A wonderful waterproof novelty , but better cameras overall can be had for the price.

The latest pistol –grip Xacti is an update to the company’s previous waterproof model, the VPC-CA65EW. Rather than attempting to beat the competition on storage capacity, price or even image quality, Sanyo has instead gone after the niche market of swimmers, surfers and holidaymakers who want the novelty of a submersible camcorder.

The necessitates a larger amount of protection and seals than other models in the Xacti range, so while it’s the size of the VPC-HD700, it only manages to house the features of the far smaller VPC-CG9.

The camera can be used at depths of up to 1.5m, though knocking it while underwater is a no-no, warns Sanyo, as one of the waterfight flaps may open and allow gadget-killing water inside. The camera also needs to be rinsed with fresh water after any dip in the ocean, and Sanyo recommends the rubber seals be replaced every year. Despite these restrictions, the image quality remains largely the same above and below the water, and even audio is captured.

But the image quality isn’t great: the ½.5 in sensor will only  capture footage at 600x 8480 pixels, though stills can be taken at 12-megapixels using interpolation when not filming. The video output is poor, while low-light perfomance leaves much to be desired, with detail suffering badly, and bright light similarly confuses the sensor.

Results aren’t much better in normal light. The auto-focus struggles to keep the image sharp when cutting between near and far objects, and the image stabilization is no match for the A-listed Panasonic HDC-H59.

The image quality is bad enough, but the price is worse. The Xacti VPC-CA8EX costs as much as cameras with better image quality and features, though without the water-proofing.

But the lure of shooting underwater is enough to forgive many of these problems. Considering the technical challenge of waterproofing a delicate and fragile piece of electronics, Sanyo has done rather well.

Sanyo VPC-CG10 HD Flash Memory Camcorder w/5x Optical Zoom (Black)

Here’s yet another solution for intergrating your PC’s audio capabilities into your home-theater system: Use an external USB audio device. These won’t deliver multichannel sound over HDMI ,but they’re dead simple to install: Plug the device into your A/V receiver with another, and install the accompanying software.

Asus’s Xonar U1 USB Audio Station (Asus Xonar U1 Sound Card (White)
) and Creative’s X-Fi Surround 5.1(Creative Labs SB1090 USB Sound Blaster X-Fi Surround 5.1
)are two examples of external USB audio devices. Both products use Dolby Digital Live to encode any audio signal to 5.1-channel Dolby Digital in real time. The audio is then output through a S/PDIF interface to your A/V receiver.

Asus Xonar U1 Sound Card (White)