This camera is big and burly. It has survived a lot with me behind the lens and still works great. The start-up was another big draw for me and it still starts up super quickly. The image quality is great for cropping/resizing photos and the 4x6 photos I've printed have all been spectacular.

Sharp quality photos, good menu selection, easy to get to manual options and buttons a-plenty.

Ability to purchase wide-angle or tele-photo zoom lenses was a plus.

Takes great action shots on sports mode, scenery mode (I like the colors better), and in manual mode.

Super easy to plug into computer and transfer photos to a folder of your choice and name and delete photos all in one fell swoop.

I like the fact that it has two memory card options - xD and Compact Flash.

Battery is pretty long-lasting. I only had to recharge once during the day ever, at the Nationals. I took over 800 photos in 3 days and had the camera on most of the day, so it needed a recharge. Otherwise it's always been fine using it throughout the day.

Sometimes in manual settings (A/S/M at different settings) the photos are a bit dark, even with the ISO turned up.

Not so great indoors with poor lighting and dust in the air.

Zoom isn't great, but you can buy the telephoto lens.

I purchased this camera kind of last minute to replace my Olympus C-700 as I was going to be taking photos for a magazine at the 2004 R/C Car Off-Road Nationals in Vegas. I definitely needed a better camera than my older 2.1MP digi cam. I was nervous about purchasing a DSLR with less than a week before I left for the Nationals as I'd never used one before and wasn't going to get a lot of training. So, I went with the C8080 as it had a ton of manual options and settings and was 8MP.

The camera was great. There are a ton of functions that I still don't even know about or use, but the A/S/M priority settings are good and I really like the wheel buttons and menu options. I went with another Olympus over any other brand as I was familiar with their settings/options through the C700.

I've used this camera for high-speed action shots of r/c cars in all types of outdoor light conditions, in snow for snowboarding, at the beach, different landscapes all over the SW US, etc.

It doesn't really shine indoors for action shots in low-light conditions with dirt in the air, but I'm not sure what would.

This camera has held up through dustings due to r/c cars flying by and roosting up dust, dust from mountain biking, snow flakes... It's held up wonderfully to the beating it has taken on my mountain bike handlebars and still takes great shots.

The zoom isn't killer, but I purchased the telephoto zoom lens. This is good for long zoom shots, but for anything in between you'll need to take it off. The camera has to zoom in a bit so that you don't see the zoom lens.

Similar Products Used:

Olympus C-700 and recently purchased a Canon SD800.

Low noise, Low ISO shooting, solidly built, easy to navigate if you have ever owned an Olympus camera before. Excellent color rendition, great resolution. Supports both SD and Compact flash, so I didn't have to go out and buy a ton of new cards just for this camera Fast in-camera image viewing

FL-50 flash is awesome but ouch 399.00 Door port covers plastic hinged (but I do not use them so it's not a weakness for me as such) Hot Shoe adapter not compatible (so far).. I have been unable to get my strobes working with the camera other than using the 8080 in flash slave mode (setting 1 for low intensity).. I hope this works itself out after getting the flash extension cable and bracket. Not sure I'm all too thrilled about the freeze image before you shoot thing.

I have 3 DLSR's already and do primarily studio shooting and some outdoor shooting. The Olympus was to be an indoor outdoor camera. I love the meaty feel to it (it's more approaching a DLSR than a point and shoot), and the cam looks like it is a quality built unit. Shutter lag is minimal and the zoom and the power-up are fast as compared to older models and the Canon Pro 1 I almost bought (ugh). Almost no noticeable aberation, no flaring or any light inconsistencies. Overall great image quality. Ultra-fast viewing of the images in camera (something I hate about the Rebel and 10D).. Even at higher ISO, the noise is acceptable (I usually only shoot 100 and lower though as I blow up most of my pics).. I purchased the battery grip for it as well and the flash (FL-50) and flash bracket, so when fully assembled it is a nice piece of work. Flash is great, and very flexible. I do not regret my purchase and based on all the reviews I am reading, the 8080 was a great choice for a secondary (or thirdarary :) camera)

Customer Service

Used Olympus for customer service on an old 2020 and it was good. No issues yet with the new camera

Similar Products Used:

Canon Digital Rebel Canon 10D Canon Elan 7e Pentax MZs

Attractive & compact body styling. It holds two memory cards: one XD card, and one CF card, and access to either one can be toggled. Imagine putting in two 512 MB cards, and you won't be changing cards too often. You don't have to download software. With Windows XP (and possibly others) just connect the USB 2 from camera to PC, and you're in business. It's got a nice electronic viewfinder (evf). The monitor can tilt up or down, and is visible even in bright sunlight. The mode dial can let you quickly change from manual-program-aperture or shutter priority, or personal presets. Recording modes are RAW, TIFF, JPEG. There is a hot shoe, and a tripod socket. The evf eyepiece is diopter adjustable. The doors for the battery and the memory cards are sturdy and hinged properly (metal hinge pins).

The battery has to be removed in order to be charged. The doors for the DC input, USB & television/monitor ports are hinged with plastic.

One the things I look for is the look and feel of the body. It's aethetically pleasing to look at; very compact and it's almost ergonomically perfect, a joy to hold and shoot. It handles like a traditional SLR and it resembles one, although it technically is not. In practical use, I find the shutter lag time to be almost undetectable. Its 1.6 frames per second for either 3 to 5 shots is a very nice feature. The quality of the lens is right up there with the previous Camedias, and the picture quality is excellent. The 8 megapixels sure help.

Customer Service

I've not had to call them yet, and hopefully never.

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Sony MVC CD300