I do a lot of shots using a 20mm lens with my 35mm SLR and have been
looking in vain for a digital compact that can achieve something similar (I
don't want the bulk of a conventional digital SLR).

However I've just learned of the Kodak EasyShare V570, which as well as
having a conventional 39-108mm zoom (35mm equiv) also has a fixed 23mm
(35mm equiv.) ultra-wide lens which sounds like just what I'm looking for.
However it turns out this second lens is not just fixed focal length but
fixed focus, which makes me wonder how well it will perform. Focus is 0.8m
to infinity, which suggests a hyperfocal distance of 1.5m. Does anyone have
experience of this beast? 5 megapixel, 0.4" chip I think. The click-to-
picture time of 0.2 sec also sounds good - I hate long delays, and the
weight of 125g is perfect. But if it gives fuzzy pictures there's not much
point - I often enlarge to A3 so I need crisp images.

The naturally short focal length of digital cameras combined with the
wideangle suggests it should be possible to get the depth of field for this
to work, but I wonder how it pans out in practice. The near point of 0.8m
is not all that good (with a focussing wideangle lens I am more used to
0.3m, although admittedly it's not needed much).