Casio Exilim EX-S2 Review

8/10

The EX-S2 camera is stylish looking with a sharp stainless steel case and is incredibly intuitive to use; perfect for any occasion

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Highs: Extremely fun to use, feature rich

Lows: High price, average photo quality

By: Ian Bell
Date: April 24, 2003

Casio has introduced the successor to the Exilim EX-S1 digital camera with the EX-S2. The EX-S2 camera is stylish looking with a sharp stainless steel case and is incredibly intuitive to use; perfect for any occasion.

Summary

The Casio EX-S2 is an extremely fun camera to use. There are a lot of features for the size of the EX-S2 but for $279 dollars we would like to have seen optical zoom and sound recording capabilities. We also would have liked to have seen USB 2.0 support. With SD memory cards now reaching up to 1 GB in size, transferring that much data over USB 1.1 connection can get incredibly time consuming. The EX-S2 would have received an editor’s choice award if it either had more features or a smaller price tag. Overall the EX-S2 is an extremely solid product and those looking for a slim digital camera in this price range should consider the EX-S2 a serious contender.

Introduction

In Japan, small and sleek is in. From laptops to video game consoles, if consumer electronics are too large in size they simply will not sell. While in the US the opposite may be true, times are changing and small is starting to look better each day. Americans are quickly jumping onto the small electronics band wagon as is the case with mobile phones, and digital cameras are no exception; size matters when you are on the run. Casio is not new to this concept; their first generation Exilim cameras were a big hit both in Japan and stateside. Casio has introduced the successor to the Exilim EX-S1 digital camera with the EX-S2. The EX-S2 camera is stylish looking with a sharp stainless steel case and is incredibly intuitive to use; perfect for any occasion. Did we mention the size of the Exilim EX-S2? The EX-S2 is only 11mm thick, and can fit behind a credit card; it is that small. The Exilim series digital cameras from Casio are some of the smallest camera’s in the world featuring a TFT color LCD display.

Features

The EX-S2 sports a higher 2.0 mega pixel CCD imager than the EX-S1 and can take still images in 1600×1200, 1280×960 and 640×480 resolutions; large enough to produce a native 8”1/2x 11 picture. The EX-S2 also can take up to 30 second AVI movie files (with no sound) at 320×240 and has a 4x digital zoom. Pictures are taken using the beautiful 1.6” TFT/ 354×240 color LCD. If you currently have an Exilim EX-S1 you will probably find little reason to upgrade since the only noticeable difference is a higher resolution CCD imager. To those critical enough, the difference in resolutions between the two models may be enough reason to justify upgrading; if not then you should probably wait until next year’s model before upgrading.

The Exilim EX-S2 uses a 1/1.8-inch progressive CCD which is larger than the ½.7-inch CCD found in most mainstream cameras allowing for the largest cell (4.4 micron pitch) in its class. What is truly unique about the Exilim camera’s is that they use a multi-chip module which includes the CPU, ASIC, SDRAM and flash memory integrated on the same circuit board module. This allows the Exilim camera to be small and feature rich. Included with the Exilim camera is a 3.7V 360mAh Lithium-Ion battery smaller than most cell phone batteries. The EX-S2 is charged via the included USB docking station and AC adapter.

Performance

This first picture is under indoor normal lighting positions and using the Sepia image filter. Image was taken on “fine” setting and at 1600×1200 resolution.