Samsung S730 and S630 First Impressions Review

by Richard Baguley
Published on January 09, 2007

Navigation
Intro	Physical Tour
Components	Design / Layout
Modes	Control Options
Image Parameters	Connectivity / Extras
Overall Impressions	Conclusion

Auto Mode
The full auto mode takes control of most of the features of the camera away from the user and puts them under the purview of the silicon brain buried deep in the camera. The only options that the user can control are image size and sharpness.  

Movie Mode
Movies are captured at a maximum resolution of 640 x 480, with an option to capture at a lower resolution of 320 x 240, both at either 30 frames per second or 15 frames per second. Movies are captured as Motion JPEG files, which tend to be larger and of lower quality than the MPEG-4 files that more expensive camcorders capture. The zoom can be used while filming, but the camera makes the slightly odd move of muting the sound while zooming. This sounds odd, but it is more attractive than the annoying buzzing noise that most cheap zoom mechanisms provide. Mono audio is captured, although this can be disabled if you prefer silent movies to those modern talkies.

Drive / Burst Mode
Samsung didn’t release any information on the number of frames per second that either camera can capture, and we were not able to do any realistic testing on the model that we looked at. Samsung was keen to point out that both the camera and the software on it were pre-production. 

Playback Mode
The playback modes of the S630 and S730 are basic but adequate. Images can be played back singly, as thumbnails showing nine images on screen, or as slideshows. 

Custom Image Presets
As well as the auto and program modes, the S630 and S730 include nine scene modes: Night, Portrait, Landscape, Close-up, Sunset, Dawn, Backlight, Fireworks, Beach & Snow. The first two modes are also available directly from the mode dial that is an interesting touch that makes them easier to access quickly. The portrait mode makes sense here, but the Night mode is an odd choice since we would have preferred to see this valuable dial real estate taken by the Landscape mode.