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CNET editors' review
- CNET editors' rating: stars OK
Detailed editors' rating
- Reviewed on: 11/05/2003
- Released on: 09/15/2003
The 5-megapixel Toshiba PDR-5300 is a near twin of Gateway's DC-T50. Manufactured by Premier Camera, the two models essentially differ only in their firmware and accessories. Both have an adequately competitive design and feature set, but they fall short of the rest of the field when it comes to performance and image quality. The Toshiba, however, does manage to deliver a marginally better shooting experience than the Gateway.
Compared with the T50, the 5300 has a slightly longer life and moderately greater responsiveness. These advantages are due to the Toshiba's 1,035mAh battery, which is more powerful than the Gateway's 950mAh cell. However, the 5300 still turned in subpar performance results. The battery hung on for 275 photos. Shot-to-shot time ran a little longer than 6 seconds typically and stretched a bit past 8 seconds with flash use. Shutter lag came in at around 1.5 seconds; that time is slower than we'd like, but at least it falls within the acceptable range. Thanks to an autofocus-assist lamp, the 5300 behaves well in low light, though it falters on low-contrast objects.
The 5300's white balance was quite impressive, delivering very neutral results under strong tungsten lights.
A close inspection of the 5300's images reveals numerous flaws. The high-contrast pink petal is an example of an edge artifact, color shifts caused the yellow blotches on the book, the entire photo lacks detail, and you can see blurred patches on the rolling pin beside the grapes.
The 5300's white balance, saturation, and exposure were quite good, but our test photos were poor in all other respects. For instance, we spotted fringing in places we'd never expected to find it, and poor compression algorithms resulted in high-contrast edges and blurry patches. Also, the sensor and the firmware somehow combined to produce blotches of color-shifted pixels across entire sections of images.
Otherwise, the 5300 is perfectly amiable. It slips easily into a purse or a shirt pocket. The sensibly labeled controls work as billed, but their relatively small size may frustrate large-fingered users. Just like the T50, the 5300 has a f/2.8-to-f/4.8, 38mm-to-114mm zoom lens; manual, aperture-priority, and shutter-priority modes; and brief video clips with sound.
There are plenty of reasonably priced 5-megapixel--and even some 4-megapixel--cameras that deliver far greater image quality and better performance than the 5300. We suggest you check them out.
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