Umax (Yamada) Astrapix 550 is a nifty little number

FOR OBSCURE REASONS, reviews tend to concentrate on hardware at the apex of technological chain. But let's face it, most of us will tend to buy affordable products, those that don't compel us to remortgage the house or sell the car. Many will never hit reviewers' desks although they may be more worthy than their price tag. The Yamada Astrapix 550 falls in that category. Umax manufactures this product in an original equipment manufacturing (OEM) arrangement. The Yamada brand also includes cheap DVD players, DVD-recorders and home cinema systems.

Available only in Europe, this is a camera with a twist combining other functions like a digital camcorder, an MP3 player, a removable storage, a webcam and voice recorder; all for the svelte price of £46.99 inc. VAT. The real innovation here is the MP3 player which was pioneered by Fuji back in 2000 with the Finepix 40i at nearly $700. Now, for this price in the UK, you would probably get a 1.3MP digital camera like this one, so I was a bit wary about the “too-good-to-be-true" syndrome.

The Yamada Astrapix 550 is found at the lowest rung of the Yamada range of cameras just above the Astrapix 530. Oddly, it is the only one of the range offering CF instead of the usual SD/MMC cards. It may have a plastic feel but is certainly more appealing than comparable offers from similar manufacturers (Mustek, Aiptek or Trust). It has a fixed focal and it uses a half-inch progressive scan CMOS sensor to produce 1600x1200 pixels images (hardware interpolated to 2048x1536) in (JPEG format) which can be compressed from a ratio of 4 to 16, with 4 giving better results. It has a 9.2mm lens (equivalent to a 47.4mm in the 35mm world) which has a F number of 2.8, depth of field as from 60cm and field of view is 53o.

A USB 1.1 interface as well as a TV Out/Audio socket allow it to communicate with the outer world. A small 1.6"TFT 80,000 pixel screen as well as the optical viewfinder enables previewing images though the first one is more practical. Onboard memory is limited to 7Mb but expansion is available via a Compact Flash Slot.

Be aware that (1) your CF card should be formatted to FAT-16 to be detected by the camera or an error message will pop up and (2) using a CF card disables access to the 7Mb onboard memory.

Using a CF card does have its advantages even if this format is slowly losing ground. Large capacities are available at a reasonable price. A 512Mb Secure Digital card carries a 56% premium over its Compact Flash counterpart while a couple of 1Gb CF cards are available under £100 (USD 156 in the states). As a rough rule, a 512Mb card will hold 550 photos (best setting at maximum resolution and lowest compression), around 9 hours of CD quality MP3 songs, 36 hours of audio notes and 90 minutes of video. The CF insertion mechanism is a little tricky though and requires some learning.

Though you can learn the basics of that camera all by yourself in less than hour, you would be better off browsing through the online manual found on the CDROM. Installing the camera on a computer require you to install the driver first then to set the rotary dial to “storage media"and select mass storage instead of WDM; quite a tedious step. Controls are non intuitive and let you wonder whether this camera has been designed with a normal customer in mind.

Images produced tend to be a little bit grainy under low light and the flash tends to be a little too powerful at close range. The latter can be either disabled, forced enabled or put on an auto mode. Nothing that cannot be mended though. Despeckling the image removes the “graininess" while playing with contrast and brightness adds more life to the photos. You can control white balance and exposure Also the camera is very sensitive to shakes especially at the highest resolution. It is therefore not advisable to use highest resolutions to capture rapidly moving objects (Shutter speed varies from 1/10 sec to 1/1000 sec). The Astrapix 550 only has a digital zoom of 4x in four steps.

But who would expect an optical zoom at that price? It does its job fairly but is disabled at the highest resolution. The camera can be mounted on a tripod if needed. Short audio notes can be added to images. As for MP3 part, the Yamada provides a very basic reader. It does not allow any filename with more than eight letters and does not have any sound option such as volume control. But you can repeat songs and the LCD screen does display names. More sophisticated users might be turned down but the prospect of having a 1 Gb MP3 player for less than £130 is tantalising.

The earphones provided with the Astrapix 550 are not what you will want to carry around with you since they are combined with the TV out jack. On a positive note, it also plays MP3 with bit rates other than 128kbps and delivers a good sound on a wide range of songs I played. But don't expect to play music while trying to take some photos.

The video part is the most interesting one. It does allow hour-long AVI movies to be produced with sound; only limit is memory. Quality is sub-VHS but you can live with it; do a small clip and watch your audience reaction when you view it directly on the telly with the sound. It can't be quicker on a camcorder, real plug and play. Resolution is 320x240 and quality depends heavily on lighting conditions.

The software provided is Photomanager 2.1. I'd personally advise you to skip it and stick with your usual photo editor. If you don't have one, download GIMP or any other decent free photo editor. You might also want to download the lastest firmware on Umax's website just to be on the safe side. The camera comes only with a smallish pocket guide (though the one on the CDROM is 71 pages). I bought this camera together with a 128Mb CF card for less than £55 and a USB charger with 4 NiMH cells for a tenner.

As added bonuses, the camera is compatible with Linux and Windows 98 onwards and is DOPF-compatible meaning photos can be obtained directly from a printer without going through the PC. Accessories included a USB cable, a hybrid TV-out/headphone cable, usual driver CD, a carry case and four Alkaline batteries. Can it be considered as a good buy? The Astrapix 550 provides with fantastic value for money especially considering the state of the competition for that sum of money. It might have a number of shortcomings but everything is forgiven when the price is considerd. It can be purchased at ebuyer.com. Just insert 51451 in the search field. µ

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