The new Sony Cybershot DSC-W290 was released this week. The Carl Zeiss lens wielding compact, packs a punchy 12.1 megapixels and a boat-load of software features all for around £240.

In black or blue and weighing in at 160g, the W290 isn’t going to be strain in your pocket but does come with all the features of an altogether more expensive compact.Boasting multi-face detection, anti-blink reduction, smile shutter and red eye reduction, the W290 has a feature set not to be sniffed at.

Though whether this means it will be any good at taking pictures is another thing entirely. Too often the practise with compacts seems just to wedge them full of megapixels, vaguely helpful and occasionally, entirely useless features with the quality of the snaps playing second fiddle.

Megapixels do not maketh a compact. A lens does though.

The thing that should set the W290 apart is Dynamic Range Optimization, which works by automatically figuring out the best exposure and contrast levels to give more natural looking photos.

Sounds like the same old shtick you’ve heard a bajillion times before? Me too. Hopefully we’ll get our hands on one soonish and find out. If you’ve got a W290 tell us what you think about it in the comments, go on. Do it. I freaking dare you. What are you scared? You chicken…Go on.