Amazing quality, Amazing warranty, Amazing all around!

With our old Canon 3 Megapixel digital camera recently deceased, we were on the hunt for a replacement. When we spotted the Fuji S700 on sale for only $149 at a local drugstore chain, I immediately came home and checked Epinions for other peoples thoughts on this camera.

Clearly, the reviews were positive, and I've come to learn that this was for a very good reason - this is an EXCELLENT camera for this price point.

We had a $50 discount courtesy of the drugstores discount program, and in addition on purchase over $75 there was also a promotion that provided us with 2 movie tickets as an additional bonus. In the end, the camera only cost us Net $75. Even at $150 this camera constitutes an excellent value, but at $75, it was seemingly a steal for us.

INITIAL THOUGHTS:

On opening the small box (no over-packaging) the items were packed well, with the manuals at the top of the box. The unit includes 4 batteries, although they are not rechargeable, but disposables. There was a lens cap, a neck strap, USB cable, and a CDROM containing software included.

POWERING UP:

I started out with 4 of my 2400MAH rechargeable batteries instead of the included Alkaline cells. Some people complain about cameras that utilize four batteries include of 2, but the advantage is at least double the operational time between recharge requirements. Coupled with the Fuji S700's already remarkable battery life, these extra two batteries allow for excellent battery life-spans, meaning more shots without the hassle of swapping batteries.

With the batteries in, a quick flip of the power switch had the camera alive in a matter of a second. You are prompted to select your preferred language using the directional pad and "OK" button, and immediately after that you are ready to point and shoot!

MEMORY:

The camera does include a small amount of onboard memory, but it's not good for much beyond a few demonstration photos, especially at the maximum quality settings at which point it will only hold a few photos. At lower settings it may hold enough to be useful, but why own a 7 megapixel camera only to take 1 or 3 megapixel photos? In a pinch it could be useful, but don't rely on it - buy an external memory card!

The S700 supports both standard SD memory, as well as the (more expensive and rare) XD Memory. I saw no advantages whatsoever to the XD cards, so I picked up a 2 gigabyte SD card.

The manual states a maximum of 2 gigabyte memory cards, but I have heard of others having success with cards in the 4 gigabyte range.

With a capacity of well over 1000 photos in the maximum 7 megapixel "Fine" setting I would see no real reason to need that much, however.

FEATURES:

I will not go into great detail when it comes to features. I'll admit that I'm not a photo "Pro", and if I was I would probably have bought a much higher end digital SLR instead of the S700. As somehow who wanted a camera that was clearly ahead of the run-of-the-mill point and shoot cameras flooding the market, but not at the much higher price point of the SLR lineup, the S700 fit the bill.

The camera offers many features that might confuse amateurs, but may impress even the pros - various manual modes allow control of F-Stop settings, exposure, flash, etc.

I experimented with several of the manual modes and repeatedly found it simpler to simply use the "AUTO" mode instead, as I suspect most others with my rather limited skill-set will also resort to. In this mode the camera repeatedly took excellent quality photos.

I must stress that the photo quality is noticeably better then anything I've ever used short of a friends very high end Canon digital SLR. The "quasi-pro" lens on the S700 has allot to do with this as it's simply far ahead of the tiny lenses found on lesser cameras. Yes, it adds considerable bulk to the camera, but once again (as with the battery situation) you cannot have your cake and eat it too - if you want higher quality results, you need to lean towards the features that the high-end cameras offer, and the S700 strikes an excellent balance in this regard.

Some of the more "basic" of the advanced features are simple to utilize - a Macro mode, an "Ultra" macro mode, and various flash settings. These everyday features are accessed directly from the D-Pad without need to navigate into the menu system, meaning that they are not complicated to activate or deactivate.

Experimenting with the macro mode returned excellent results - I was very impressed at the results, and even my wife felt comfortable activating and deactivating these basic features.

Unfortunately many of the more advanced features do involve diving into the setup menu system. I will admit that this menu system is not the most intuitive I've ever come across, and in on regard it's downright irritating as it exits the menu system completely after each individual item is toggled on/off, instead of allowing you to step backwards back into the menu system.

With some practice it's straightforward enough, but it's one of the cameras weak spots.

PHOTO QUALITY:

As I stated, I am no professional, but I have had first-hand experience with a friends professional 10 Megapixel digital SLR. I was astounded to find that the pictures from my new S700 were honestly very close in my "layman's" side by side comparison. Crisp, clear, and with excellent color reproduction, I was astounded. The macro photos that I took had genuine "Wow!" factor.

The camera did seem to have weaker results in low light situations, but that doesn't seem to be uncommon. Appropriate use of the flash yielded much better results.

Can I provide technical details? No. Can I honestly state that it takes amazing everyday pictures, even comparable to cameras 6 and 8 times it's price? Yes! Can it perform some of the features that a pro could use to extract even more high-end results out of the S700? Probably.

DOWNLOADING THE RESULTS:

Although the cameras manual (and even a label on the USB cable itself) insists that you install the included software BEFORE connecting the camera to your computer, as an Apple/Mac user I have always found this unnecessary as iPhoto automatically recognizes almost any digital camera without the need for any extra software.

Sure enough, iPhoto recognized the S700 seamlessly.

Windows users may wish to heed the warning to run the included installation disc first - important drivers are likely included.

iPhoto quickly provided a preview of the photo and I prompted it to download them to my iMac so I could review the results.

Unfortunately another weak spot of the camera quickly shows it's face - A slow USB1.1 interface. The much faster USB2 interface is a very curious exclusion from this camera, and the slow USB1.1 connection speed means that transferring photos from the camera to your computer could be a very slow process.

A wise investment would be an external card reader which would allow much faster transfers. Unfortunately I have always owned Compact-Flash (CF) digital cameras so all of my external readers do not support SD cards, but clearly I will need one as transferring any quantity of photos using the "direct-to-camera" USB connecting would be painfully slow.

WARRANTY:

Fuji offers a virtually unsurpassed 3 year warranty. Clearly they are ready to stand behind their product in the long run, and this was a major selling feature for me, especially with our recent Cannon having not only experienced problems in it's past, but completely dying at about 2 years of age. I hope to never need the warranty, but if I do, it's there!

END THOUGHTS:

In the end I'm overjoyed with the camera so far - it offers SLR looks and many premium features, and even rivals the photo results of SLR cameras costing many times it's price. At 7 megapixel it offers more photo resolution then almost any non-professional could ever need, and despite offering a handful of advanced features, the "Auto" mode makes it as simple as "Point and shoot" for people who want quality photos without the hassles.

Some negatives persist - the slow USB1.1 connection is the worst, but with an external reader is mostly moot. The bulkier size may be an issue to some, but you cannot get 10X optical zoom and a real high quality glass lens without this sort of bulk, so it's a tradeoff for quality. A few of the newer bells-and-whistles are absent, but with most amateur photographers often not using many of these features, why pay more for them?

Unless you want a full SLR, or insist on the much smaller comparable models that will fit in your shirt pocket (but have inferior zoom capability and lower quality photos) then look seriously at the S700 - you won't be disappointed.