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You'll also have to use AC when it comes time to download your images to your
computer. We couldn't get the camera to download at all on battery power even with
the NMHs fully charged.
__ Which brings us to our biggest disappointment. Although
the camera ships with its own cataloging and management software along with Adobe
PhotoDeluxe and a Photoshop plug-in downloaded. The software worked well on PC/Windows
computers, bu we never could get the camera to talk to the Macintosh. Any of them.
Several calls to the Olympus Tech center yielded some of the screwiest solutions
we've ever heard -- but no solutions. The software is very frustrating and throws
up errors and dialogs at the strangest times.
__ Acting on a tip from Macfixit.com,
we downloaded the shareware program Cameraid which worked perfectly.
It connected to the camera first time and every time. The D-600L includes its own
cables for connecting to a serial port and a high-speed parallel port for connecting
to the Olympus P-300 printer. (Which, by the way, everyone loves -- they don't want
me to send it back! Perhaps Santa is listening!) Once the files are downloaded they
can be manipulated in most any photo imaging software.
__ If you get this camera we strongly recommend an extra
PC card and a PC card reader (Olympus makes a PC Card adapter) which can be had in
the $90 to $150 range. Swapping SmartMedia cards will allow you to shoot and transfer
to the computer without knocking down the studio set-up. (This is one of the strong
points to the Mavica... you can shoot, proof the disk, and shoot again if need be
without disturbing the camera set-up.) Olympus also offers a FlashPath "floppy
disk" adapter which holds the SmartMedia and inserts into the computer just
like a floppy. So to get fully outfitted with the D-600L, expect to cough up $100
to $300 more than the ads in the catalogs.
__ Learning and using the D-600L is a breeze, with internal
camera management software that is probably the best on the market. The LCD screen
walks you through all operations of the camera and allows easy setting of various
viewing and file management modes. The instructions and menus are clear and concise
-- easily learned by even our youngest reviewers from the middle school. (In fact,
they could operate the camera fluently without the manual before we could figure
it out by using the manual!) Clearly marked icons on the camera indicate button use
for all of the various shooting and viewing modes. The instruction manual is nicely
done but really about four-times as detailed as it needs to be.
__ One final comment, and perhaps it's just our own
opinion here -- but -- we feel Olympus is really chintzing by not including the AC
adapter. You won't survive by just buying the camera. Olympus nickle-and-dimes you
to death, charging extra for the battery charger and the AC adapter -- both highly
overpriced. For professional use, you'll need the extra Media card and a Media card
reader as well. At retail, these necessities carry the price well over the $1,000
mark. As with most vertical market gizmos like digital cameras you're basically paying
for about $25 worth of glass, plastic and electronics, and several hundred for marketing.
C'mon Olympus -- don't insult your user base. Provide a wrap-around digital camera
solution in one box. If you can't afford the $49 (SRP)AC adapter and battery charger,
then just mark up the camera. We can take it. The Mavica as do many of the others,
ships with everything right in the box. You hook it up and you're ready to go.
__ Aside from that last bitch, we feel
...any web designer, DTP professional or publishing practitioner
will be well served by the Olympus D-600L.
It's cleanly designed, works very well and takes great pictures. Unless some
of the other cameras we review really blow the roof off, the D-600L may well be the
one we'll purchase for the Design Center.
Fred
Next month: Mavica Tricksin the Studio
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