I'm planning a 3 month backpacking trip to india in the new year and am looking to purchase a "robust" digital camera that will survive 3 months of knocks, drops, spills, heat, and very high humidity. The last camera I took backpacking lasted just 6 days which was gutting!
I'm not a serious photographer, more of a point and shoot man, so not really looking for anything too high end, but 12mp would be good.
I've looked at the Olympus mju tough 8000 and it seems to tick all the boxes but I just wondered if anyone had any other suggestions or recommendations?
All advice most welcome!

Just chasing around the specifications of what is available today, I've not found anything to match the Olympus Tough cameras.

You won't need even 12 megapixels for your style of photography The factory settings will be far lower than the full potential 12meg, and very few point-and-shoot people ever find out how to change that factory default setting. The chase for megapixels is almost meaningless in cameras that use small sensors: the pixels just get in each other's way, sort of. The latest G series by Canon has less pixels than its predecessors; my memory permitting I think they've gone down to 10 meg. I probably use more than half the available pixels on my DSLR 10 to 12 times a year, but I do virtually no "post-production" computer work on my shots. Maybe I'm a Luddite...

You could take something cheap and cheerful off Ebay as a spare/second string just in case.

Hello,
I brought a Olympus 1030sw camera a year ago and have been so impressed. I brought it to keep on me at work, and as im a zoo keeper it had to be pretty tough, and so far i couldnt fault it. I'm really into photography and have an expensive SLR too, but i find when im away on holiday im using my olympus much more.
Its waterproof up to 10m, and ive used it in water many times (its quite scary to put it in at first), and i have never had a problem. Its super tough, ive dropped it a few times without a hiccup, its a camera you can put in your pocket and abuse to the max and it just keeps going. on top of all this its beautifully styled unlike some tough cameras and the battery life is brill, just what you need when a battery point many not always be available.
its 10.1mp and also has a video on it although the sounds not great.
I really couldn't fault it in any way, i only wish i had brought it before i went traveling in Indonesia (all those snorkeling photos i missed!).
Hope this help
Shelley

iv head many good thing about the Panasonic Lumix FT1 Panasonic Lumix FT1 Tough Digital Camera - Silver (12.1MP, 4.6x Optical Zoom) 2.7 inch LCD check out this review on Cnet http://reviews.cnet.com/digital-cameras/panasonic-lumix-dmc-ts1/4505-6501_7-33529155.html?tag=contentMain;contentBody

Olympus Tough range is definitely built for survival, so is probably your best bet. The only problem I had in Bangladesh was that unfortunately there was a loss of electricity (could be a frequent occurrence in India too...) whilst the battery was charging, and the subsequent surge of power when it resumed burnt out the charger, rendering it useless! I couldn't replace it there, so then had to rely on my phone's camera. Make contingencies eg, carry a spare charger, camera, have a decent camera-phone, keep spare batteries, or buy a camera that you know you could get accessories for in India. Oh, and be prepared for a deluge of your subjects, especially kids, running towards you, desperate to see the image you've just taken! Have fun!

for high quality photographs the panasonic ft 1 or the canon D10. if you want to do underwater photographs then the canon D10 comes out on top, whereas my personal choice would be the panasonic FT 1, smaller, more compact, and very sharp photographs although the built in flash is not that good. the olympus tough series are quite soft in focus. theres a very good review on this site, http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/Q209waterproofgroup, with all these cameras and more.

How refreshing to see a common sense bit of advice on digital cameras, thankfully even the DSL R manufacturers are no longer chasing the stupidity of for ever higher megapixel sensors!
I own a number of cameras including small point-and-shoot through to heavyweight DSL R's, all of these will produce excellent A 4 prints without post processing. You are certainly not a Luddite, your advice is sound.