Overall, the Olympus EVOLT E-330 is a very capable DSLR with lots of exposure flexibility - it will take months to try them all - and excellent image quality. If you’re thinking of graduating from the world of point-and-shoot digicams but not too sure about it, the Olympus E-330 is not too big and not too heavy and may be the exact bridge digital camera you need to convince you to make the jump.

Positives: Excellent image quality. Excellent metering. Excellent colour rendition. Effectively noise-free up to 400 ISO. Comlete range of formats (RAW, TIFF and JPEG). Built-in SSWF sensor cleaning system. Useful Live View system. Powerful built-in flash. Negatives: 14 to 45 mm kit lens a bit soft focus at the wide angle end. Noise reduction system lowers overall image sharpness. Some functions are overly complicated. TTL viewfinder is a touch too small.

Finally there is no doubt that this camera can produce excellent results (at lower sensitivities) and that the live view may be the deal maker for some people. I struggled for a long time rating this camera, and if we had a half-way it would get an ‘Above Average and a Half’ however it’s just good enough to scrape a Recommended (lets hope we see a price drop), but come on Olympus you can (and will have to) do better than this!

It may not be a flawless camera, but the Olympus Evolt E-330 stands apart from all other D-SLRs on the market today.

The Olympus E-330 is well put together and the only interchangeable-lens camera which lets you compose shots on the LCD. Be aware, though, that this is the E-330’s only advantage over a number of cheaper cameras, including the very good E-500. It produces faithful images with a rich film like quality.

All in all, the feelings on the Olympus E330 are positively mixed. The image quality should be improved, and the same goes for certain other features such as the live view and the white balance setting. On the other hand, the Olympus E330 is simply a delightfully sassy camera that in addition to offering a live view provides the user with a great range of settings that would certainly befit a professional camera.

he new EVolt’s image quality is good, with good detail and sharpness. Like many other Olympus cameras, the E-330 comes with factory settings that add a big contrast and saturation boost to your images. If you think it’s too much, you can easily tone down the effects by adjusting in-camera settings. If you shoot in RAW mode, you won’t have this problem.

That said, the preview still seems like a technology in search of a use. Olympus seems ambivalent about it, suggesting exotic uses like underwater photography but leaning more heavily on the notion that that users stepping up from compact cameras to DSLRs might feel more comfortable with an LCD display like the one they’re used to. However, how much validity this claim holds still remains to be seen.

Elsewhere, the E-330 sports all the features of the excellent E-500, in itself a camera that offers far more manual control than the rival Canon EOS 350D. Handling is intuitive and reasonably responsive, but the real sticking point is price. Olympus is marketing the E-330 digital SLR as a mid-range model, but the live-view feature is more likely to tempt compact users to trade up. If it were £200 cheaper, it would make a convincing choice.

This is a camera that you could use professionally and be assured of good results. Although it may look a little strange, it performs as well as any of its direct mid-range competitors. It has a full range of professional options, including excellent colour options. The live monitor view is a very welcome bonus on an excellent camera.