Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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25 of 25 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Perfect for travel, 24 Dec 2006
I bought this camera (my first digital) for an adventure travel holiday in Borneo. The promised ruggedness outweighed most other factors in the decision. Having used the camera "in battle", and now seen the results, I'm sure I made the right choice.
The camera is tiny, but looks and feels very solid. The water/dust/etc proofness certainly isn't a gimmick, backed up by the advice in the manual to clean dirt off the camera by dunking it in a bucket of clean water! Note that you can't use the camera on it's own for scuba diving, and need to add the £150 PT033 case.
First the highlights:
- The camera is truly water and shock (and idiot) proof, as it fell out of the neoprene pouch mine came with into a river. After 10mins on the river bed, I managed to find it, and no ill effects. I also managed to drop it on the floor (in the case) and no problems.
- Image quality is very good for the size of sensor, but noise does become a problem at high ISO settings.
- Battery life is subjectively very good considering how small it is (but you need to recharge after about 150 shots).
There are some aspects that could be improved in the design of the camera:
- The LCD is very reflective, and it gets near impossible to accurately compose a shot in bright sunlight.
- The camera should come with a neck strap - the neoprene case includes a short wrist strap, but that's no good when the camera is in the pouch on your arm.
- Even in SHQ mode, the compression is a little strong.
- The tiny lens is good, but at wide angles there's some purple colour fringing.
- Finally, and crucially, the image stabilization is weak - its digital not optical. For a camera intended for use in the middle of the action, this should really be fixed (maybe on the next version, Olympus?).
Note that the manual states you should replace the seals around the battery and USB covers annually to maintain the waterproofness - I've not yet found a source for these.
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17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great 'little ' camera, 4 Dec 2006
Writing another review as my other one seemed to disappear? Great camera, build quality is good and solid, the camera turns on very quickly, the lack of protruding lenses makes the camera feel more robust, the metal casing feels nice to use, picture quality is good for such a small device, you cannot compare it to DLSR or larger digital cameras. Some post production is needed to get the best results but this is true of all photography.
You will need to get a memory card as the 19mb internal is a token amount; you will also want to buy another battery as the size of the camera means the battery is small and will only do so much. Both can be found cheaply. I paid £20 for a 1gb high speed XD card (H type) and £10 for a battery online (much, much cheaper than a certain well known high street camera shop). The camera (as with most these days) does not come with a case, I bought a crumpler PP70, just the right size and a mesh part for a spare battery, XD card and USB card reader - £10 online. All in all you are looking at about £260 for the camera and extras if you buy online, not bad as the rrp is £300 for the camera.
It's a great point and shoot camera, however some points of interest;
The camera is very small, someone with big hands / fingers may find the buttons hard to use.
The camera starts on the default picture mode of Portrait - you have to press the record mode button twice to change this to one of the other modes. So if you just turn the camera on and take a photo it will be in portrait mode, the background will be slightly soft. It's annoying that the camera does not use the last mode you selected, surely just a software issue? When you double press the record mode button it does take you to the last used setting e.g landscape so why not just keep that mode on...
When you review your pictures the display shows information such as ISO speed, white balance and so on, it shows for a couple of seconds and is quite annoying, especially given that the camera is a point and shoot and thus has next to no manual controls to use the information with. You cannot turn it off and have to zoom in to remove it or wait for a couple of seconds.
These are minor issues when you look at what a great camera this is, the size, functions and robustness are a winner, I would recommend this camera for anyone wanting to travel, swim, bike or just snap some pictures with a camera that will fit in to a pocket and take knocks and water in most conditions that other cameras will fail. This camera will suit all ages, amateur and pros alike.
(I presume the other reviewer made a mistake in giving three stars as the review itself suggest four or five?)
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Not quite what it says, 1 May 2007
Appears robust and well made, but its NOT for underwater. Although its claimed waterproof to what, 5m I think, the manual says open the battery and USB cover and dry off after immersion. Sure enough after 30 seconds in 1 foot of water there was water inside both covers. Not much, a few drops, but enough to worry about swimming or 5 metres. Great for rainy Scotland though.
The manual says replace the seals around the battery and USB covers annually , but not where to get them or how much that would cost.
The lcd display is very easily scratched - I recommend covering with plastic film. Battery life is amazing...I almost bought a spare battery but am glad I didn't as its managed 130+ shots per charge over the last 5 charges.
Movie mode is not impressive, especially compared to the mju 300 and the Kodak D5. Still picture quality though is better than those.
And it fits in a shirt or trouser pocket and you'll have it with you when the Loch Ness monster poses for you.
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