Nikon Coolpix 8700 8MP Digital Camera with 8x Optical Zoom

Product Description

"The Power of Eight". With an impressive 8.0 effective megapixels and a powerful 8x zoom lens, the COOLPIX 8700 is positioned as the line-up's newest flagship model. It delivers unmatched image quality - a hallmark of all Nikon products - and offers an advanced ergonomic design that greatly enhances operational ease and comfort.

Amazon.com Product Description

Boasting an impressive 8-megapixel resolution and 8x optical zoom lens, the Nikon Coolpix 8700 is a great choice for professional and advanced amateur photographers. Compared with its predecessor--Nikon's Coolpix 5700--the Coolpix 8700 has a faster start-up time, faster data recording, shorter release time lag and a new AF-Assist illuminator for quick AF operation in low light. It also features a movie mode with audio, a lightweight magnesium alloy body, PictBridge compatibility, and much more.

Optics and Resolution
The ultra-high resolution Coolpix 8700 has a 2/3-inch-type CCD that captures up to 3264 x 2448 images for poster-size print enlargements. Other resolution modes include 3264 x 2176, 2592 x 1944, 2048 x 1536, 1600 x 1200, 1280 x 960, 1024 x 768, and 640 x 480. The 8x optical Zoom-Nikkor lens (f/2.8 - 4.2) offers a focal range of 8.9-71.2mm (equivalent to 35-280mm in 35mm format). It also has a 4x digital zoom. The lens incorporates two ED (Extra-low Dispersion) glass elements that minimize chromatic aberration for sharp, clear images. Additionally, the Optical Low-Pass Filter is optimized, which helps the high-definition CCD image sensor get the best optical performance.

See detailed views of the 8700's features:
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Movie Mode
In addition to snapping brilliant still photos, the Coolpix 8700 can also capture video with audio. It offers four movie modes: TV movie (640 x 480 pixels; 30 fps) with audio, Small movie (320 x 240 pixels; 15 fps) with audio, sepia movie (320 x 240 pixels; 5 fps) with audio, and time-lapse movie (640 x 480 pixels; 30 fps).

More Features
The Coolpix 8700 offers Programmed Auto, Shutter-Priority Auto, Aperture-Priority Auto, and Manual, as well as Exposure Compensation for an exceptional degree of exposure control. Nikon's 256-segment Matrix Metering system enables optimal exposures in even the most challenging lighting conditions, while its Matrix Auto White Balance neutralizes color deviations created by ambient light sources. The convenient Best Shot Selector (BSS) function automatically selects the sharpest image from a series of consecutive shots--especially valuable during macro or telephoto shooting.

The 5-shot buffer mode retains the last 5 shots when the shutter button is continually pressed and then released in order to capture unexpected or fleeting moments. The continuous shooting feature captures 2.5 (H) or 1.2 (L) frames per second. Alternatively, you can use the new Multi-shot mode to capture 16 consecutive frames in a single image. It's equipped with a large, vari-angle 1.8-inch LCD monitor for increased visibility--even during bright daylight and a high-resolution EVF (Electronic Viewfinder) that offers greater contrast and clearer images.

Other features include:

Continuous shooting of up to 5 full-size (3,264 x 2,448-pixel) pictures at 2.5 frames per second (fps)
12 Scene Modes: Portrait, Party/Indoor, Night portrait, Beach/Snow, Landscape, Sunset, Night landscape, Fireworks show, Close up, Copy, Back light, and Panorama assist
RAW mode image recording
Accessory shoe to accommodate attachment of external Nikon SB-series Speedlights
Fast shutter speed of 1/4,000 seconds and maximum 10 minute long exposure mode (along with noise reduction mode for long-time exposures)

Printing

The camera's magnesium alloy body is rugged and lightweight.

The Coolpix 8700 is PictBridge compatible, which enables you to transfer pictures from your digital camera to your printer, without a PC or image-editing software. All PictBridge devices share three basic features: camera-to-printer connecting, single-image printing, and uniform error messages (in case something goes wrong)

Storage and Transfer
Images and video are stored on CompactFlash memory cards (Type I/II), and the Coolpix 8700 is compatible with MicroDrives (no memory card is included with this package). Files can be downloaded to either a Mac or PC via USB 1.1 connectivity, which means it can be connected to any USB-based Windows 98/Me/2000/XP and Mac OS 8.6 or later computer without installing any software.

Power and Size
The camera is powered by a rechargeable lithium-ion battery (EN-EL1, included, captures approximately 210 images). It can also be powered by the optional MB-E5700 battery pack (6 AA batteries). It measures 4.4 by 4.1 by 3.1 inches and weighs 17 ounces (excluding battery).

What's in the Box
This package includes the Coolpix 8700 digital camera, rechargeable lithium-ion battery (EN-EL1), battery charger (MH-53), lens cap, camera strap, USB and A/V cables, and CD-ROM with Nikon View editing software and drivers. Optional accessories include: Fisheye Converter (FC-E9), Wideangle Converter (WC-E80), Telephoto Converter (TC-E15ED), Step-Down Ring Lens Adapter (UR-E12), Lens Hood (HR-E5700), Lens Hood (HN-CP11), AC Adapter (EH-53), Car Battery Charger (MH-53C), Remote Cord (MC-EU1), and Soft Case (CS-CP11).

Customer Reviews:

Compact, full featured, great pictures, but not for action scenes.......2007-08-07

I'm a novice photographer and the Nikon 8700 was the first camera I bought
that was a step above the point and shoot Olympus camera I've owned for
over 6 years.

I had read many great reviews on this camera and it lived up to all those
expections, minus one: this camera is not ideal for taking sports or
action pictures. I was quite disappointed with the results after trying
to take decent pictures of my sons playing indoor basketball and outdoor
soccer. I finally did some research and learned that (like another
reviewer had observed) only digital SLRs have the responsiveness and
speed and capability to take action pictures. With the 8700, the shutter
lag speed is one factor- you click on the shutter release button but it
takes a portion of a second before the camera snaps the picture. I then
thought that with manual settings (shutter release priority mode)I could
correct that behavior, but no combination of settings changed or improved
the result. The result was the images coming out blurry. I was surprised
at this and thought it was a camera setting, but after doing some more
online researching I found out that (1) the major digital camera review
sites do not seem to cover any sports or action picture taking and
(2) a lot of users of the 8700 did report the same problems that I
encountered and (3) you can improve sports shots by learning some basic
techniques because some claim that no matter what camera you have, you
do have to apply some of these techniques, which is basically predicting
your shots and having knowledge of the sport in hand so that you know
when to prepare for your shots. In either case, those folks did confirm
the weak sports mode and limited capabilities of the 8700, which seem
to be more pronounced than other cameras.

As a novice user, the only other negative aspect of the camera is its
difficult access to the options, which is not intuitive, especially when
you don't use the camera a lot and you're under time constraint to take
a picture (of a sports scene) and don't have time to fumble around to
figure out how to change a camera setting. And I'm quite a technical
guy who had already read the user manual. I'm sure with time one would
be more familiar with the menu system and how to tweak a specific setting.
I guess the camera's strength of many features can be its own weakness.

Other than the two above mentioned weaknesses, I would have to say that
with the many still shots of landscape, people, and even animals, this
camera has made me look better than my novice photographer status. Along
with the Canon inkjet printer I have, I can print out better than the
lab photo quality pictures at home. However, I am looking for a true
digital SLR just to compensate for the lack of a decent sports mode in
the 8700. Better digital SLRs have either 3 or 5 fps for continuous
shooting modes versus the 8700's 1.5 fps, but of course they are in
two different classes and price ranges.

Amazing functional camera!.......2007-07-11

This is a wonderful little camera. I started my little addiction to Nikon with a $500 3MP point and shoot. I used it for a long time, this was when digital camera's first became everywhere. I decided to spend the money and get a GOOD new one. This one was perfect. I own a mini DVD camcorder and I'm sad that the quality of video isn't as good as the video from this camera! And easy to add to your computer. I am not a photographer, and this camera was very easy to learn. It has so much it can do, but other than video mine stayed on auto. I ended up upgrading to a SLR Nikon d70s and the size isn't much larger. I couldn't ever go back to a point and shoot because of the delay. When I got this 5700 it was $600 whereas I got my d70s body for the same price. I already had several lenses from my Nikon film SLR cameras. If you cant afford to get a SLR, I would absolutely recommend this camera. I sold mine to upgrade to the SLR and I miss it terribly. I would probably carry it around just to get little video's. But the pictures are amazing! If you want a sample of what these pictures turn out like I will gladly show you some of my snap shots, indoor and out. Just email me at ItsMelodie@aol.com and let me know. I highly recommend this camera though!

I love this camera.......2007-05-12

This is a wonderful camera, for me. I don't know much about photography and admittedly don't understand all the bells and whistles it offers but it does work great on mostly automatic focus. Only slght difficulties with a sort of slow shutter release requiring complete steadiness when shooting.

Solid Performance.......2006-10-09

I have owned my Nikon 8700 for almost two years and have taken over 7000 photos. It is a very good serious amateur's camera and might make a reasonable back-up for a professional phtotographer. The 8 megapixel resolution is enough for moderately sized prints, up to about 11 x 14, assuming no cropping.

The zoom lens is reasonably fast and quite convenient. Autofocus is normally pretty good, but as one approaches close-up shots with long focal length and moderate or low light, it fails quite regularly. One can see it 'hunt' right through the perfect focus and choose something not even close. Otherwise, the optics seem pretty good. The viewfinder is bright, but it is really small. It will indicate whether the subject is in the frame, but it will give only a hint of what the final result will look like. This puts it at a great disadvantage to real "through the lens" slr's.

It will produce very sharp images under moderately favorable conditions. There is only a little barrel distortion and vignetting at short focal lengths, and virtually no chromatic aberration. The jpeg compression, comes in three flavors: basic, normal, and fine. Basic is alright for small snapshot photos and shots of very smooth things, but it produces a lot of jpeg artifacts when trees are cast against the sky or other places where irregular edges contrast with the background. Fine mode has very little of this problem. In-camera sharpening works reasonably well, though even the lowest level will produce banding artifacts in high contrast areas. These will typically be visible only during image editing, though.

Color reproduction is generally quite good, but dark and midtone colors between blue and red - especially those between magenta and red - will often appear to be qualitatively very different in the photo from what they do to the eye. It is something that can be repaired in Photoshop, but anyone without a really solid image-editing program will be tempted to throw the camera against the wall. In other words - if you want this camera, you need to have an image editing program that allows adjustment of curves, and adjustment of hue and saturation for the six primary and secondary colors. My cheap Fujifilm 2800 is much more faithful with these reds.

With eight different modes of operation including landscape, flowers, indoor portrait, fireworks, and panorama, the electronics offer a good variety of modes. I use floral and landscape all the time, and they work quite well. Floral mode offers five zones that you can use for focus and exposure metering, making this a really handy mode for all kinds of close work.

Other modes are not quite as good. I tried nightime landscape last night. It was a full moon - one of those 'bright as day' nights. But the shutter did not stay open long enough to register any sort of an image, except for a ghostly dark gray image of some pure white surfaces. Similarly, the flash manages to make everything look ugly. This may not be a quality unique to this flash, but I would never use the flash except for cases of slight fill when the subject was 6-10 feet away. In its defense, there is a hot shoe and if I were not in the habit of using natural light for everything, I should have mastered this art by now.

Most of the controls are intuitive and easy to use. There is a bank of controls that naturally falls beneath the left hand when one is steadying the camera. These include the jpeg adjustment, self timer, and the flash mode selector. I have ruined many dozens of shots by accidently pressing one of these. Almost every photo-shoot in moderate or low light finds me waiting for the self-timer. And I went a whole shoot doing "basic" mode when I intended "fine."

The body is solid and it is mechanically quite sound. It fits the hands quite comfortably. Fit and finish are very soli. After two years of moderate use, the camera seems none the worse for the wear. Even the decals are in mint condition I have two batteries and a charger, and find that this is just barely enough. I also bought a 1 gigapixel card and would not reecommend anything less.

I have owned three film SLR's and I could never recommend trading to this camera from a film SLR. I have scanned a number of slides and am sure that this camera produces an image, that is is better than one from a 35mm, but one quickly misses the control one is used to shooting manually with an SLR. I bought this camera at the same time as a Pentax 6x7 medium format camera, and I find myself using this for almost everything because it is so much more convenient and portable. And only in the case of images that would be over 20 inches on a side is the advantage of high resolution one that makes the Pentax a better choice. For those serious about fine art landscapes and other photos with much detail, medium format film will still beat this camera or, probably any digital camera for detail. But for less than poster-sized pictures under normal shooting conditions, it is hard to beat this camera.

Big time disappointment.......2006-07-07

I had high expectations for the Coolpix 8700 being a Nikon product. I have been very disappointed with this camera for the
following reasons:
the owners manual is almost impossible to
understand unless you are a rocket scientist.
The viewfinder is very poor quality and most of the time i cannot
see clearly the subject i am trying to photograph.
The time it takes to take a photograph is very slow and by the time the lens has opened and shut, the picture has changed.
I took some side by side comparison photos with my little Kodak 3.1 mp Easyshare DX 4330 which is several years old and was much much less expensive than the Nikon Coolpix 8700, there was no discernable difference in the quality of the pictures!
I find all the buttons on the Nikon confusing, and like another reviewer said, by the time you remember which one to use it is too late.
This is my first Nikon camera, but i plan on selling it and buying another camera from the Kodak Easyshare line.

Remanufactured Nikon Coolpix 8700 8MP Digital Camera with 8x Optical Zoom

Average customer rating:

Remanufactured Nikon Coolpix 8700 8MP Digital Camera with 8x Optical Zoom

Manufacturer: Nikon
ProductGroup: CE
Binding: Electronics

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Product Features:

8-megapixel sensor captures 3264 x 2448 images for poster-size plus print enlargements
8x optical zoom and 4x digital zoom (for 32x total zoom)
Movie mode with audio; 5-shot buffer mode; fast start-up time
Store images on CompactFlash type I/II memory cards; Microdrive compatible; no memory card included
Powered by rechargeable lithium-ion battery (included); connects via USB 1.1

ASIN: B000C7HD2O

Product Description

The new Averatec 6100 Series Mobile Notebook PC is powerful, portable, and affordable. Providing the comfort and functionality of a desktop and the ability to go anywhere you want to go. Backed by an Intel Pentium Processor this 15.4" wide screen notebook is filled with performance-rich features including an ATI MOBILITY RADEON 9600 Graphics card and a built-in digital media reader.

Amazon.com Product Description

Combining powerful mobility features with an affordable price tag, the Averatec AV6128H1-01 notebook PC will keep you productive when away from the office. Featuring a large, widescreen 15.4-inch screen, the AV6128H1-01 also offers an ATI Mobility Radeon 9600 with 64 MB of video memory for crisp rendering of graphics and DVD movies. Other features include a 40 GB hard drive, 512 MB of installed RAM, a combo DVD-ROM/CD-RW drive, and 54g wireless connectivity.

The Basics

Hard Drive: The 40 GB hard drive (4200 RPM) is smaller in comparison to other business-oriented notebooks. However, it will offer a decent enough capacity for storing documents and productivity software for road warriors--though not much multimedia storage.
Processor: The 2.8 GHz Intel Pentium 4 processor offers the speed you'll need for today's demanding office productivity software and multimedia presentations. It features a 533 MHz front-side bus (FSB), which measures how fast a processor and the main memory communicate, and a 256 KB L2 cache. (An L2, or secondary, cache temporarily stores data; and a larger L2 cache can help speed up your system's performance.)
Memory: The 512 MB of built-in memory (2 x 256 MB, PC2700, DDR SDRAM) is a good start for power users. It has two memory slots in total, with a maximum memory expansion up to 2 GB (2 x 1024 MB).
CD/DVD Drive: This notebook includes a combo DVD-ROM/CD-RW drive, with 24x write/read and 10x rewrite speed for CDs and 8x read speed for DVDs.
Keyboard & Mouse: This notebook has a standard 86-key keyboard and electro-static two-button touchpad.

Screen, Graphcs and Sound
The 15.4-inch widescreen TFT active matrix LCD screen (with 1280 x 800-pixel resolution) provides a bright, vivid display and allows images to be seen from a wider angle than most notebooks. The ATI Mobility Radeon 9600 is a relatively high-end video/graphics card, and will easily drive two monitors (the notebook's LCD and an external monitor) at high resolution. It also features an integrated audio card with headhphone and microphone jacks.

Connectivity and Expansion Slots
The AV6128H1-01 has an integrated 54g wireless LAN that's compatible with 802.11b and 802.11g networks. You get a good offering of connectivity options, including both super-fast USB 2.0 and Firewire options:

3 USB 2.0 ports for connecting a wide range of peripherals--from digital cameras to MP3 players
1 VGA monitor port
1 Parallel port
1 FireWire (also known as IEEE 1394 or i.Link) port for connecting digital video camcorders and other peripherals
1 PCMCIA (or PC Card) slot (Type II)
1 headphone jack
1 microphone jack
Multiformat memory card reader compatible with Secure Digital, MultiMedia Card (MMC), and Memory Stick

It also has an integrated 56K modem (V.90) and an RJ-45 LAN network port (for a 10/100 Gigabit Ethernet connection to networks and DSL/cable modems).

Preloaded System and Software
This system comes with the Windows XP Home Edition Service Pack 2 operating system with Advanced Security Technologies, which helps to reduce unwanted downloads and pop-ups while surfing the Web.

Dimensions and Weight
This notebook measures 14.1 x 10.6 x 1.4 inches and weighs 7.7 pounds.

Power
It's powered by a rechargeable lithium-ion battery, which has a battery life of up to 2 hours (depending on usage).

What's in the Box
This package contains the AV6128H1-01 notebook PC, rechargeable lithium-ion battery, AC adapter, and operating instructions. It is backed by a one-year limiited hardware warranty.

Customer Reviews:

So much to offer .......2005-03-26

I shopped for a (under $1000) notebook for my wife basically for her digital photos and her Girl Scout files, I was very disappointed in what the local stores had to offer.

PROS:

This laptop looks great, has a nice large keyboard, and the 15 inch XGA display is beautiful with up to 128MB shared memory!

The front 4-in-1 Media Card Reader is impressive and works flawlessly.

It comes with only 512MB ram, but is easily upgraded with PC2700 type (333mhz) 200-pin DDR memory.

The AMD Processor is quick and pushes this laptop to achieve the desired results (photo editing and word processing).

I turned it the first time and within a few minutes I was already surfing the web as it easily found my router, and my network.

The sound on this laptop is much better than all of the other similarly (and some higher) priced laptops I looked at.

We watched a DVD the first night and had absolutely no complaints (and this was still using only the original 256MB of memory)!

Comes loaded with Roxio CD burning software and Microsoft Works 7.0, and PowerDVD.

CONS:

A bit larger/heavier than what I was originally shopping for, but I couldn't pass up on the great deal. And at 6.8 lbs, it's really not that heavy.

The video is NOT for gaming! But like I said, you'll have no problems watching movies and if you use the S-Video (TV Out) Port on a flat screen... WOW!

SUMMARY:

We have nothing to complain about.

All around great "budget" laptop.

This laptop will do everything except render the latest games.

What a Bargain!

Electronics:

Electronics

Electronics