Introduction

Ease of Use

Rising out of the Style range like a skyscraper in the suburbs is the Nikon Coolpix S9700. Packed with tech, the S9700 looks like it would be more at home in the Performance range. However, the P series of Nikon cameras are for keen enthusiasts and as such, don't really offer much in the way of easy modes for the point and shooters. The S9700 still offers the Easy Auto mode, albeit buried in a menu system.

The S9700 bears an uncanny resemblance to the more higher spec models in terms of shape and design. It's a heavy block of metal and plastic which holds a 30x optical zoom inside the bulge at the front. The lenses contain ED (Extra-low Dispersion) elements to reduce chromatic aberrations and the focal length works out at an eye bulging 25-750mm in 35mm terms.

We hear you asking “What about camera shake?” Well, the S9700 has been fitted with a 5-axis Hybrid VR. This type of Vibration Reduction of combining electronic and optical image stabilisers isn't new but using 5 ways of stabilising the image is on a camera at this designation.

Front	Rear

Once the light has gone through the lens, it burns onto a back-illuminated 16 megapixel CMOS sensor. In the past, some Nikon compacts have suffered with low light and high noise problems, so hopefully, this new sensor that is lower in resolution than previous models will react better. The back-illuminated technology will also help by allowing more light onto each photo site, but our noise test will give the definite answer.

No expense has been spared on the screen incorporating a 921,000 dot OLED screen which can even be used in direct sunlight. We managed to get some glorious sunshine while testing the S9700 and we can confirm that this is certainly true.

As we mentioned earlier, the S9700 sits on the Style side of the fence. But it's so close to the Performance series, it can reach an arm through and tickle its armpits. Because of this intimacy with both ranges, the S9700 has a mixture of lazy modes and performance enhancing features. On the top plate, you'll find the power switch and shutter release with a tiny switch that operates that obscene zoom range. It's like striking a match and getting a bonfire burning at the end of your fingers.

Front	Pop-up Flash

Situated next to the shutter release on the shoulder of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 is a Command dial. It has the easy to use modes, such as Auto, Scenes, Smart portrait and Special effects but also holds the manual PASM modes. The top of the camera also holds the WiFi and GPS unit above the lens. On the opposite side to the Command dial is a pop-up flash that sits very high when open. That's great for avoiding red-eye. However, it uses so many different joints to collapse down into the unit – which you have to do manually – it's like trying to get a cat into a bath; it's possible, but you'll have to wrestle a bit.

Thanks to the aforementioned Command dial, there's no need for a Mode menu button on the back of the Nikon Coolpix S9700, so this has been replaced with a GPS button. It displays a map of the World and allows you to not only log your photo's locations, but also track where you're going. Fantastic for travellers and that's exactly who the S9700 is aimed at.

The menu will change depending on the mode that you're currently in. It has the usual layout of three sections with the primary menus tabbed down the left side. The centre section shows what each tab can offer, while the right side shows the current setting for that option. Pressing right drills into the menu and allows you to make any changes. The colour scheme is light grey on the centre section with dark grey surround and a yellow highlighter. Those colours may not sound appealing, but they work nicely and the menu is very easy to see and use. The five tabs on the left are for the mode you're currently in, Video modes, WiFi, GPS and the Set-up menu.

Side	Top

Start up time from the off position to being switched on, focused and a photo taken is 1.8sec which is a good performance. There are two continuous shooting modes; High and Low. The first is a burst mode that rapidly fires off five high resolution pictures in just over half a second. It works out roughly 8fps (frames per second). Slightly higher than the 6.9fps on the Nikon website, so that's pretty good. You do have to allow for human error, though, so keep an open mind. It takes a total of 10 seconds to download the pictures as well.

In Low mode, the camera takes pictures at a much slower rate. We got 16 pictures in eight seconds before the camera stopped to download. That's roughly 2fps and it took the camera up to 43 seconds to download and be ready to shoot again. This was going through the Nikon EXPEED C2 processor and writing onto a Class 4 Micro SD card in an adapter. The speed of the card will affect the write speed, so you may see a slight increase with a faster variation in.

In playback, the pictures will be displayed full size with some basic information that will disappear after a few seconds. Should you take a photo that you wish you'd added a digital effect to, you can press OK at this stage and add it on after. The added bonus is that the camera saves that as a separate file on the memory card, preserving the original. The layout of the Playback menu is the same as when you're shooting. However, there's a slight variation in the inclusion of the Mode tab.

Memory Card Slot	Battery Compartment

The Playback modes are usually in a separate menu which is accessed via the Playback button. On the Nikon Coolpix S9700, doing that takes you back to the shooting screen. The Video menu has been replaced with the full Playback menu which allows you to amend the pictures with some basic editing via the Quick retouch, D-Lighting, Red-eye correction or Glamour retouch options. There's also provision to amend the print order, create a slide-show to thrill your family and friends of your travelling adventures.

In the top section of the box is a Quick Start guide which is in multiple languages. ViewNX 2 is now in downloadable format, which is a shame for those photographers with no internet connection. Below the guide is the camera, a lithium ion battery and charging unit. The unit consists of a USB cable, charging unit and three-pin UK adapter. This a much more flexible approach and one thing we like about all Nikon compacts. The cameras can be charged up via USB on the computer or by using one of the two plug options available to you.

Image Quality

All of the sample images in this review were taken using the 16 megapixel Fine JPEG setting, which gives an average image size of around 5Mb.

Noise

The Nikon Coolpix S9700 is the top of the line camera before going into the Performance range of cameras and that's where the prosumers sit. Couple this with the back-illuminated sensor technology and we want to see something good come from the noise test.

The sensitivity range of the S9700 is ISO 125 – 6400. At ISO 125, the picture quality is fantastic. There's no noise present at all, edges are sharp and there's lots of colour available. In fact, noise doesn't start to affect picture quality until ISO 800 which sees a drop in edge quality. There's also a little smudging of colour, but nothing to worry too much about and it's only really noticeable at full magnification.

Move on to ISO 1600 and we can see noise starting to affect the picture quality. In fact, the turn for the worse is particularly steep at this point. Edge quality has nose-dived again, primary colours are starting to wash out in order to remove colour noise, but it's still invading.

At ISO 3200, nearly all colour has been drained form the pictures to reduce the effect of colour noise. The final setting simply can't stop the tide and bright blue colour blobs take over the pictures. Still, it's a great performance from the camera.

ISO 125 (100% Crop)	ISO 200 (100% Crop)
ISO 400 (100% Crop)	ISO 800 (100% Crop)
ISO 1600 (100% Crop)	ISO 3200 (100% Crop)
ISO 6400 (100% Crop)

Focal Range

The focal range of the S9700 is 25-750mm in 35mm terms. That's more than enough to deal with anything that life can throw at you, from carnival floats to distant boats.

25mm	750mm

Sharpening

We like how the camera handles JPEG sharpening, but if you do decide that you want to add a little more in an editing suite such as Adobe Photoshop, it wouldn't be detrimental as long as you keep it to the low ISO images.

Original (100% Crop)	Sharpened (100% Crop)

File Quality

All images were taken at the Fine setting which is a separate menu to the resolution in the Main menu. There were massive variations of exposure from 7.15Mb to 4Mb at Fine setting. The night shots are even as low as 2Mb. We had to check the settings. Adjust the Quality to Normal and the camera will drop more information from the shot making it less detailed, but it frees up precious space if you're running out.

18M Fine (4.63Mb) (100% Crop)	18M Normal (3.18Mb) (100% Crop)

Chromatic Aberrations

One area that we found the S9700 fails on is the removal of chromatic aberration. It occurs when the lens can't focus all the colours onto the sensor and lines of colour appear on contrasting edges. On images from the S9700 we found thick blue and orange lines on edges that were generally light on dark. However, there were a few instances of vice versa.

Chromatic Aberrations 1 (100% Crop)	Chromatic Aberrations 2 (100% Crop)
Chromatic Aberrations 3 (100% Crop)	Chromatic Aberrations 4 (100% Crop)

Macro

Close focusing on the S9700 is an incredible 1cm. That easily gets you a close up of an interesting lizard. Because of the close proximity of the lens to the subject, image drop off comes in quite early. However, the centre sweet spot is ultra sharp.

Macro	Macro (100% Crop)

Flash

Adding flash to the pictures definitely adds a strong vignette at wide-angle. This problem settles out towards the top end of the zoom range. Without flash, there is still a little vignette, but it's barely noticeable and certainly won't be on everyday pictures.

Forced Off - Wide Angle (25mm)	Forced On - Wide Angle (25mm)
Forced Off - Telephoto (750mm)	Forced On - Telephoto (750mm)

The flash is a pop-up type and therefore won't see much of an issue from red-eye. In fact, we couldn't replicate it in any way.

On	On (100% Crop)
Auto/Red-eye Reduction	Auto/Red-eye Reduction (100% Crop)

Night

We took three shots at night on a very foggy early morning. We tried the camera in Night scene Tripod and Night scene Hand-held as well as shutter priority. The Hand-held setting has selected a high ISO to combat camera shake and a shutter speed to ensure it gets a sharp result. However, we're left with a noisy image.

The Tripod and shutter priority modes have selected a low ISO 125 setting with us opting for centre-weighted metering and a slightly shorter exposure time with exposure compensation at a third of a stop under. The images in shutter priority are much sharper than the Night scene modes.

Night Shutter Priority	Night Shutter Priority (100% Crop)
Night Scene Tripod	Night Scene Tripod (100% Crop)
Night Scene Handheld	Night Scene Handheld (100% Crop)

Sample Images

This is a selection of sample images from the Nikon Coolpix S9700 camera, which were all taken using the 16 megapixel Fine JPEG setting. The thumbnails below link to the full-sized versions, which have not been altered in any way.

Sample Movie & Video

Product Images

Front of the Nikon Coolpix S9700

Front of the Nikon Coolpix S9700

Side of the Nikon Coolpix S9700

Side of the Nikon Coolpix S9700

Front of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Pop-up Flash

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Image Displayed

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Turned On

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Shooting Modes

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Special Effects

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Main Menu

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Main Menu

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Main Menu

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Main Menu

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Main Menu

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Main Menu

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Main Menu

Rear of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 / Main Menu

Top of the Nikon Coolpix S9700

Side of the Nikon Coolpix S9700

Side of the Nikon Coolpix S9700

Front of the Nikon Coolpix S9700

Memory Card Slot

Battery Compartment

Conclusion

The Nikon Coolpix S9700 is – simply put – a joy to use. It's small and pocketable, but still has a ridiculously large zoom lens on it that can deal with any situation. Nikon are touting the S9700 as a perfect photographic travel accessory and we're inclined to agree. The tech is all there, such as the aforementioned zoom, GPS, WiFi connectivity, USB charging via computer, SDXC card compatibility and full manual control.

It's also a fast camera with a super start up time and good burst mode options. Some compact cameras are capable of zooming while the processor is working on pictures, helping you set the next shot up, but Nikon's rarely allow this. Aside from this, the camera is very well thought out with a great UI and plenty of modes and features for all levels of photographer to use. It's built to a high specification with a solid body and firm buttons. The battery door could be a little more reinforced and the port covers are rubber instead of plastic, but there has to be something saved for the Performance range.

There's a distinct improvement in image quality recently from Nikon and it's not before time. Some of the previous Nikon's have come under criticism for poor noise handling and over exuberance of noise reduction software. It seems the employment of a back-illuminated sensor and lowering the resolution has done the trick to bring it all under control.

For the cost of the S9700, you can get an older CSC camera which is slightly larger than the S9700, but they enjoy a DSLR size sensor and interchangeable lenses. If you're more interested in space over image quality, then the S9700 will be perfectly matched to you. Should you be about to embark on the adventure of a lifetime, then you need to invest in a decent camera and the Nikon Coolpix S9700 should provide everything you need.

Ratings (out of 5)
Design	4.5
Features	4
Ease-of-use	4
Image quality	4.5
Value for money	4

Main Rivals

Listed below are some of the rivals of the Nikon Coolpix S9700.

Review Roundup

Reviews of the Nikon Coolpix S9700 from around the web.

Specifications

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