Ricoh

The RR1 is equipped with a 3x 7.3-21.9mm (35-105mm 35mm equivalent) F:2.6-3.4, constructed of 10 glass elements in 7 groups. It also has a 1.4x/1.8x/3.6x digital zoom only in the 640x480 mode.

In normal mode the focusing range is 24cm (9.4in.) to infinity. or in Macro mode the range is from an amazing 1cm (0.4in.) to 24cm (9.4in.). In manual focus mode the user can manually adjust the focus, there are also presets for at 0.8ft or infinity.

You can also see the second shutter release for shooting in portrait mode to the right of the lens.

The zoom lens control is located around the Mode Dial and can be actuated from either the top or bottom of the camera. The zoom control also function as the zoom-in and zoom-out control during playback.

The optical viewfinder has a diopter adjustment control on the bottom. Along the side are colored LEDs to indicate the autofocus and flash status.

The RR1 has a 2" TFT color LCD display to frame or review your pictures or access the camera's menu system. When used as a viewfinder the LCD shows about 95% of the final captured image. The LCD can be rotated 270 degrees and tilted up or down which is really useful when doing table top macro shots.

Controls on the top; Self-timer, PICture size/quality, Shutter release, Card / INternal memory, Flash mode, Zoom controls.

The mode dial has positions for (counter-clockwise) SETup, Movie, Continuous, Text, Audio, AUTO record and Play modes. In the center is the power On/Off button.

Located underneath of the color LCD are the controls shown above. The LCD must be flipped open to access these buttons. Hopefully they are self-explanatory as they are well labelled asto their functions.

The monochrome data LCD on the top lets you see the major camera settings and change them using the dedicated buttons on the top. Unfortunately it is NOT illuminated.

The built-in flash has a working range of 2 to 8.2 feet. It has Auto, Fill, Red-Eye reduction, Slow sync and forced off modes of operation.

Just below the flash is the camera's microphone which is used for audio annotations or during movie recording. Audio notes can be added to pictures during capture or afterwards in play mode.

Located below the color LCD on the back is the SmartMedia card slot.   The RR1 has 8MB of internal memory and Ricoh includes a whopping 64MB SM card. This is the largest card that any manufacturer has included with a camera so far, kudos to Ricoh ... those 4-megapixel images can fill up a small card in no time. Any size 3.3v SmartMedia card can be used up to 128MB size.

On the side is a high-speed USB port for image download and it comes with a standard USB cable for PC and Mac users. There's also the A/V port with user settable NTSC or PAL output and a DC INput jack for an optional AC power adapter or external battery pack.

The AV Out port carries both the video and audio signals, the video is user-settable for either NTSC or PAL format. The DC INput jack is for an optional AC adapter or external battery pack.

The camera is powered by the Ricoh DB-20L rechargeable lithium battery, a proprietary 3.7V 1300mAH pack. This battery is identical (and swappable) with the Fuji NP-80 and the Kodak KLIC-3000 used in the DC4800.

Ricoh claims a battery life of 50 minutes in record mode and 50 minutes in playback mode with a fully charged battery.

Ricoh supplies an AC powered rapid charger that charges the battery outside of the camera which is good news if you have two batteries. Shame on you if you don't, you can't power the camera with any off-the-shelf type of batteries so it pays to have a spare.

The charger takes 75 minutes to bring the battery up to 90% and another 35 minutes for a full charge.