Samsung has launched the world's first digital still camera to feature High Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) - a revolutionary new feature allowing users to view their photos on a high definition television.

Set to launch in April, the 8 megapixel Digimax L85 also includes a Schneider Kreuznach lens with 5x optical zoom and a 2.5-inch LCD display.

The L85 provides MPEG4 video compression and can capture movie clips in VGA (640 x 480) at 30fps. Additionally the L85 comes with 11 scene modes including Night Scene, Portrait, Children, Landscape, Close-up, Sunset, Dawn, Backlight, Fireworks, Beach & Snow and Text Recognition.

The text-recognition mode lets users shoot documents such as books, papers, and magazines and extract text from the resulting image using text recognition software bundled with the camera.

The camera will also include 32MB of built-in memory and a voice recording function.

Available in black and silver. The Samsung Digimax L85 will cost $499.99 and will be available in April 2006. Samsung has yet to set a launch date or price for the new model in the UK.

• Samsung - Official website of Samsung

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