New year, new Everios.

With some revolutionary HD tech at the lofty heights of the Everio range JVC has turned its attention to tweaking the Everyman cams, with new models announced at the world's largest consumer tech show in Vegas.

The first to hit the UK's shores is the budget MG330, part of a range that extends up to the Full HD GD7 model.

The essence of the Everio remains - a 30GB HDD using MPEG2 compression - however, there are some outstanding cosmetic tweaks and a new lens system to serve up unrivalled video.

Design and layout

The most striking aspect of this latest range of Everio cams is the new slender chassis. Trimming down significantly from previous incarnations the MG330 is a pocket-sized powerhouse barely bigger than an average palm. It's lightweight too; just 360g (including battery) to be exact, and when combined with the tiny dimensions makes for a highly portable video solution.

Open the LCD and there are more surprises. The new operating system is unlike anything seen on a camcorder to date, and finally we have an interface that challenges the usability and cool factor of the Sony LCD touchscreen menu.

Laser Touch Operation combined with a menu and a selection button lets you gracefully slide through the menu options and operate the manual functions by tapping the demarcated areas of the LCD. The MG330 is also pretty stylish to boot, with a smart brush metal finish and a polished ebony finish on the inside of the LCD.

Features

The talking point here is the new lens system. Allied to a 1/6in, 800,000 pixel CCD, JVC has adopted Konica Minolta lens technology to give your videos and stills - saved to either HDD or Micro SD - a bit more zing. This lens offers a 32x optical zoom that is enough push for any kind of close-up without overstretching capability.

The MG330 is the entry-level model, so the hard disk is the smallest in the range. That said, 30GB isn't exactly small, and shooting in the best quality you can still enjoy up to seven hours of home movies.