Digital Camera Reviews - Customer reviews - Casio Exilim EX-Z4U 4 MP Digital Camera w/ 3x Optical Zoom and Dock

The camera is very speedy. The time between pressing the trigger button and taking the picture is about 1/2 a second delay. It takes about 2 second to complete a shot, and you are ready for the next shot. Viewing images is also very fast, even at 4MP.

The camera is a pro-consumer camera. It has some advanced image options such as White Balance and EV Shift. The standard 3x optical zoom is great. The images are very clean. The digital zoom is not so great. 12x images (3x optical, 4x digital) are good enough to identify, but they are blurry...which is understandable. The camera is so small, I realize you can't fit the optics for a much higher optical zoom. Having some optical zoom was important to me, which is a great feature of this camera. If compact high-level optical zoom is important to you (more than size), I hear the Panasonic Lumix Digital DMC-FZ10K (12x optical, 3x digital) might be a good option (it is larger to support the optical zoom lenses).

A note on picture taking. The images this camera produces is really effected by the image options. The White Balance especially changes the coloring of the images. For example, on a sunny day at the beach, setting the White Balance to "Sun" makes the images look great. At dusk, setting the White Balance to "Shade" produces better images. If you are lucky enough to get this camera, you should spend a little time getting comforable with the images options. To make things easier, Casio has pre-programmed different configurations for night, day, scenery, portrait, etc. These configurations make it easy to get a great picture. You can also create your own 'canned' configurations.

It also has a few cool options like the ability to superimpose a background (you take two pictures to get one), and the ability to take half a picture, and then a second half, so if you are traveling with a buddy, you can each be in the same picture. There is also the ability to create HTML pages with thumbnails to copy to your website. Overall, it has some impressive features in such a small device. Make sure you get a memory card. The internal memory card is insufficent. I am very happy that Casio supports the SD/MM cards, rather than some proprietary format like Olympus.

One thing that does disappoint me is that the camera does not support video. I figured since the Z3 did, the Z4 would. I am not too disappointed, since I plan on getting a second camera at some point, but if you only want one digital camera, you might consider a different camera which supports video (perhaps even the Z3!). Also, the camera is not the greatest in low light conditions (early evening)...where the picture can get grainy in zoom mode (without flash).

Overall, if you want a very portable camera, this is such an awsome device. It really amazes me. If you are more concerned about image quality over portability, you might consider other cameras. I plan to purchase another larger digital SLR camera such as the Canon Rebel 6.3MP to use when image quality is most important. I have a friend with a larger Sony camera, and he rarely uses it because it takes time to pull out of the carrying case. He also does not like to carry it around all of the time. I, on the otherhand, yank the Casio Z4 out of my front pocket, and am ready to go in seconds. He might have somewhat better pictures (subjective), but I get much more use out of my camera, which is a better investment in my opinion. Why buy a camera that you barely use? Actually, now he is thinking about getting a Casion Exilim as well.

In closing, I am very happy with my purchase. It is a pleasure to use, and my money was well spent. After having this camera, if I only planned on owning one digital camera, I would be very happy owning the Casio EX-Z4.

I am not a professional photog... but do know good from bad. I have owned 3 digitals, and a die hard 35 MM user. I own Camera's with lenses that come off :-)

What I liked most - the big screen, if not just for me, I was able to hand others this camera to take the shot... and they have all been able to use it. Even in strong sun.

Small size, keep it on your pocket.. starts up fast enough to get the good shots.

It is practical, I never needed to pack a "bag", and never felt guilty about it. Seriosuly if the only way you'll take a digital camera with you is to pack an entire bag for it... you won't want this anyway. Keep your 35 MM. Traveled with some folks recently, and I usually had my camera out, shot and done before a co-traveler even had the bag unzipped... got so bad he bought a disposable. Just emailed him my picks which he claims looked better than the new 6.3 MP camera he was using.

Good battery life, recharges, comes with a cradle, and a spare battery is tiny enough to carry if you are really that demanding. Most of us just need to get through a day or two of sightseeing in between charges. I recently took over a hundred picks before needing a charge. Other camera's I had always needed new battery's frequently. Don't buy a digital without rechargables, you'll spend more $$'s on expensive battery's than your kids favorite toys demands.

Dislikes.. power button is a bit small, fingernail is the best way to turn it on, but this was probably thought out I never was concerned about it powering on in my pocket as a result. I did have this problem with an other small camera. No direct usb link, you have to use the cradle.. but such is life with sucha small body, you have to move some things out. I bought a USB reader (cruzer), tiny and I slide the SD memory into it. Also serves as a great place to store a spare memory chip on a trip. Software that comes has weird navigation for the average folks. Try it out, but suggest you look for a decent photo editing program if this is you first camera.

4.0 MP... will be as good as the scene you choose (there are 21 with this camera, everything from Portrait, Pet, Kids, Food and Night and Fireworks, very cool).. or choose Best Shot, which I have inadvertently turned off a few times. 4.0 MP is also as good as your printer and process...

Like that it uses SD memory, although most SD cameras are a little more money, it does make your life more flexible (fits in Palm Pilots, some phones, tablet PC's, etc. etc.). You should consider what memory format you want to standardize on if you are a first time buyer.

The Pentax lense seems good. If you haven't figured it out yet, the Pentax Optio is similar, but has it's own strengths and weaknesses.

As for price I noticed that you can save about $40 between merchants (as of now)

Hope this helps !!

I'll first talk about the plusses.

The obvious ones are 4M pixels and 3x optical zoom, ultra sleek design (by far the best looking camera I've seen), dock availability, super fast startup and capture time. Here's a brief mention of other features.

1) Large LCD screen for its size. This really helps for focus and also for previewing the pictures.

2) Best shots mode: Though it takes a while to get used to different modes to figure out the best possible setting, once you remember that, you're in tune to take great pics. I got fantastic pics of my campus on a cloudy day. The scenary mode allows you to capture intricate landscape details even in the borders.

3) Long exposure: You can take night pics with the long exposure mode (upto 4 seconds), the picture quality was awesome.

4) Fits in my shirt/coat pocket, no bulky stuff to carry around, can travel with your hands free.

5) The superimposing feature, where you and your buddy can take pics of each other with a scenary and merge the pic with both of you in it, sounds like a cool feature (if you're not an Adobe pro). I haven't had a chance to try it though.

After mentioning the coolness factor, please read this also.

For indoor pics, the flash is not powerful enough for objects that are say about 10ft away, but for closer objects it's good, or if the room is well-lit also, its good.

Make sure you choose the correct white balance. OK, this is a feature you'll have to test out if you're not a pro. Especially, if your room has fluorescent lamps, there is a special setting and I did not get good quality pics with the default setting.

The US version of the camera does NOT have MOVIE mode. I don't care for it, if you do, you should look for other cameras. There are cameras which have movie mode for this price.

And yes, if you're planning a long trip you have to carry the dock for recharging (you save on battery costs though).

The 10M memory bundled is inadequate, additional memory is a must, I bought a 256M SD card which costed me about 80 dollars.

but if you set that aside, the things i like most:

- it's very compact - the size of a pack of cards
- 3x optical zoom, then digital zoom on top of that
- strong battery life -- 200+ pictures taken before it needed recharging
- nice integration of SD flash card. i think these are the best cards out there, and you're starting to see readers integrated into laptops, etc., which tells me this format is winning the standards war
- key feature is the mode selection -- my last digital had the capability to take night shots, but this sets up your camera with idiot-proof profile selections. outside, choose an outside mode, twilight? that's there too. probably 20 modes to choose from.
- handy feature when you're with your girlfriend, you can take the shot in two steps - take part 1, then hand the camera to the person you just took the shot of; they get a ghost image of the left side of the picture, and can frame you on the right.
- personally, i don't like to advertise that i'm carrying around $400 worth of camera...this is a tight package that you don't need to wear a harness to have with you...inside your jacket it goes, and no one's the wiser.
- playback mode has a calendar, which divides your pictures into the days that you shot them, so you can better manage your collection before you get it onto your pc.

the last thing i was looking for when i walked into compusa was a casio...the guy at the counter said he had just purchased one, so i took his advice and i'm glad i did.

cheers!