3 shots of the same thing "just in case", just keep on smiling and the camera will take care of that for you.

-there's a 3-shot burst mode, where it automatically takes 3 pictures when you click the button: one with your default EV, one at -1EV, and one at +1EV (or different intervals even, if you choose). That once-in-a-lifetime shot you take will have 3 different versions automatically, and you can choose the one you like the most and delete the rest later.

-The Intelligent Auto mode works fantastically, it takes a lot of the stress out of taken urgent pictures. The only time I ever don't use it is when I have plenty of time to plan for a shot.

-Startup time is great! I've seen other complaints from people that say this camera takes too long to startup and be ready to use, but those people must be the most impatient people ever, because this thing is faster than any other camera I've owned, digital or otherwise. When you click the power button, the lens fires out lightning fast and the screen immediately displays the picture and is ready for action. Probably takes about 0.5 seconds from pushing the button to being ready to use.


Cons:

-Plastic cover on LCD screen protrudes from the camera body, making it more easily scratched. I would recommend getting some screen protectors, as I'm about to do.

-the jack for the all-in-one cable is on the bottom of the camera, which will be great once a dock is available, but in the meantime it's a very inconvenient place to plug in the cable. It forces you to lay to camera on either the lens side, or the LCD side (which, as mentioned above, is designed in such a way that it could be scratched quite easily without a screen protector)

-Doesn't come with HD video cables, only the typical yellow/red/white RCA analogue cables. Seeing as how this camera records HD video, it would be nice to be able to play it back in HD on my tv without burning it to a DVD first. You can buy the HD cables from sony if you really need them, though.

-Comes with an NP-BG1 battery, which disables the camera's ability to show you the remaining minutes. You have to buy the optional NP-FG1 battery to see that. That's the only difference, both batteries have the same capacity. It was obviously designed that way to force us to buy a second battery... but that was fine with me, since I planned on buying one anyways.


I would definitely recommend this camera to anyone looking for a great quality point-and-shoot digital camera!

This camera works great! I have only had it a week but it is great. The smile detection works pretty well. I noticed subjects that wore hats had troubles with their smiles being detected, possibly due to extra shading from the bill of the hat, but for my one-year-old daughter, it took almost 10 pictures in 30-45 seconds automatically while she was having a laughing fit. A lot quicker than I could do. I also like how the portrait mode takes 2 pictures to try and get one without eyes blinking, and if it detected a blink, it alerts you to that. The HD video shoots pretty smoothly. I haven't gotten a chance to check out what it looks like on TV, but it shot well. I was worried about being able to keep this steady when taking pictures, but I do better with this camera than I did our old Canon Powershot A530 (it was taking upwards of 5 minutes to charge the flash for one picture with brand new batteries!...thus being the purchase of a new camera).

It takes a couple seconds for the camera to turn on, so if you think you may have a shot to quickly take, be prepared and turn the camera on early. Also, I am nervous about the rechargeable battery versus just dropping in new AAs. It seems like the battery takes a little too long to charge fully, but so far I have just charged it while sleeping.

Overall I am extremely satisifed with this camera. I mainly need a camera to capture my daughter's memories and will mostly send them out over e-mail and print out 4x6 images for my wife's scrapbook. This camera is giving me hope it will take pictures well. The picture quality looks great and it seems slightly faster than my old Canon for taking successive pictures.

I consider myself a normal camera user. I don't care about top of the line electronics or the latest greatest stuff. I just wanted a camera that would shoot landscape, low light, and those "one in a million" pics. I have to say that I am very pleased with this camera.

I went to an aquarium and took pics of the animals without flash and I have some of the most beautiful, colorful pics. The thing about this camera is that you have to change settings to get that good picture rather than keeping it on auto. Some of the zoomed-in pics were a bit grainy as the other reviewer said but the PMB picture loading software that came with the camera fixed it and made it into a great picture.
Another bad thing about the camera is that you have to hold it still to keep from getting a blurred image and it takes a sec or two for the flash to go off. Not a big deal to me.

I went to a baseball game and was taking pics with the Cybershot and the people sitting behind me (2 different couples) were gushing about the clear LCD screen and how clear the pics were at the 5x zoom. When I showed them the aquarium pics, they stated they were going to buy one soon, both couples.

There are some downfalls to the camera, just like anything else, but I am very happy with my purchase. I had a Kodak Easyshare before this one, and I am much happier with the Sony. It is difficult to come away from this camera with a bad picture.

Sony Cyber-shot DSC-W290 12 MP Digital Camera with 5x Optical Zoom and Super Steady Shot Image Stabilization (Silver)

We are very pleased with this camera. I have always had Canon and loved the quality photos, but lately i have been seeing and reading alot about the Sony W line. We were going to get the DSC-w300, but i didn't like that it only had a 3x optical zoom. Then i saw this camera that has a 5x optical zoom. It works great. The pictures this camera takes a perfect. Our 15 month old son runs everywhere and this camera catches all of the right moments. It takes amazing pictures in daylight and low light indoor. Could not be happier with it so far!

The only thing, like the previous reviewer stated, is that you do need to get a screen protector for the lcd display. It will scratch too easy if you dont get it.

I think I'd rate myself as a pretty average camera user. I need a camera that will take nice clear pictures without a lot of programming, or selecting the right settings. I need a basic click and go camera. Unfortunately, the Sony Cybershot DSC-w290 didn't meet my needs.

I took my camera on a trip to visit family, take pictures of my new nephew, and to take pictures at a graduation. The pictures we took outdoors on a cloudy day didn't turn out well. It seemed like the camera kept focusing on objects in the background instead of the background. When we used pictures using the zoom, the pictures were grainy. Most frustrating was that when I took pictures indoors, the pictures were really grainy, and the focus just couldn't get very sharp. One requirement for this camera was that it take pictures indoors in low light--and it couldn't at all. I don't know if this is a problem with this particular camera, but anything we took a picture of that had a lot of white in it (like white tents) there was this weird halo/cloudy effect. I have an older Nikon camera that's a 4 megapixel, and it takes much better pictures.

Overall, I wouldn't recommend buying this camera. I had a Nikon before, and perhaps it's what I'll go back to using.

I like this Sony camera very much. Taking it on vacation next week but have already taken several photos and they look great. The camera is small, easy to use and takes nice photos. The auto mode does everything so all you need to do is point and shoot. The other modes and menus are easy to use and make sense (laid out well). I also bought a screen protector so the screen would not get damaged/scratched if/when you lay it down. I do wish it had a slightly better zoom lens but it's fine for my general use. The battery compartment door seems a bit fragile but I had read about this. It seems to work fine so it has not been an issue.

However, I would not buy from the seller: "Electronics Expo" again. They screwed up on shipping and then offered me a credit to make up for it but ONLY if I would remove my negative feedback from Amazon's website. I refused to remove my negative feedback and they did not credit me. Can you trust the online feedback ratings? Can you be bought? Think about it!

I like this camera very much, the features are amazing and the smile recognition thing is handy with babies. The quality of the pictures and videos are perfect. And the wire connects directly to my T.V which is very convenient and quick for viewing my pictures on my HD TV.

But 2 things I dislike about this camera:

1. You can't zoom when you start video recording. You can before pressing the recording button but once you press it you won't be able to zoom.

2. The video quality is perfect but sometimes I get a glitch or 2 in some of my videos.

I would highly recommend this camera for this price.

Managed to drop my old camera on the beach on holiday, and the zoom became unsurprisingly temperamental, so I needed a replacement in a hurry. Choose the Sony because that's what I know, and have always found them easy to use, and exceptionally quick startup times.

This new generation of cameras really does take things to a new level. Best of all, Sony have rationalized the controls and modes to make the camera even simpler to use than previous generations (whilst still maintaining the flexibility of manual mode).

The photos I have taken so far, all look amazing, with very vivid and accurate colour reproduction, and the HD Video modes look great.

About the only thing I can really fault with the camera, is the lack of a HD video cable in the box, if you want to play HD directly from the camera you need to buy a lead for it. However it's no big deal for me, as I transfer everything to PC first and edit and make my video/picture compositions and play the HD video that way.

In summary, a 5star performer without a doubt.

My husband is a semi pro photographer. Therefore, I reviewed and researched pocket size portable cameras that would give us some memorable shots on our trip to Kauai. There are so many biased reviews it seems on Amazon. Even for different colors of the same model DSCW290, so it was confusing to me, and I am an avid reviewer of things. So anyway, it is our 3rd day of vacation in Kauai and here is our take on this little camera. The Sony DSW-290 is about as thick as a deck of cards. Its zoom is about a 7 score on a scale of 1-10. However, I already knew that ahead of time. The pictures seemed like they were too far away when we were taking them, but when they were displayed on my computer they were fabulous and easy to see everything we were aiming to shoot. I am a shaker and all my pics normally come out blurry, I even shot some amazing photos with this camera. The battery life- lasted about 100 shots and it was toast; so you have to consider the cost of a spare if you plan to shoot a lot (approx $29). Overall, the pictures were just wonderful but hey it's KAUAI! I will post one if I can. I give this camera of 5 rating because you can't have everything perfect for the price range in which we purchased this camera. I love this little camera and I am happy we got it. Moreover, my very picky husband is really pleased with it as well.Sony Cyber-shot DSC-W290 12.1 MP Digital Camera with 5x Optical Zoom and Super Steady Shot Image Stabilization (Silver)

My family loves our new Sony DSC-W290. On the surface it can seem very intimidating, but once you use it a while you will see it is a very easy to use camera. From its Carl Zeiss lens to its massive screen you will see this is a quality digital camera. We have taken about 450 photos so far and most of them have been very good. When there is an issue its almost always operator error. If you see many blurry pics you can fix this by turning the top knob to the EASY menu. From that point on I had hardly any blurry shots.

Pros:

>> Carl Zeiss lens
>> Good quality feel
>> 12.1 MP
>> Easy to point and shoot

Cons:
<< Memory stick - come on Sony the world has moved on, give up the ghost already.
<< Can take blurry photos if you dont RTFM.
<< iffy battery life

All in all a fine digital camera to take with you on trips or whatever.

Thank you for reading my review.