Quick impressions: Crops at 1:1 are definitely much better than the Panasonic. It’ll do digital zoom while recording video but not optical zoom (lame). I made a test video of over 3 minutes on the “slow” SD card that the DMC-FX9 would stop recording on after 90 seconds. For this PC user, AVI > MOV. Taking some sample shots of the grass in my yard, the Panasonic seems to have better color. The FX9’s image stabilization in poor light or at full zoom wasn’t all that hot but it’s slightly better than the SD700’s. The SD700 is a little too tall for the case I had for the FX9, so that’s fifty more dollars down the drain and another trip to Best Buy desperately trying every horizontal cell phone case to discover the one that will fit correctly… only this time I’m not so sure that I’ll find one.
Overall it seems good enough. My next autocross on 7/23 will probably be my first opportunity to really put it to the test.
