Nikon Coolpix 4600 review

These features also compensate for the camera's limitations. The Nikon Coolpix 4600 has a narrow ISO range of 50 to 200, so you're more likely to have blurred or poorly illuminated photos in dim light. To meet the low price point, Nikon had to limit the camera's hardwired capabilities. Features such as the Best Shot Selector, D-lighting and Blur Warning restore some of those capabilities through software.

Performance
The results of our performance tests for the Nikon Coolpix 4600 were very close to those for the Coolpix 5600. Shutter lag measured a reasonable 0.31 seconds in bright light and 0.43 seconds in dim light. You'll be able to respond quickly to changing environments, such as when you're shooting sporting events or fast-moving children. When we tested the Coolpix 4600, its poor time of 7.25 seconds from start-up to first shot surprised us. By turning off the default opening screen animation, we were able to reduce that time to 5.86 seconds, which is still much too slow. We were also disappointed with this camera's flash-recovery time. While the shot-to-shot time without the flash was a fairly typical 1.89 seconds, when we engaged the flash, the time jumped to a frustratingly slow 12.11 seconds. You could miss many valuable shots while waiting for the tiny red light to stop flashing.

Image quality
The Coolpix 4600's photos were similar to the Coolpix 5600's, except for the lower resolution. Overall, the image quality was quite good. The colours in our exterior shots looked oversaturated, even for a point-and-shoot camera. This was especially evident with the brighter hues, though less obvious with more subdued colours, such as skin tones, that need to be more realistic. Image noise, sharpness and exposure accuracy were better than average in our well-lit exterior shots.

With our interior photos, we began to see some deterioration. We couldn't adjust the ISO setting, so we experienced higher noise levels on some low-light photos, especially with flash-illuminated shots where the camera would sometimes boost the ISO to artificially extend the range of the flash. The narrow 50-to-200 ISO range for this camera will limit your ability to capture low-light and long-exposure shots, unless you're willing to live with elevated noise levels.

The video mode on the Nikon Coolpix 4600 is hardly worth having. Even the best setting (640x320 pixels at 15 frames per second) was jerky and riddled with compression artefacts. Also, the camera doesn't record sound along with the video.

One bright spot is the camera's macro mode. We produced some excellent close-up shots using the macro-focus indicator. The macro icon changes from white to blue when the zoom is within the proper focus range. Note that the manual says the icon changes to green, but it definitely looked blue on our review camera.

Edited by Aimee Baldridge
Additional editing by Nick Hide