Fujifilm
DS-260HD "BigJob"

Have you ever wished that you could take a digital camera out in the rain without fear of ruining it?   Or to the beach with all that nasty sand ... Or skiing in the snow ... Or on that wild ride at the park where you get half-drowned at the end ... Or ... well, you get the idea. The Fujifilm DS-260HD is the camera to take with you for all of these conditions. It isn't an underwater camera but it is highly water resistant and dustproof and able to survive where other cameras would quickly fail. The DS-260HD is the only digital camera that I have ever used that comes with a tube of silicon grease. The last camera I had that needed this was a Nikonos 35mm underwater camera. The silicon grease is used to maintain the rubber O-ring seals on the camera's three access doors (SmartMedia, I/O ports and the battery compartment.) Fujifilm's DS-260HD "BigJob" is basically their MX-600 inside of a weatherproof and very ruggedized housing. The camera specifications are identical, it has a 3X optical zoom lens and a 1.5 megapixel CCD imager that yields 1280 x 1024 pixel images. Images can be stored in one of three levels of JPG compression. Jump to the DS-260HD specifications As you can see, the BigJob is a big camera. Here it is next to a Sony Mavica FD-88 which is considered a large camera by modern digicam standards. All of the controls are big and easy to operate, even while wearing gloves. The optical viewfinder is large and has a fairly wide viewing angle plus a diopter adjustment too. The 1.8-inch color LCD screen is mounted behind a very thick but transparent cover and is just as visible as a normal digicam's LCD. On the top there is an accessory shot but it is not a hot shoe. The flash is built in but the DS-260HD does have an external flash sync mode in the menu but no PC sync type port. The shutter button is a bouncy, rubberized type of switch that takes a healthy push to activate, you won't be firing off any "accidental" shots with this camera. Here is the SmartMedia access, it looks more like an escape hatch on a submarine than a card access door. When closed it forms a very secure seal around the card slot. The DS-260HD comes with an 8MB 3.3v SmartMedia card and works with cards up to 32MB capacity. Even a person with tiny fingers is going to have difficulty extracting the SmartMedia cards. The cards don't pop out halfway like some SM slots, and there's no eject lever either. I ended up using my favorite pair of needle nose pliars to remove the cards. The I/O ports are also protected by a weatherproof access door. There's a RS-232 serial port, a Video output port and the DC input jack to power the camera or charge the battery. And speaking of the battery. The DS-260HD comes with a rechargeable lithium battery and combination charger and AC power supply. You can take hundreds of shots per charge if you keep the LCD useage down to a minimum. It is highly recommended to buy a second battery as you can't run this camera with any other type of battery and it takes about 7hrs to charge.

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