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| The 8-megapixel DiMAGE X1 is extremely compact and represents a fusion of Konica Minoltas best imaging technologies including the revolutionary Anti-Shake technology and high-resolution movie clips both a first for the DiMAGE X line to provide the best image quality possible. To accommodate the cameras high resolution while keeping the body as slim as possible, the DiMAGE X1 employs a newly designed non- protruding 3x optical zoom lens.
 The DiMAGE X1 is equipped with a large, 2.5-inch LCD monitor that features a Bright LCD backlight function, which lets users adjust the LCD brightness as needed with the simple touch of a button. For the first time ever in the DiMAGE X series, the DiMAGE X1 offers Anti-Shake capability to help reduce the effects of camera shake, ensuring clear, steady shots of scenes that are otherwise difficult to shoot by hand such as in low light situations or indoors. The DiMAGE X1 makes taking clear, high-quality images effortless with a Digital Subject Program Selection that offers pre-programmed settings for seven common photo scenes: Portrait, Landscape, Sunset, Super Macro, Night Portrait, Night View, and Text. Users simply choose the mode best suited to their shooting conditions, and the DiMAGE X1 is ready in an instant with the optimum settings to turn that special moment into a beautiful memory. For the first time ever in the DiMAGE X series, the DiMAGE X1 offers recording of smooth, high-resolution VGA (640x480 dots) movie clips with sound. Anti-Shake technology and auto focus combine to ensure amazingly clear images. While recording, users can even get even closer to the action using the 3x optical zoom without losing image quality. The DiMAGE X1 records movies in JPEG (MOV) format and is compatible with QuickTime for playing images back on a computer. The DiMAGE X1 is the first-ever Konica Minolta digital camera to come with its own convenient multifunction cradle. The cradle eliminates cumbersome cable arrangements and provides quick and easy connectivity for uploading and viewing images directly on a Computer or TV. The DiMAGE X1 multifunction cradle can also operate as a battery charger, which can either charge the battery by itself or the battery when its inside the camera. The cradle can even position the LCD monitor forward so you can use it as an image viewer. DiMAGE X1 Features: - 8-megapixel, 1/1.8-type CCD captures images in clear, ultra-high resolution
- Konica Minoltas proprietary CxProcess III image processing technology reproduces images as clearly and naturally as they appear to the photographers eye
- Newly developed, compact Anti-Shake system for clear, steady shots
- New flat 3x Optical Zoom lens doesn't protrude even when zooming
- Large, 2.5-inch LCD monitor ensures a clear view even under bright light
- Ultra-slim, sleek, and elegant body with a luxurious finish
- Digital Program modes: portrait, super macro, landscape, sunset, night view, night portrait and text
- Multi-segment and spot metering modes
- 640x480 motion video with Anti-Shake and audio, length limited only by SD card capacity
- Automatic noise-reduction for one second or longer exposures
- 5 white-balance settings including custom settings
- Digital Effects Control for contrast and sharpness
- Color modes: Natural, B&W, Sepia
- ISO Sensitivity: Auto, 50, 100, 200 equivalents
- Playback/QuickView with histogram feature
- 32MB SD card supplied
- Rechargeable Li-ion battery
- Multifunction cradle offers ideal connectivity with a computer or television
- PictBridge, Exif Print, and Epson PRINT Image Matching II compatible
Physical Views(NOTE: The DiMAGE X1 is -not- a two-tone colored camera as it may appear below, it's very reflective and nearly impossible to photograph correctly sitting on a white surface.)
 
The DiMAGE X1 compared in size to a standard CD. 
The 5-megapixel Kodak V550 and the DiMAGE X1. |
Features & Controls
 The DiMAGE X1 is very trim, measuring a mere 19.5 millimeters thick, thanks to a non- protruding, 3x optical zoom lens. This all-glass lens is constructed of 12 elements, 2 aspherical, in 10 groups and provides for an equivalent focal range of 37 to 111mm. The maximum aperture is F3.5 to F3.8. The lens is covered by an automatic protective cover when the camera is powered off. The auto focus system is a contrast type with a Normal range of approx. 0.1 m (3.9 in.) Wide angle / 0.4 m (15.7 in.) Telephoto to infinity. The Super Macro closeup range is from 0.05 m (2.0 in.) to infinity. There are Spot and Wide (5-point) AF modes with focus lock available.  The built-in flash has modes for: Auto, Auto + Red-eye Reduction, Forced Flash, Suppressed Flash and Slow Synchro. The flash effective range is unspecified by the manufacturer.  The X1 lacks an optical viewfinder, the large 2.5-inch color TFT LCD monitor is used as the live viewfinder with 100% frame coverage.
Controls on the back:
On the top are the zoom lens controls. They function as the Index and Zoom buttons in playback mode.
The 4-way selector is used for selecting images in review mode and accessing the menu system. The center button accepts selections. The top-left button puts the camera in record or playback mode. The top-right button controls the amount of data shown on the LCD. The MENU (bottom-left) button calls up and dismisses the menu screens The bottom-right button changes the Flash mode and in playback is used to Delete images.
 Controls on top: The shutter release, power button and mode selector switch for record mode; still, scene or movie/audio.  The X1 is equipped with a SD//MMC card slot and is supplied with a 32MB SD card. It's compatible with any SD card up to 2GB. The NP-1 battery is also located in this compartment. The 32MB SD card can hold approx. 9 Fine 8-megapixel images, 13 in Standard quality and 27 in Economy. In movie mode it can capture up to 29 seconds of VGA quality action or 70 seconds in the lower QVGA resolution. You can definitely see the need for a much larger SD card, we recommend at least a 1GB size card.  Power is supplied by a proprietary NP-1 Li-ion 3.7v 820mAh rechargeable battery. It will provide enough power to capture up to 200 shots per charge and is recharged whenever the camera is placed in the included cradle.  The included cradle provides a home for your X1 camera. The battery is automatically charged whenever the camera is in the cradle. You can view an automatic slideshow on a TV if it's connected with the A/V cable.  On the side of the cradle is the combination USB (12 mbps max.) and Audio-Video port for connection to a TV for playback, it's selectable for NTSC or PAL standard. The USB port is for downloading data to your computer - a PictBridge compatible printer can also be connected for direct-printing. | Record Modes & Menu Options (Note: The X1 does not output video in Record mode, therefore these screen captures are from the X60. The Appearance and some settings may differ.)
The AUTO mode is a pure point-n-shoot fully automatic exposure mode and is good for most normal shooting conditions. When you want a little more specialized control then use the DSP mode. The default for Digital Subject Program (DSP) mode is Portrait selection, the user can manually select from seven modes (portrait, super macro, landscape, beach&surf, night scene, night portrait, or text) by pressing the 4-way controller Right or Left. The zoom lens features Auto Macro and automatically covers the normal to closeup range of 3.9 inches - infinity, selecting Super Macro mode will let you get as close as 2 inches. Record mode menu: Page 1
Drive mode - single, self timer, continuous
Image Size - 3264x2448, 2560x1920, 2048x1536, 1600x1200, 640x480
Quality - Fine, Standard, Economy
White balance - Auto or Preset (Daylight, Cloudy, Tungsten, Fluorescent)
Anti-Shake - Display + Exposure, Exposure only, Off Page 2
Sensitivity - Auto, 50, 100, 200
Metering mode - MultiSegment or Spot
Exp comp - Exposure compensation 2.0EV in 0.3 steps
Inst. Playback - On/Off
LCD backlight - Normal or Bright Page 3
Color mode - Color, B&W or Sepia
Sharpness - Normal, Hard, Soft
Contrast - Normal, High, Low
Digital zoom - Enable/disable Digital zoom
Date imprint - Put date/time stamp on the image Page 4
Up/Down Key func. - Choose Drive mode, Exp. comp., White balance, Sensitivity, Off
Left/Right Key func. - Choose Drive mode, Exp. comp., White balance, Sensitivity, Off The X1 can be used like a voice recorder in Audio mode. About 31 minutes and 47 seconds of audio can be recorded using the supplied 32MB SD card. Recording data storage is approx. 16KB/sec and a maximum of 180 minutes can be recorded at one time; and optional AC adapter is required for long recordings. In Movie mode you can record motion video with audio. You can choose an image size or 640x480 or 320x240. The length of a video clip is limited only by the amount of available memory on your SD card. The optical zoom can be used when recording if it is enabled via the Movie record menu. Movies can be recorded in one of two modes: Standard produces a normal movie clip, Night Movie uses higher sensitivity to record in low-light so the image quality can be lower. X1 SETUP menu options: LCD brightness - Adjust the LCD brightness
Auto reset - On/Off, restores factory settings when camera is powered off.
Language - Chose the menu language Audio signals - Change or turn off audio sound effects
Focus signals - Change or turn off focus sound effects
Shutter FX - Change or turn off Shutter sound effects
Volume - Adjusts volume of camera sounds
Power save - Choose 1 - 30 minutes. Reset default - Restore original settings
File #memory - Sequentially number images
Folder name - Choose the method for creating folder names
Date/Time set - Set the camera's clock and calendar
Date format - format in which date is displayed
Video output - NTSC or PAL format
Transfer mode - Specify camera use with a computer or printer
Firmware ver. - Displays current firmware version
| Playback Modes & Menu Options | When you enter playback mode the last image captured is displayed full screen with overlay data for file folder and number, image resolution and quality, time and date. If an audio memo has been recorded then you will see the musical note icon and a Play prompt at the top of the screen. Pressing the Wide angle zoom control activates the thumbnail index mode shown above. Once you select an image to be viewed, pressing the Telephoto zoom control will display the image fullscreen. A full-screen image can be enlarged 1.2x to 6x in 0.2x steps by pressing the telephoto zoom button. Once an image is enlarged you can scroll around inside of it using the 4-way selector. Using the Crop Frame function in the playback menu allows you to select an area and save it as a separate image. Movie clips can be viewed on the LCD with the audio played back on the internal speaker or you can view them on a TV via the supplied Audio-Video cable. While viewing your movies, you get VCR type controls for pause, rewind, fast forward and volume. Pressing the Menu button will stop playback. The Play mode menu: Page 1 Delete - Delete current frame, marked frames or all frames
Format - Format the SD card
AudioCaption - Add a 15-sec audio memo to image file
Lock - Lock (protect) current frame, marked frames, all frames Page 2 Slide show - Start automatic playback
Dissolve - Enable a random dissolve effect for slideshow frames
Crop frame - Crop a portion of a still image and save as new image Page 3
DPOF set - Select images for printing
Date Print - Print the date with DPOF images
Index Print - Create an index print with the DPOF order
E-mail copy - Create smaller size image for e-mail
Up to a 15-second audio memo can be recorded and attached to still images using the Audio Caption option. | Steve's Conclusion | The DiMAGE X1 is the most resolute X series model we have seen from Konica Minolta (as of 9/2005), featuring an 8-megapixel imager with Anti-Shake technology, 3x internal optical zoom lens, large 2.5-inch LCD, all packed in a durable metal exterior. This is a diminutive point-n-shoot that offers fully automatic exposure control, with some manual adjustments for ISO, white balance, exposure compensation, metering, etc. There's also seven different scene modes (portrait, super macro, landscape, beach&surf, night scene, night portrait, or text) choosing from those allows users to capture great looking images in a wide variety of shooting conditions. I was pleased with the X1's ergonomics. Although this is the smallest model we have worked with from Konica Minolta, I found it was easy to hold (even with large hands), and one-handed shooting was no problem at all. Its metal exterior helps ensure it will stand the test of time, however it's shinny finish is very prone to finger prints. Controls are arranged for quick and easy access and the menu system is logically organized. We especially like the ability to customize the Up/Down and Left/Right functions of the 4-way controller. Its large 2.5-inch LCD covers about 2/3 of the back side of the camera. Outdoors it works great with only a few angles that reflect the sun. However when shooting in low-ambient lighting the display fails to gain up making it difficult to see your subject in these conditions. Shooting performance was below average for a camera in this class. From power up to first image captured measured about 3.5 seconds. Shutter lag was 1/10 of a second when pre-focused and 8/10 of a second including auto-focus. The shot to shot delay averaged 3.2 seconds without the flash and 4 - 6 seconds with the flash, depending on how far away your subject is. The X1 offers several burst modes to choose from (Continuous advance, UHS continuous, Progressive, UHS Progressive, Multi Frame.) Using Continuous advance, I was able to capture 4 images in about 6.6 seconds. UHS Continuous mode captured 15 640x480 sized images in only 1.6 seconds. Progressive mode allows you to capture images at about 1 frame per second, saving only the last two frames. UHS Progressive captures records at about the same rate as UHS Continuous, but it allows you to continuously capture images and then only saves the last 15 when you finish. Multi Frame captures 9 images in about 2.8 seconds and then saves them as a single 2048x1536 image. When using either of these modes, the LCD blanks out momentarily in between each frame, making it very difficult to follow a moving subject; this is when an optical viewfinder would come in handy. Our tests were done using a SanDisk Extreme III 1GB SD card, Program mode, preview off, flash off, with all other settings at default (unless otherwise noted.) Times may vary depending on lighting conditions, camera settings, media, etc. The image quality of its 8-megapixel Fine images was good, but not great. Outdoors it produced relatively sharp results, with the majority of our sample images being well exposed and showing good color saturation. The white balance and exposure systems did very well in a wide variety of lighting conditions. Noise levels were a little above average for a consumer digicam, and I noticed large amounts present in red subjects. You can see an example of this by looking at the red tractor photo on our samples page. The AF system did a good job focusing in low light situations, although it would benefit greatly from an AF-assist lamp. When shooting in a very dimly lit room, it will fail more often than not. Its Anti-Shake system really comes in handy, allowing you to capture images at slower than normal shutter speeds. Most users would ask why anti-shake on a camera with such a small zoom? Well, you have to take into consideration its very small size. We found it helped out best during movie recording, when holding a small camera steady is very difficult. The X1 records video at VGA (640x480) or QVGA (320x240) resolution with audio. Unlike most digicams that record sound, you may use the optical zoom during recording when the option is enabled via the menu. I found the zoom did OK when keeping up with moving subjects; just make sure you zoom very slowly if at all, presetting the zoom before hand always produces better results. There's a variety of options when using Movie mode, it allows you to adjust white balance, exposure compensation and color modes. I was pleased with our movie samples, they were sharp and showed the usual amount of compression artifacts. When shooting indoors I was surprised by the power of its tiny flash. While it can't illuminate a large open room, you should be pleased with your individual and group portraits. Konica Minolta does not specify a range, but we found it worked well up to about 8 - 10 feet when using ISO Auto. The X1 did very well at macro photography. You can focus on a subject at about 4 inches (0.1m) from the lens or get as close as 2 inches (0.05m) with its Super Macro mode. It also controls the flash well by throttling down to ensure you don't overexpose the subject. This would be handy when shooting product shots of items for inclusion at online auctions. Power comes from a small NP-1 Li-ion 3.7v 820mAh proprietary Lithium-ion rechargeable battery that is charged in-camera when seated in the supplied docking cradle. Minolta claims that you can capture up to 200 shots with a fully charged pack (based on CIPA Standards.) During our use we were able to capture about 90 shots and complete our other tests before it displayed a battery exhausted warning. As with most cameras that use a proprietary battery pack, we recommend you purchase a second battery and keep it charged just in case. Bottom line - the Konica Minolta DiMAGE X1 will appeal to many users who are in the market for a stylish and durable digicam that features a high resolution imager. This ultra-compact model's size allows it to be carried in almost any size pocket, however, with its so-so performance, you'll have alot less chances of capturing those spontaneous moments. Although we were a little disappointed with the quality of its 8-megapixel images, they still produce pleasing prints up to 13x19-inches. With a MSRP of only $399 it offers a good value for an 8-megapixel consumer camera, however we feel you should take a look at some other manufactures models in this price range like Canon's Powershot SD500, Nikon's Coolpix 7900, or Sony's Cyber-Shot P200, just to name a few. Even though they might have less resolution, the quality of their images and speedy performance make up for it. |
DiMAGE X1 Specifications | No. of effective pixels | Approx.8.0 million | | CCD | 1 / 1.8-type interline primary-color CCD with a total of approx.
8.3 million pixels | | Lens | 7.7 - 23.1 mm (35 mm format equivalent: 37 - 111 mm),
f / 3.5 - f / 3.8; 12 elements in 10 groups | | Start-up time | Approx. 0.9 seconds | | Digital zoom | 4X (Max.) (12X zoom range with optical zoom) | | Recording media | SD Memory Cards / MultiMediaCards | | File format | JPEG, DCF2.0, DPOF(supported by printing function in ver.1.1), Exif 2.2, Motion JPEG (MOV) | | No. of recorded pixels Storage capacity* (using 32 MB card) | 3264 x 2448, 2560 x 1920, 2048 x 1536, 1600 x 1200, 640 x 480 3264 x 2448 (Still) Economy: 27, Standard: 13, Fine: 9
(Movie) 640x480 29 seconds, 320x240 70 seconds
The actual number of images may vary depending upon the subject and the media used. | | Autofocus system | Video AF, Focus lock available | | Autofocus area | Spot or wide (5-point AF) | | Focusing range | Wide-angle: 0.1 m (3.9 inches) to infinity, Telephoto:0.4m(15.7 inches) to infinity, Super macro mode: 0.05 m (2.0 inches) to infinity (from the front of the camera) | | Exposure control | Programmed AE, AE lock available | | Exposure compensation | +/-2EV in 1/3 increments | | Metering | Multi-segment (300 segments) / Spot | | Camera sensitivity | Auto, ISO 50, 100, 200 equivalent | | Shutter speeds | 1 - 1/1250 seconds | | Drive mode | Single-frame advance, Self-timer, Continuous advance, UHS continuous advance, Progressive Capture, UHS Progressive Capture, Multi frame | | Continuous advance | Approx. 0.5 frames per second (Number of frames: Approx. 3 frames, 3264 x 2448, Standard), Progressive capture selectable. | | Self-timer | Approx. 10 second delay | | Movie recording | Frame rate: 20fps / Recording time: Until the memory card is full / with monaural audio | | White-balance control | Automatic, Preset (Daylight, Cloudy, Tungsten, Fluorescent) | | Flash mode | Autoflash, Autoflash with red-eye reduction, Fill-flash, Flash cancel, Slow sync | | LCD monitor | 2.5-inch (6.3cm) low-temperature polysilicon TFT color, Total pixels: 118,000 (approx.) | | Printing output control | Exif Print, Print Image Matching III, PictBridge | | PC interface | USB (Full-speed 12 Mbps data transfer with a USB 2.0 compatible computer) (cradle CA-1 required) | | AV output | NTSC / PAL (selectable on the camera) (cradle CA-1 required) | | Battery | One NP-1 Lithium-ion Battery | | Battery performance | Continuous playback time: approx. 140 minutes, based on Konica Minolta's standard test method with NP-1 Lithium-ion Battery / Number of recordings: Approx.150 frames, based on CIPA (Camera & Imaging Products Association) standard with an NP-1 Lithium-ion Battery and an SD Memory Card | | External power source | 4.7V DC (with specified AC Adapter Set) | | Digital Subject Program Selection | Portrait, Super Macro, Landscape, Sunset, Night View, Night Portrait and Text | | Color mode | Color, B / W, and Sepia | | Additional functions | Instant playback, Date imprinting, Key customization | Dimensions
(W x H x D) | 95 x 68 x 19.5 mm / 3.7 x 2.7 x 0.8 inches (except for projection) | | Weight | Approx. 135g / 4.8 ounces (without battery and recording media) | | Standard accessories | Lithium-ion Battery (NP-1), Cradle Set (CA-1), Hand strap (HG-DG150), USB cable (USB-3), SD Memory Card (32MB), AV cable (AVC-700), Digital camera software CD-ROM* | | Optional accessories | Metal chain neck strap (NS-DG100), AC Adapter Set, Marine case (MC-DG1) | | (Specifications as represented by the manufacturer)
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