Casio QV 7000SX

I got my QV 7000SX as part of a graduation present. I read tons, and tons of reviews on this camera, and decided to get this one. It is absolutly awsome, features you think you will never use can come in handy later. I love the panorama mode, and have panorama's of tons of buitiful sites. I found you can get pretty good pan's without a tripod if your shooting a area with very little forground objects. The movie mode is great to use. The first time I used it was a SeaWorld, it was very cool to be able to take shots of Killer whales jumping. The camera is easy to use, you can flip right to a different mode in less than a second (Granted your right handed) The image quality is awsome, I find colors come out perfect in nearly any light. The only downside to this camera is the Extreeme battery drain. On NIMH batteries I get about 15mins of pretty constant shooting, and 30mins of standby. If you get this camera buy one of those mega recharable battery packs. I built my own (nonrecharable) battery pack, using four D cell batteries connected to the power jack on the camera. Using 4 D's the camera seems to last about 30minutes of constant shooting before it shows low battery. But this doesn't mean the batteries are dead, they just are getting warm from the constant power drain. I found if I left the camera off for a little while the batteries would regain a lot of their power. So the final stats are on D's the camera last about 1hour of shooting and 3hours of standby. Pretty good I think.

Image Quality Ease of use Panorama Movie Mode Rotating Lens Nice large LCD

Battery Drain

None

Depending how much you pay for it it could be a good or not so good deal. It is left behind by the new cameras out there, but it still is an acceptable solution for the average user who doesn't plan to use it for really high end photography.

Images can be pretty good if shot in proper conditions.

Somewhat complicated menus at first use. LCD drains the battery fairly quickly.

None

Didn't have to use it.

The Casio QV-7000SX is really a great performer that is usually underrated in digital camera reviews. This is a very durable camera (mine gets lots of abuse) with 2X optical/4X digital zoom, macro mode, built-in flash, and a rotating lens so you can take photos while holding the camera above a crowd or even create self-portraits while looking at the clear and bright 2.5 inch LCD screen. Panorama mode helps align sequential shots by leaving a portion of the last picture in the edge of the frame. Camera even takes fairly good six- or twelve second QuickTime movies. Several user-adjustable settings, including resolution, manual/auto focus, white balance, and timer. The auto timer function allows you to take unattended shots starting at a specific time and at a variety of intervals. Camera holds over 150 pictures on normal mode using a 24MB CompactFlash card (8MB card included), and four AA NiMH rechargeable batteries last quite a while, especially if you don't use the flash or motorized zoom alot. Included QV-Twain software is useful for rotating or making minor corrections to original camera files, but most pictures come out so good I simply crop and adjust white balance using a photo utility program (such as ACDSee or Ember PRO). All around the Casio QV-7000SX is a very user-friendly and value-packed camera.

Good controls and simple settings make it easy to use. Has lots of great features, including a nifty panorama mode and even a movie mode. Takes great pictures and saves them in jpg and HTML format, among others. Built-in titling and sumperimpose features are useful and fun to use. This is a very versatile camera!

Lighting and color tend to be a little weak, but it takes better pictures than other cameras in it's price range. Sports mode and low-light mode tend to produce grainy pix, so I usually use the normal mode and make other adjustments depending on the conditions of the shoot.

None

If Casio had only blessed this camera with a rechargeable battery pack (like camcorders and like some of the other digital camera) and an optical viewfinder, then this would truly be an outstanding digital camera. Unfortunately, Casio must not know that people want this yet in their digital cameras as the new models don't have these features either. If they did, the camera would be the perfect mid-range priced megapixel digital camera. As it is, it is very good and I would still highly recommend it, and would buy it again, although other models might give it good competition.

Ease of use Control of photographic variables Software bundled with camera to download and edit the photos Ability to control size/resolution of images in several steps Compact size makes it convenient to take along, convenient to hold as one would a film camera Picture quality is outstanding Memory is replacable with higher capacity Compact Flash cards

No optical viewfinder eats batteries expensive as comapred to other cameras with similar features, e.g., Kodak DC240, Epsons easy-smudge lens The swivel for the lens to be able to be rotated is a desirable feature, but I agree with other reviewers who have written that this feature is also a weak point as they (and I) worry about breakage. Slow to warm up if you want to take a candid shot or a shot where being able to turn the camera on fast and point and shoot is important

Sony Mavica FD-91, Kodak DC240

N.A.

This is my first digital camera. I wanted both high resolution available and low resolution, for web pages etc. I think the Casio-QV 7000SX gives the best price/performance ratio in it's class.As a juggler i especially enjoy the movie mode, the 6.4 seconds 'film' at 10 frames a second is just enough, i only would like to have these images bigger :) And of course, the camera takes good quality photos.Here are some of my wishes for a newer model, don't let them scare you :1 even more light-sensitive, it's hard to take good photos when not so much light is available. (i take a lot of fire-juggling photos)2 support for linux or freebsd, this is where i want to download my pictures to.3 faster boot time, a 'normal' camera is ready to shoot, digital ones need to boot first ...4 more powerful flash, i like the flash, but it's range is short (< 3 meters, but of course this flash is built in)5 less overall energy usage, under 'normal' conditions i can take 30 photos with fully charged NiMH batteries.6 more powerful optical zoom (but i *always* want this :)This says it all: i would buy this camera again if i lost it now.Have a look at http://www.dse.nl/balans for some photos as most of the photos there are created with this camera.Hans Lambermont