Fuji Camera Download

Fuji Photo's MX-2700 said to fit in shirt pocket, includes disk adapter, Adobe editing software

Over the past few years, digital cameras have become less expensive, smaller and higher in resolution.

Tokyo-based Fuji Photo Film Ltd.'s MX-2700 boasts 1,800 by 1,200 - or 2.3 million square pixel - resolution at an estimated street price of $1,200.

Fuji claims the camera can fit into a breast pocket. This may work for a sports jacket, but don't try carrying it around in a dress shirt pocket - it's fairly heavy and you'll look like a geek.

It is easy to use and has more than enough features for basic photography, but don't expect to carry it around without having the manual handy (one of the drawbacks of a small camera is there's not enough room to label all of the buttons). To stow the manual, you'll need a briefcase , or at the very least, cargo pockets on your trousers.

If you like zoom lenses, then zoom away from the MX-2700. Although it boasts a "digital" telephoto lense (meaning the lense doesn't physically move in and out), you can zoom in at 1.2X or 2.5X telephoto mode, but nothing in between, although the Macro mode allows you to focus in on small objects, such as business cards. This is one of its biggest drawbacks, but it's a reasonable sacrifice to make for the small size.

Fuji has taken pains to make the product nearly idiot-proof. Novice users can choose Auto Focus mode, whereas more advanced users can switch to manual mode, which lets photographers control white balance, exposure and flash settings.

Like most other digital cameras, the MX-2700 comes with serial cables for downloading photos to your PC. For those who don't want to tie up their camera while downloading photos, Fuji offers the FD-A2 Floppy Disk Adapter, which is sold separately.

Simply remove the Smart Media card (the device on which the images are stored) from the camera, insert it into the Floppy Disk Adapter (which is basically a 3.5-inch disk with a slot for the Smart Media card) and load the disk into your disk drive.

There's one catch with the disk adapter, though. It comes with software that can only be installed on one PC. If you want to be able to download images on to two PCs, then you would have to buy two floppy disk adapters.

The camera includes Adobe PhotoShop Home Edition 3.0, which is a consumer product but allows users to look at the images they've taken and do some minor editing.

Overall, the MX-2700 is a relatively inexpensive camera that is suitable for a business user who's not a trained photographer or graphics professional.

More information is available at www.fujifilm.com.

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