$122 with free shipping on Amazon. 30 day free return policy there.

dliidlii wrote:$122 with free shipping on Amazon. 30 day free return policy there.

It's not that I don't believe you, but it's a lot easier for us to fact check when you provide a link with the price comparison.
Edit I found the amazon links: 122 Free shipping for red, 140 Shipped for white, 127 shipped for red

Here is a pretty decent review from gadget speak

Here it was during a previous woot-off

Here was the first time it was up for sale

I come with some more goodies.

Here is a flickr with pictures shot with this camera

The Manual for this camera (Upped to google docs for easy viewing, it took me 5 minutes for me to download this from the slow source)


Unboxing video.

An in-depth review by photography blog is here:

http://www.photographyblog.com/reviews/pentax_optio_rz18_review/

Which includes handy sub pages such as:

Nice summary page:

http://www.photographyblog.com/reviews/pentax_optio_rz18_review/conclusion/

The rivals page offers potential alternatives if you think this camera isn't up to par:

http://www.photographyblog.com/reviews/pentax_optio_rz18_review/rivals/

Would I be nuts to buy this for my son's 8th birthday? He's been using my old Canon Powershot G3 for the past year, taking good care of it, and coaxing some decent pictures out of it at times. But it's getting old (going on 10 years) and finicky.

Does this camera come with the SD card???
Any negatives I should know about in advance??


[MOD(TT): It does not come with an SD card.]

Specifications are slightly jumbled as far as optics. It is an 18x optical zoom, for a range of 4.5mm to 81mm, equivalent to 25mm to 450mm as 35mm.

Numbers were all there, just wasn't computing for me.

Nice work, CowboyDann & bwillette!

From $140 in April to $120 WootOff to $100 now is a rapid price drop. Perhaps explained by this:

According to DigialCameraInfo.com,
"Pentax Ricoh Imaging announced last week that they will no longer make point-and-shoot cameras under the Pentax brand, according to Japanese site Digicame-info. It’ll be business as usual for Pentax DSLRs and mirrorless system cameras, and Pentax Ricoh imaging may continue to release point-and-shoots under the Ricoh brand name."

Nice reviews, and if you need an inexpensive gift or back-up camera this would be a good choice.

The killer for me is the lack of zoom in video mode. That plus I need an upgrade, not a backup.

I have this camera. It is small, takes nice pics and so far does what it should. It is simple to use, takes good pics, and is priced good.

The other camera I own is a Canon G3. It is better, only too big.

tsfisch wrote:Would I be nuts to buy this for my son's 8th birthday? He's been using my old Canon Powershot G3 for the past year, taking good care of it, and coaxing some decent pictures out of it at times. But it's getting old (going on 10 years) and finicky.

I have a G3 and this camera. They are two different cameras. The one offered is a very simple point and shoot. The G3 has a lot more functions on it and is a good camera to learn on before dropping some money on a DSLR. If your son knows all the in's and out's of the different settings on the G3 he may be bored with the pentax. The pro's for me are it has more zoom, better video,and is small.
Cons are the close up shots, no time lapse. I use the pentax more now only that I am still figuring it out.

Thanks to the US Postal Service's 'bad decision' on mailing items with lithium batteries, they defaulted on $5.5 billion.

Maybe if they would have buckled to let personnel at APO addresses order those iPads, cameras and watches they wouldn't have this problem.

Bought one when it was last on woot. Total failure. Worked for a few days then completely died the next time I used it.

The manufacture didn;t want to honor the warranty. Claim woot was not a valid reseller and that the camera could have been a open item for all they know.

Not worth the headache.

Soo, camera wizards out there could you give me some advice. Should I drop the 100 here, or drop another 100 on a first gen ILS like the GF2 or E-PL1?

Before you ask: No, this class of camera does not have a large enough aperture to take inside action-freezing shots of little Johnny making the game winning basketball shot in the high school gym.

I bought one of these during the $120 woot-off and it's been great. It survived bouncing around in my pocket for a 10-day trip through the US southwest and took some amazing shots with that 18X zoom. Using the landscape enhance mode the pictures look like a post card. I carried a spare battery with me but didn't need it because it seems to run forever. No regrets here...

radi0j0hn wrote:Before you ask: No, this class of camera does not have a large enough aperture to take inside action-freezing shots of little Johnny making the game winning basketball shot in the high school gym.

I always like your camera comments but must it always be "little Johnny" how about "little Jenny" now and again just to change it up.

I purchased this camera last time it was on Woot. We are planning to take it on our upcoming trip. I've been using it around the house and at parties and have had no problems. It's a nice size to fit in the pocket and is a simple point and shoot with a serviceable zoom as well as the shake reduction. The smile recognition can be wonky, but you can turn it off. It looks to be a good portable choice to take on the rides when we hit FLA in a few weeks.

What is the recovery time? My wife always complains she misses the "Kodak" moment when photographing the grandkids because the delay between picture is so long.

I got this when it was here last time. It has a panoramic mode and "kid" mode that are awesome. It detects moving kids (I have a toddler) and waits for non movement. Incredible price and incredible deal. I highly recommend to anyone looking for a great deal.

Great reviews. I hope my lady likes it for her trip up North for 14 days. 7 days on land then 7 more at sea.

Can anyone tell me if the battery charger can be used in Europe (with the proper adapter)? I guess I should really ask if it supports 110 & 240?

nanaejt wrote:I always like your camera comments but must it always be "little Johnny" how about "little Jenny" now and again just to change it up.

Absolutely! I have a friend who's daughter is doing hockey AND ballet! A formidable young woman!

how does this camera make out in low-light conditions?

One comment I found on the web about one of my concerns with these cameras...

One comment you my want to add is that the compression ratio of the Pentax RZ18 is so severe that the 16M pixel images end up looking less defined than my old 5M pixel camera. I bought the camera for its zoom capability but there's no point in using the 18X zoom because the image quality is so poor after it has been compressed. I've given the camera to a friend, (I didn't even sell it) and have gone back to my 10X zoom 10M pixel Fujifilm which produces far superior zoomed images despite the lower zoom capability.


Also, found another review - http://www.ephotozine.com/article/pentax-optio-rz18-digital-camera-review-17902

Back in June I almost got the Panasonic that is currently up on Moofi for $138. (It's $2 cheaper today than it was in June.) I was going to buy it, but wonder if I should just get this one instead.

Here's the discussion from when the Panasonic was on Sellout, back in June. I do like the idea of a Leica lens, but as I said, I don't have a good grasp on a useful way to compare them.

Edit: Thank you, dear Mod, for highlighting my dilemma!

InFrom wrote:Back in June I almost got the Panasonic that is currently up on Moofi for $138. (It's $2 cheaper today than it was in June.) I was going to buy it, but wonder if I should just get this one instead.

Here's the discussion from when the Panasonic was on Sellout, back in June. I do like the idea of a Leica lens, but as I said, I don't have a good grasp on a useful way to compare them.

Edit: Thank you, dear Mod, for highlighting my dilemma!

The Panasonic is no comparison spec wise. 12MP vs 16mp and 5x zoom vs 18x zoom. I had a Pentax Optio before the Panasonic I have now and it took great photos. I would pick Pentax out of the two cameras here especially with the lower price point of the Pentax- it seems like a steal.

InFrom wrote:Back in June I almost got the Panasonic that is currently up on Moofi for $138. (It's $2 cheaper today than it was in June.) I was going to buy it, but wonder if I should just get this one instead.

It depends on what you want to use the camera for. This camera can zoom in almost 4 times further than the Panasonic, so it would be your best bet for photographing your kid playing soccer outside on a sunny day. (Not that any pocket camera is ideal for action photography, but with luck and practice you'll at least get some good shots. No amount of skill can overcome having all the players look like tiny little ants because you couldn't zoom in far enough.)

On the other hand, the Panasonic has a lens that's a full stop brighter and has fewer megapixels on the same size sensor, both of which will make it work better in low light. So it would be the choice to shoot the after-game party at the local Chuck-E-Cheese's™.

You pays your money and you takes your choice...

I bought one of these the last time they were up here.
It has some nice features, but overall it's a very poor substitute for my old 8MP Canon Digital Elph SD850is.
The long zoom is a nice feature, and the Auto mode works very well at selecting the correct mode for the current shot.
However, the actual photo quality is quite bad. At the full 16MP, I get terrible noise and jpeg blocking when viewing the images at 100% zoom.
Also, the camera's UI is rather cartoonish, and the camera itself feels cheaply made and plasticy.
I'm actively hunting for a new camera, even though this one is only a few months old.

chickdr wrote:The Panasonic is no comparison spec wise. 12MP vs 16mp and 5x zoom vs 18x zoom. I had a Pentax Optio before the Panasonic I have now and it took great photos. I would pick Pentax out of the two cameras here especially with the lower price point of the Pentax- it seems like a steal.

Thanks, that's helpful. I guess part of my confusion is that it seems that numbers alone don't tell the whole story. For example, how to evaluate the comment, quoted higher up in this thread, about the 18x zoom of this Pentax:

acewingman wrote:One comment I found on the web about one of my concerns with these cameras...

One comment you my want to add is that the compression ratio of the Pentax RZ18 is so severe that the 16M pixel images end up looking less defined than my old 5M pixel camera. I bought the camera for its zoom capability but there's no point in using the 18X zoom because the image quality is so poor after it has been compressed. I've given the camera to a friend, (I didn't even sell it) and have gone back to my 10X zoom 10M pixel Fujifilm which produces far superior zoomed images despite the lower zoom capability.


Also, found another review - http://www.ephotozine.com/article/pentax-optio-rz18-digital-camera-review-17902

OTOH, several people here report that the Pentax has done well for them. Though obviously not everybody:

Elmojo wrote:I bought one of these the last time they were up here.
It has some nice features, but overall it's a very poor substitute for my old 8MP Canon Digital Elph SD850is.
The long zoom is a nice feature, and the Auto mode works very well at selecting the correct mode for the current shot.
However, the actual photo quality is quite bad. At the full 16MP, I get terrible noise and jpeg blocking when viewing the images at 100% zoom.
Also, the camera's UI is rather cartoonish, and the camera itself feels cheaply made and plasticy.
I'm actively hunting for a new camera, even though this one is only a few months old.

Edit:
I just had the chance to take a look at one of the reviews linked higher up: http://www.photographyblog.com/reviews/pentax_optio_rz18_review/conclusion/, and compared it to the review from the same source for the Panny: http://www.photographyblog.com/reviews/panasonic_lumix_dmc_fx90_review/

The Pentax suffers in the comparison.

I appreciate the responses to my question, having a couple of points of view really helped. All things considered, I think I'll get the Panasonic.

Final edit, I promise!
And so I did:

Last Wooter to Woot:
InFrom