24x club gets new member: Samsung HZ25W
Sammy's latest megazoom has a wide-angle 24x lens, similar if not identical to the one used by Pentax, Nikon, and Kodak.
Joshua Goldman Managing Editor / Advice
Managing Editor Josh Goldman is a laptop expert and has been writing about and reviewing them since built-in Wi-Fi was an optional feature. He also covers almost anything connected to a PC, including keyboards, mice, USB-C docks and PC gaming accessories. In addition, he writes about cameras, including action cams and drones. And while he doesn't consider himself a gamer, he spends entirely too much time playing them.
Expertise Laptops, desktops and computer and PC gaming accessories including keyboards, mice and controllers, cameras, action cameras and drones Credentials
- More than two decades experience writing about PCs and accessories, and 15 years writing about cameras of all kinds.
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If there weren't already three cameras available using the same wide-angle 26mm-equivalent lens with a 24x zoom, the announcement of the Samsung HZ25W would be a little more interesting. It doesn't seem to bring anything terribly new to the category either, making it an also-ran in a race of fairly mediocre cameras.
I'm not saying Samsung's entry isn't worth considering, just that it's more than fashionably late and brought the same bag of pretzels to the party that Nikon, Kodak, and Pentax did. Hell, Samsung even brought the same brand as Kodak by using a Schneider-Kreuznach lens.
Specifications include:
- 12 megapixels
- 24x, f2.8-5.0, 26-624mm-equivalent lens
- 3-inch LCD and an electronic viewfinder
- 720p HD movie capture (H.264)
- Dual image stabilization
- Raw support
- Full manual, shutter-speed priority, aperture priority modes
