The Sony Ericsson K850i is one of the best camera phones on the market today. Not only does it offer 5 megapixel resolution, it also offers auto-focus, all manner of automatic and manual aids for capturing the perfect picture, and comes complete with Sony's seal of approval courtesy of its highly-respected CyberShhot brand.
At the end of the day, though, it is still just a camera phone, which begs the question: just how well does a camera phone compare with a dedicated digital camera?
Comparing the Sony Ericsson K850i with a Nokion D40
Fortunately, the Unofficial Sony Ericsson Blog (USEB) has a done a sterling job in comparing and contrasting a Sony Ericsson K850 with a Nikon D40, as well as describing in great detail the various technicalities that
prevent a camera phone from measuring up with a dedicated digital camera. However, as should hopefully be obvious from the picture above, it's not really a fair comparison. The Nikon D40 is hardly your average point and shoot digital camera, and while it may have roughly the same amount of megapixellage (6 megapixels for the D40 compared with 5 megapixels for the K850), as you can see from the pic below, the D40's sensor is 16 times bigger than the K850's!
What the review does show, though, is how far camera phones have come. The shot below, for example, is better than anything my old point and shoot Fuji could have come up with. Click on the thumbnailed pics over at USEB, and you'll see full size examples taken from the K850 in all manner of different locations and lighting. Not a patch on the Nikon D40's photos, for sure, but would you have believed they'd come from a camera phone just a few years ago?