Though I'm not fond of the G1's design, I do understand Sony's predicament: creating a slim camera with a huge display doesn't leave you a lot of flexibility to actually make it usable. It's rather ironic that Sony chose not to put a touch screen on this model.
Given the size of the camera, I expected buttons with a little more play. The G1's are flush with the surface and very hard to differentiate from one another without looking, and the zoom switch provides little tactile feedback.
Despite the jumbo 3.5-inch LCD display, the G1 offers only relatively basic MP3 playback capabilities; you can flip through the tracks, but it doesn't support playlists.
All of the G1's operational controls--three buttons and a joystick--sit sideways on the right edge of the camera. This gets quite awkward, since you need your thumb to grip the camera and to operate the controls. At the very least, you need two hands to use the G1.
You slide the latch to expand and power on the G1. It doesn't open completely in one go, however; after about three-quarters of an extension, you must reposition your hand and exert a little more effort to open it all the way. The whole process exacerbates the already long (over 4 seconds) time to first shot. You don't have to close it completely, though, and can use the power button instead.
To connect directly with up to three other G1s, you press your WLAN buttons simultaneously.
