If there is a camera that can set the hearts of fashionistas racing, the Cyber-shot T200 certainly deserves pole position. While we have seen some lackluster efforts which have tried squeezing onto the starting line with a new lick of paint, the Cyber-shot T200 kicks throttle with an improved chassis over its predecessor, the Cyber-shot T100.

Design of the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T200 Digital Camera

Whatever your tech heart tells you (i.e. going for a higher megapixel count), it's hard to remember its advice when you are gazing upon a well-designed piece of kit--even when that 3-megapixel lemon is sitting next to a high-spec, high-zoom beast of a camera.

The Cyber-shot T200 is an animal along the lines of the former. It's wonderfully sleek. And it's a close replica of the awarding-winning Cyber-shot T100, so it's good to know that the Japanese firm understands the need for not fixing what's not broken.

The slider cover remains identical. It's a large panel that protects the microphone, lens and flash all at the same time. And it still has that nice, solid snap when you flick it up or down. Compared with some flimsy sliders we've tried, this Sony's got quality.


Yet, while the classics are still there, some have gone missing. The joypad controls on the Cyber-shot T100's back have been replaced by a 3.5-inch LCD. In fact, leftover buttons have migrated to the camera top and, they look and feel… a little cramped.

But turn on the touchscreen and you may feel a little forgiving. It's like watching TV. And the LCD has a large viewing angle, so you can compose pictures even when you are looking at the display from a close to 90-degree angle. Experienced photographers may disdain the LCD in favor of a viewfinder, though, the average consumer would find it easier to frame with the larger screen.


The camera menu is pretty much touch-and-go, literally. You can press a part of the screen to select a focus point or you can scribble over the recorded image in red ink. Because it's a touchscreen, there are more hotkeys (peppered over the display) than the Cyber-shot T100, so options are now more accessible. But all these aren't new; early Sony Handycams used touch-based controls. There's also the matter of subjectivity--not everyone likes non-tactile buttons.

Features of the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T200 Digital Camera

The 3.5-inch LCD is a bit of a mirage. For one, the Cyber-shot T200 doesn't use the entire screen for framing, which leaves two black bars on the sides. During image playback, you do not enjoy the benefit of a full screen, either.


In both cases, the T200 is using just 2.8 inches for the display, while the T100 flaunts more screen space. There is a widescreen option for the T200, but what it does essentially is to crop an image temporarily to a 16:9 aspect ratio, so some visual details will be lost.

In playback mode, you can also tweak color, correct red-eye, and even apply different effects such as fish-eye and blur filters, all within the camera. Most of these are available on the T100 as well, but it's instinctively easier when you are manipulating an image using a touchscreen.

The Cyber-shot T200 can also output MP3-playing slideshows to standard-definition TVs with the included video cable, or to high-definition TVs with an optional component-video cable.

Under the hood, the heart of the T200 is almost the same as the T100. They both have the same 8-megapixel resolution, same 3,200 ISO cap and 5x optical zoom. However, the T200 does have an additional 10 scene modes.

Smile Factor

The face detection mode (it focuses and tracks faces) on the Cyber-shot T200 isn't worth grinning about since it's so commonplace, but the Smile Shutter may be worth it for some.

As the name literally suggests, the shutter mechanism is activated by your subject's smile. He beams and the camera takes a picture immediately. But smiles can vary from a mild smirk to a laughing-your-head-off guffaw. To remedy that, Sony lets you set three levels of grin detection, but it still isn't foolproof.

"Can you smile a little bit more?"

Your friend shows more teeth.

"Not good. I think you need to grin harder than that."

He puts on his best Cheshire cat impression.

"Nope, nope. Hey, don't look at me like that. It's the camera that thinks you aren't smiling enough."

Things get more interesting in a group photo. If someone in the group flashes the correct grin before everyone else, the camera will just snap the picture anyway. And it's no laughing matter, if you have to keep repeating the shot just because someone has a stubborn smile.

Performance of the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T200 Digital Camera

In lab tests, the T200 lacked the performance grunt that marked the T100 as a winner. The T200 took 1.98 seconds to start up and time to first shot was a slow 3.8 seconds. This is even slower than the new Panasonic FX-33 (2.9 seconds).

Its shot-to-shot time (1.58 seconds without flash) was just average among 8-megapixel cameras and its shutter lag (0.9 second with pre-focus) was one of the slowest. However, the burst mode performance (2.1fps) ranks as one of the best in its category.

Image Quality of the Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T200 Digital Camera

The Cyber-shot T200 takes decent pictures, but image noise is its bane. Even at ISO 400, we were already detecting noise and nitpickers would probably not even consider light sensitivity settings above that. ISO 800 should be the furthest ventured as anything beyond that is plagued with plenty of detail softening and speckled noise.

We did not detect noticeable purple fringing and the autofocus churned out accurately sharp pictures.

The auto white balance was accurate in most types of lighting conditions, whether it was in a fluorescent or tungsten environment. However, Sony did not include a custom white balance option.