Sony Cyber-shot DSC-TX1/L 10MP "Exmor R" CMOS Digital Camera with 3-inch Touch-Screen LCD (Blue)

My requirements in a camera are pretty basic: compact for travel, good color values, enough megapixels to maintain clarity when the pictures are shown in class on a data projector, and something convenient for family and pet shots. When I body-slammed my camera and myself to the paving stones of Salisbury, England, my Sony DSC-T9 performed like nothing had happened until I returned home, four days later. Then, it completely kicked the bucket, vibrating uncontrollably and unable to focus. I researched other brands online and in person, but frankly, the color values for Canon, Nikon, Casio,Samsung, and Kodak and the Sony W-series were completely unnatural on the viewing screens. I've been with Sony digital cameras since the first Mavica and I liked what I saw advertised, so took a leap of faith with the TX1. My daughter got the HX1 and after seeing its colors values and features, it was tempting, but bottom line, too bulky for my needs.I've had the DSC TX-1 camera for 24 hours and having mastered the touch screen am running it through its paces:* Low light, wonderful! That will help in museums and the interior of historic homes where flash and tripod are not welcome, not to mention sparing people (especially babies) temporary flash blindness when taking candids at parties.* Panorama? Not a gimmick to me: I can shoot the local lighthouse which means I can shoot cramped cathedrals.* The pet feature is great. Don't laugh, my first dog was a ham and it didn't matter, but the new one's camera shy.* Closeups of the flowers in the garden and some figurines inside without flash came out beautifully.* I tested out the film feature, and caught a pair of squirrels chasing on the fence in perfect clarity (not to mention hilarity.)I don't have an SLR and I don't want one. I'm strictly point and shoot. The memory stick duo is what Sony uses; save to an external hard drive (you're going to need one either for the quantity of VGA photos or the memory required to store all your 10.2 megapixel treasures) and re-use to bring down your expenses if the price differential with other media is such a big factor. Maybe I should know what "noise" is without having to look it up, but I don't. The outdoor and indoor pictures look just fine, even at full magnification. I haven't transferred them to the computer, but I don't show my pictures on my computer. Neither do I have a huge HD television, nor a super-duper printer for printing large images on photo paper. If you're like me, then you probably won't see odd color flecks either (that's what noise is, for the uninitiated.)For me, it's a sweet little camera, a perfect fit. Did I pay too much? Having the first decent portrait of my three-year-old Sheltie, in glorious true sable and white color (unlike the competition), is worth every penny I paid.

I've owned Sony cameras for years and would never look at another brand of camera, until now. It seems like something has changed in the recent years. My older Sony Digital Cameras worked great in all conditions - low light, outside, indoors. I never had a problem with blurriness or noise in my pictures. But my camera broke down last summer after years of use on vacations (at beaches and on the run), and I was forced to get a new camera. At first I looked at the Sony W290. I looked at the reviews and they were mixed, but I gave it a shot. Not happy. All I got were very blurry pictures which was a huge disappointment after never having this problem in the past. So I moved on to the Sony TX1, which was a GRATE improvement. I love the design and the style of the camera. It's a great pocket camera and it seems to have conquered the low light issues, to a point at least. I love the features of this camera, but I'm still tossed about it, which is why I'm only giving it 4 stars. I have a couple concern.First, some Pros:- Very stylish camera.- Love the touch screen. Very easy to use once you get into it.- The indoor shots seem pretty good (I'm still working on this. It still doesn't seem to be as good as my "old" cameras).- Love the neat features, like the screen shows with music, panaromic shots, HD video, face detection. All of these things make this camera very "hip" and up to the times.My concerns:- Small zoom. For a camera of this price, I feel it needs a much better zoom. 7x would give more flexibility when taking pictures. It seems like most the Sony models lack on the zoom capability.- Taking HD Video takes up so much space on the memory card. Be prepared to download to the computer, or a portable computer drive that stores a lot of gigs. I still struggle with how to edit these HD files and put them together to form a movie and burn to a DVD. The documents say you can take video in lower version, but I haven't figured that out either. It seems all my video files are HUGE. This could be my user error, so I take some responsibility, it just seems like this should be easy to accomplish.Overall it's a great point and shoot camera. Some people might not like the touch screen, but it's actually quite easy to manipulate. In the end the video capability might be too advanced for me and I had to return it in lieu of basic video functions. I need to educate myself on this...being able to edit and play with the HD video files.