Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T70 review (Silver)

Image quality is impressive, with nice color accuracy and accurate exposures that tend to preserve shadow detail at the expense of highlight detail when forced to compromise. We also saw almost no colored fringing in our test photos. The camera's automatic white balance does a good job of neutralizing color under natural daylight or fluorescent lights, but turns in overly yellow results with incandescent lighting. However, its tungsten setting impressively neutralized our extremely yellow hot lights. The camera lens showed little in the way of distortion at its furthest telephoto setting, though you may notice some minor barrel distortion at its widest setting.

The camera captures a very good amount of detail, but, as usual, noise tends to obscure that when you reach higher ISOs. Noise remains well under control through ISO 200, but becomes noticeable at ISO 400 with a gentle speckling of off-color spots and a slight erosion of finer details, such as the texture of fabrics or strands of hair. At ISO 800, details like these blur away more, some shadow detail becomes lost, and images take on a more distinct grainy look. By ISO 1,600, so much fine detail and shadow detail is lost, and the grain becomes so heavy that I wouldn't count on being able to get decent prints, even at smaller sizes. I'd suggest steering clear of ISO 3,200 altogether and stay at ISO 800 and below if you plan on making prints.

If you don't mind the idea of a touch screen, and indeed some people find them appealing, then Sony's Cyber-shot DSC-T70 is definitely worth a look. For its price, it offers impressive performance and very nice image quality as long as you stick with the lower half of its ISO settings, which still gives you plenty of leeway in most shooting conditions. Add to that its optical image stabilization, various convenience features, and a very attractive body design, and you've got a nice little camera. Now if only they'd offer a non-touch-screen version, I'd be a happy camper.

Shooting speed (in seconds)
(Smaller bars indicate better performance)

Typical shot-to-shot time

Time to first shot

Shutter lag (typical)

Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T70

1.3 

1.5 

0.4 

Canon PowerShot SD1000

1.5 

1 

0.5 

Fujifilm FinePix F50fd

2.9 

1.8 

0.5 

Nikon Coolpix S51c

3.4 

4.2 

0.9