Design

The Optio 330 is only a little larger than Kyocera's tiny Finecam S3 and just 45 g heavier fully loaded. It's clothed in an all metal case, the only plastic parts are the LCD cover, buttons and compartment doors. The rather conventional design is easy to carry, pocketable and easy to understand. Just like the Finecam S3 the Optio 330's lens extends an inch from the body once the camera is powered up, I found the lens extension and zoom motor to be rather noisy (compared to others).

We also noticed that under heavy use, such as several shots per minute, the front of the camera (between the Optio label and the 3.34 megapixel label) tends to get quite warm.

Finish levels are good but not excellent, for example on the unit I had for review where the front and rear portions of the body met at the top their was a noticeable 'bulge' from the front portion. That said the camera is definitely solid enough, in your hand it feels weighty for a small camera (reassuringly so). All the controls are pretty much where they should be, although the camera would have benefited from a small front finger grip or rear thumb grip.

LCD Monitor / Viewfinder

The Optio 330's 1.6" LCD monitor is bright and fairly easy to see even outdoors, it's protected by a plastic window which should prevent it from damage if carried in a pocket, although there's no anti-reflective coating. The Optio's viewfinder is the fairly standard 'optical tunnel' type with no parallax correction lines (although there are AF bracket indicators), unusually for an ultra-compact the Optio's viewfinder does have a dioptre adjustment.

Battery / Compact Flash Compartments

In the base of the Optio 330 you'll find the battery compartment. The tiny Lithium-Ion battery has a rated output of 3.7 V, 900 mAh (3.3 Wh), this sits it somewhere between the battery used in Sony's DSC-P5 and that used in Canon's PowerShot S40. The battery is charged out of the camera in the supplied charger. On the right side of the camera (from the back) is the small Compact Flash compartment door, it's made of plastic and doesn't hinge particularly well. Behind this we find a CF Type I slot, cards are inserted with the thumb lip at the back which does makes it easier to remove the card later.

Connections

On the left side of the camera (from the rear) behind a rubber door we find the DC-IN (for the optional AC adapter) and USB / Video out connectors. The concept of dual purpose connectors seems to be catching on, the Optio 330 is supplied with a Video and USB cable, both of which end in the same small connector and only one of which can be connected at one time.

In The Box / Accessories

Supplied in the box are:

• Pentax Optio 330 digital camera
• Shoulder / wrist strap
• D-LI2 Lithium-Ion battery
• D-BC2 battery charger
• 16 MB Compact Flash card
• Video cable
• USB cable
• User manual
• CD-ROM:
  • USB driver
  • ACDSee

Pentax optional accessories:

• O-CC2 carrying case
• Infrared remote control
• K-AC2 AC adapter
• D-LI2 Lithium-Ion batteries