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Some helpful information about the Casio EX-V8 camera, early days and will grow as I discover more about the camera.

Casio V8 Links	Macro	Image size and card capacity
Apertures available	Anti-Shake

As at December 2008 it is slightly disturbing that the EX-V8 seems to have dropped right off the Casio site except for the still available firmware downloads, FAQs etc. There has been no hint of a following line or update, so maybe we need to wait until sometime in 2009 to see if this line proceeds. Maybe there was some licensing arrangement that fell through, or the sensor size used is no longer available and the redesign for the larger chip would be too expensive - who knows. The same lens arrangement is in the Pentax Optio Z10 but the rest of the body and battery etc is different. Whoever makes this lens assembly is a mystery to me but it works brilliantly and the ISO 50 results allow large prints with ease at any zoom setting. I really like this camera and the results it gives.

Until a more detailed comments page is made, just a few items will appear here.....

General operation is very quiet, the zoom is internal and almost completely silent, thus allowing optical zoom during movies. The loudest thing is the focus confirmation beep and that can be turned off for real stealth mode. The internal zoom ensures that the camera always looks the same whether it is at wide or maximum tele setting.

The movie capabilities differ from country to country, the USA version has a 4 gig file limit for a movie file, which is the limit anyway for the file system used. The Australian and European models seem to have a 10 minute time limit on any one movie file, so please do not try to copy Russian Ark and do a two hour movie in one take.

The feature that I like is the ability to store up to 999 custom settings via the Best Shots system, but it takes some self organisation to set that up to your own needs and then to recognise which of your Best Shots has what settings. More on that later on a separate page (not yet written). BestMan software from http://www.sassenfeld.de/software/bestman/detail_e.html is definitely worth the dollars/euros to buy if serious about using custom camera setups on the Casio cameras.

Image noise builds up at higher ISO settings, so if attempting large prints of A3 size (about 11"x16") then always use ISO 50 and a tripod and delayed shutter release for most reliable results. If only printing postcard size of about 4"x6" then any ISO works fine.

A problem that I have noticed (on both V8 cameras in the house) is that initial insertion of the battery often fails to make good contact resulting in a seemingly dead camera. Inserting the battery with a slightly firmer push seems to clean the contacts and all is OK from there on.

The manual indicates that a 10 mb/sec card is needed for high quality video, but so far I have had no problems with lesser speed cards.

The V8 is so good that our house now owns two, one black and one silver (black not available as at Dec 2008). I got my "backup" V8 in Australia from  http://www.getabargain.com.au/ at an excellent price, it was probably sourced from Hong Kong at a guess. Casio cameras bought overseas do have a "tourist warranty" that allows one year warranty as long as the warranty card and original receipt are shown.

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