Factory Reburbished, Fujifilm FinePix AV200 Review

Andrea wanted to get her 72 year old father a digital camera and She asked me to have a look around for something that would be easy to use, make good pictures and cost about €50 including postage.

A fairly tall order, maybe not

So after a little research and a good look around our ever present online e-market site I suggested this
Factory Refurbished  Fujifilm FinePix AV200.

Well I hear you ask what does Factory refurbished mean? you get a camera that is serviced by the manufacturer, which in this case means it looks like new, and I mean NEW not even a fingerprint on the LCD screen. Its then re-packaged with a new manual, software disc and leads + 2 AA batteries. The only sign that this has been used before is the FujiFilm Finepix Box States clearly this is "Camera is Factory Refurbished" As this particular camera is still part of the current Fuji lineup this is obliviously to stop the unscrupulous trying to sell it again as new. Which with the condition of this camera could well have been done.

A word of warning always check your seller is honest, as I have heard and read horror stories about trashed camera's sold as refurbished. On the likes of ebay if it truly is Factory Refurbished the seller will have more then one. So always check people's feedback and see what others are saying. If you are buying from another site it is always a good idea to run a Google/Yahoo search with the webshops/site name and Keywords like. "Complaints" "Reported" and the old faithful "Ripoff".

As Always Click on Photos to see a larger Image

Available Light, Nice Colour Rendition, quite good Dynamic Range but as with a lot of the current 14/16 megapixel micro sensors there is less highlight detail then one will get with a larger sensor, or less pixels!

I find the wide angle setting a little on the Normal Side for my liking

 The SR Scene Recognition is a really good catch all setting, which lets you set it and then point and shoot. Here we can see that the software is struggling to make an acceptable image under these conditions. It Looks sooo Digital !

 Full Scene

100% Crop. Actual Pixels

Andrea with forced flash used as shadow fill light

Available light in the workshop, here it did a good job of capturing detail in the highlights, To be Honest I have been polishing this little baby for a while now.

 This was taken with the flower setting in strong sunlight and is sharp as a tack, impressed with the quality of the lens, take a look at the 100% Crop below.

There is also a 1280 x 720p HD video capability with auto focus and image stabilisation which I did not have time to test as Andrea was off to Germany to see her folks

In conclusion for €50 I would recommend this to just about anyone who wants a little camera in their pocket with the ability to make A2 prints. The lens has its limits as its only x3 zoom but it is tack sharp. The one reservation I have is the I had trouble seeing the screen in really bright light, but you can say this or most screen only camera's. Having a proper viewfinder is one of the best reasons to move to a bridge camera or an SLR, because the viewfinder is were the picture is really made.