Geared to satisfy serious photographers, the ultra-compact Digital IXUS 850 IS stays true to its design heritage with a smoothly sculpted curvature design and all-metal finish. Enhanced performance and image quality are assured through Canon's latest DIGIC III image processor , which also enables low-noise ISO 1600 shooting and new Face Detection AF/AE – a Canon technology that detects up to nine faces in a frame and automatically optimises the focus and exposure for great people shots.

Under the hood, the 8125 features 128MB of RAM and a 200 MHz processor. Up front, the 240 x 320 LCD touch-screen supports 65,000 colors, while the rear of the device houses a 1.3 megapixel camera. The design of the 8125 is clean and uncluttered, with just a few buttons for mail, Internet Explorer, and contextual menus. Meanwhile, call answer and end buttons surround a a five-way toggle that allows you to navigate and control the Windows Mobile interface. As mentioned, a full QWERTY keyboard cleverly slides out from underneath the screen.

The 55-inch Hitachi 55HDX62 UltraVision CineForm Director's Series Plasma HDTV ($6,999.99 list) offers a stylish design and plenty of quality touches, but this premium television failed to deliver a premium picture. The 55HDX62 allowed common image artifacts to taint standard-definition video, and its performance as a high-definition plasma display was comparable with that of a good panel from a year and a half ago. Hitachi televisions are among the best in the world, and the 55HDX62's showing suggests a modernized successor is overdue.