I said a few days ago i was thinking about buying a new camera. I mentioned the panasonic lumix TZ7 and today i bought one on ebay (for about €225). After many hours of research (which i really should have been spending on more important stuff), the TZ7 was virtually undefeated when i matched it against similar cameras with the same specs.
There were a few really tempting cameras that i would have gone for, only they lacked the incredible 12x optical zoom of the TZ7. Here they are;
Casio EX-FC100
This camera blew me away with it’s burst mode – it can shoot 30 pictures at 6 megapixels in 1 second flat 
That feature alone almost had me sucked in along with it’s good looks. The burst mode would be ideal for sports events or fast moving objects. But then i questioned when i’d use it (the vast majority of my photos are not capturing fast moving objects).
Anyway, apart from that feature, it got hammered in reviews and comparisons with the likes of the TZ7. Plus i have a Casio already, i wanted a change.
Samsung ST550
photo credit: å°è‰¾~
The ST550 looks the part and has a full touch screen on the back of it plus a mini screen on the front which makes taking pictures of yourself easy 🙂 On the downside it has just a 4.6 x optical zoom plus i’m pretty sure those two screens don’t run on air so battery life is sacrificed. It also looked a bit too iphone-y for my liking – if i want to make a call or take a picture, i like to be able to do it very quickly and without looking at what i’m doing. Touchscreens slow things down plus i need two hands and a degree of accuracy with my fingers (which means i have to be stationary) to use them so carrying out advanced functions quickly is impossible. For example, turning flash on /off.
Panasonic Lumix TZ7
photo credit: JeanbaptisteM
So in the end, i kept going back to the TZ7 no matter what camera i was looking at, even though i really didn’t like the look of it at first. It’s not the slimmest or prettiest of the bunch but it just can’t be beaten by cameras in the same sort of class when it comes to specs and price.
Hopefully i’ll have it by the end of the week but it could well be next week thanks to royal mail strike action 👿 I never get strikes these days – it’s not as if employees are going to win.