Konica Minolta DiMAGE Z1 Digital Camera

I have had the Z1 for a week now. I had the Minolta S414 first, but the low optical zoom and the power button turning on easily when placing in my coat pocket was a pain ( dangerous chance of damaging the lens motor ).
Being a Minolta fan from my SLR days, I decided to give the Z1 a try.
First, the 10x optical zoom is great. The 4x digit zoom is realy just a commercial selling feature. Sure, it works, but the average person doesnt carry a tripod around, and without one the digital zoom is about useless. An image stabilizer might have helped this some. Of course using any zoom ( 3x to 10x+), a tripod should be used. I just wanted to point that out for those that thought they were going to use the 40x without one. The digital zoom does increase in increments ( 1.1, 1.2 1.3....4.0 ), so if a situation comes up where you need just a little more than the 10x optical, your in luck.
3.2 mega-pixels works great for me. I printed a couple photos ( that were shot in the highest res. ) in 8x10 that looked super. Color saturation has been almost perfect so far. Very, very low noise in ISO 50, 100 was good also, but 400 I could tell the difference from the 50 while test shooting the same subject.
Big plus is the hot-shoe for an extended flash. While most think you can ONLY use a Minolta flash ( read expensive here ), this may not be true. I sold my film Minolta Maxxum5 which also took the same flash as the Z1 ( 5600 & 3600 ). I had purchased a Sigma Ef-430, that worked great with the Maxx5. So I am guessing the EF-430 and EF-500's should work fine with the Z1 ( sold my film outfit, so I couldnt verfy this, but the hot shoe is the same as on my Maxx5 ). Most of my indoor photo's were taken without the flash ( day time lighting ), and they looked more balanced than with the flash. The only problem is the flash does not pop-up by itself when needed. You must manualy flip it up. No big deal really.
The Movie mode...This was another factor in purchasing the Z1. I was excited at getting 640x480 @ 30fps movie clips w/sound. Here's the skinny, you better have a GIG SD card! No kidding! I purchased a 256 meg card, and with sound I got a 3min-30sec movie clip! So a GIG of memory will get you about 15 mins! Not very practical. Of course this will vary a little depending on the image your recording, but figure 1 meg per second of record time. OUCH.
Battery time is excellant! It has been the BEST of any other digi-cam I have owned so far. I used the alkalines that came with the camera for hours and shot about 150 photos before they went dead. Considering the LCD screen was on the whole time, I was amazed! And this was with playing around and learning the different functions.
LCD screen is a little small ( 1.5" ), but usable.
Eye-veiwer uses a mirror that directs the rear LCD up, so your in effect getting thru-the-lens ( TTL ) imaging. Of course it looks alittle grainy, since its like looking at a TV screen up close, but it does work well. I prefer the rear screen.
Manual features are great. You have a choice of the programed modes, or you can play with the apeture and shutter speeds. Bracketing is also available in .3, .5 and 1.
Auto focus is pretty quick, even with out a light assist in an indoor shot.
The power button will not let you turn it on by accident as my S414 did. You have to push it in and hold for a sec to power on. The camera comes to life and ready to shoot in just a couple seconds. The mode wheel is tighter than the S414 also, which I like much better. No more changing modes by accident because I bumped the mode wheel.

I looked at 2 other digi-cams, the Fugi S-5000 ( 3.1 mega-pixel, 10x optical ) and the Kodak DX6490 ( 4 mega-pixel, 10x optical ). Both where $499. Of those 2, I was leaning towards the Kodak, until the Z1 came out.
I purchased the Z1 from Dell. Thier list price was $399, but they had a 10% off with on-line orders going ( plus free shipping ), so I got it for $359. That extra off paid for most of my 256 meg SD memory card.