Jola

My C-5050Z only supports FAT-16 so only goes to 2Gb. But check this : http://www.wrotniak.net/photo/c-wz/c5060-rev.html According to Wrotniak the 5060 DOES support FAT32 and will therefore work with the larger cards.

I'm also interested in the Sony P-200, essentially for the size advantage. Main problem is that there is no housing yet, according to user feedback the P-150 housing does not fit. Any other opinions about the suitability or not of this camera for scuba use ?

I've had both combinations, and while the 5050/PT-015 is obviously superior, the images with the 3030 will be very nice. Especially since you are just snorkeling, and not on scuba, I would tend to go for the 3030 solution. The 3040 is, of course, slightly better if you can get that for a good price. Main difference is the F1.8 lens, the rest is pretty much the same. I don't think that the shutter lag on the 5050 is significantly better than that of the 3030/3040. Both are problematical for that illusive shot with fast moving animals, especially those little reef fish that you often see when snorkeling. Rather spend your savings on your dSLR.

You should use two fresh ones for each dive. I say fresh, and not new, because you can dry them in a microwave. Put a couple on a plate for 60 sec, maybe a second time if necessary - it works well. An stove of sorts would also work well. Also, visit your local PC assembler and get some from him. A lot of components come with these driers in the bags. Ideally, he should put them in a sealed bag for you so that they don't accumulate moisture. For some examples of PT005 / C-4000z images, have a look at www.pbase.com/jola13/phuket. Just examples, mind you, I am sure that you can do much better. I just fiddle around with this stuff.

Thanks guys! I'll try to get the real stuff asap. In the meantime if I dive before I get it I will use the Sea & Sea grease (blue cap). Once I get the real stuff I will clean the O-rings properly and then revert to using the proper Olympus grease.

Thanks Robert, but I can't get hold of the correct grease easily. Most of the US online shops either don't ship internationally, or require to be paid with a US credit card. The one or two that are more flexible don't have it in stock. Adorama have it in stock, and will ship, but want to charge me USD112 for ordinary airmail postage (usually USD10 for an item like that). Locally only the Sea & Sea grease is generally available. That's why I asked the question.

Marc, thanks for the reply, I do have some of the standard silicone grease. But Olympus, etc, are always going on about how you can't use the grease for the black rings on the coloured rings, and vice versa, so I just don't know what I can or can't use. The standard grease won't damage the O-rings, will it ? PS: The stuff that I have is called "Spanjaard Silicone Paste" and comes from the UK.

The 5050 & housing is small, not much bigger than your S50. The bulk comes from the extra strobes and arms - and you will have the same problem with that if you go the external strobe route.

I have an Olympus C-5050z and PT-015, which was recently stolen, and fortunately recovered by the police. But many of the supplementary stuff, like O-ring grease, lens caps, etc is missing. The O-rings were also full of grit, so I need to clean them and re-grease before I can use the housing again. It will take me some time and effort to get hold of new Olympus O-ring grease. Is there an alternative that I can use, for example the Sea & Sea grease as used on the Mx-10 - also a coloured (blue) O-ring. Is the material here the same as the Olympus PT-015 O-rings? I have some of that grease available. Or is there something else that one can use?

I tested the Ridata 1Gb 40X CF extensively with RAW on a 5050, and it was twice as fast as a Fujifilm 256Mb xD card, and also twice as fast as a cheap Dane-Elec 256Mb CF card. In fairly comprehensive tests that I performed, xD was never noticeably faster than SmartMedia, whereas good CF cards were a lot faster than xD. xD is an overpriced dog. Rather spend the cash on a bigger CF card. I have a Sandisk Ultra II 256Mb CF on order and will test that when it arrives. From comments that I have seen it sounds like a good card, certainly much better than the Sandisk Ultra's, which never really performed.

I bought a Ridata 1Gb 40X CF for the 5050. It worked well during testing, but I never used it u/w because my 5050, new (never wet) PT-015 and CF card were stolen at the dive site before I could use them. I also had a 256Mb Fuji xD in the camera, the idea being to shoot only RAW.

There is no problem, it works perfectly. I took many nice pictures with that combination. I can't really advise about the other items, I always only lubricated the main O-ring, and only used the internal flash - it worked fine for most pictures. Look at http://www.marscuba.com/instructions.html for some info on how to use and look after the housing. And say thank you to Matt.

Doug, I think that you are correct, however. The 5060 should be much better than the 750 even though it will be more expensive. I am interested in your comments about the shutter lag on the 5060. Do you really think that it is much better than the 5050 ? I used to have a 5050 so am familiar with the shutter lag on that. I must say that I dislike the proprietary Li-Ion battery on the 5060. Granted, it will last slightly longer than a set of good AA's, but it will be expensive and where I dive there are no facilities to charge these things. I used to have lots of AA's for my 5050 and could also charge them in the car. So from my point of view the Li-Ion batteries are a major backwards step.

It's a long story regarding the insurance company but at the end of the day they misled me with inaccurate information. But there is nothing that I can do about it except to take my business elsewhere. I have checked the Olympus C-750Z, it does have Full Manual, and also has Manual White Balance. I don't know about the vignetting, anybody have input about this? I'm also not crazy about the idea of spending good cash on xD cards. Pity Olympus didn't bring out a revamp of the 5050 (new ED lens with less CA, and left everything the same). I don't like the 5060, especially not the proprietary battery.

I've just had the misfortune of having a newish C-5050z, and a brand new (never been used) PT-015, plus a HP IPAQ 2210, a number of large memory cards and three Aladin dive computers, as well as a few other expensive items stolen. Insurance won't pay. I now have to downsize a bit and was wondering how the C-750z and PT-018 worked for u/w photography. The benefit is that the camera is relatively cheap, and with the large zoom is also useful for bird and wildlife photography, as well as candids. Clearly there are a number of disadvantages compared to the C-5050z, but I want to keep costs down at this point. Any views on this?

I recently did four dives on a single set of Sanyo 2100mAh batteries with a C-4000z. I was on a boat without enough batteries or a charger. The dives were all about 50 minutes. I was reasonably careful, but still used the LCD display a lot, and also deleted poor photographs between dives, etc. I don't think that normal diving temperatures have any impact on the batteries. I used my C-4000z at below zero last December while ski-ing in Canada, and the camera performed well. The major problem was the LCD showing funny colours and condensation on the lens. Just check your batteries, or better still, get new +2100mAh batteries and use the old ones for something else.

Major changes are 4X zoom (limited WA), F2.8 ED Lens, Li-Ion battery, improved AF. But from a scuba point of view an interesting feature is the claim of a significantly reduced shutter lag, claimed to be 0.4 sec including focussing. We will have to wait and see whether this claim is justified. The shape is similar to the C-5050z, but not exactly the same. So will the PT-015 fit? I guess we just don't know yet.

I think that it would be pretty rare for CA to be a factor in u/w photography. I wouldn't worry about it. Also, the C-5050z and the PT-015 work quite well with just the internal flash. This applies especially to macro photographs. Obviously, if you take photographs through water with a lot of suspended particles, the closeness of the internal flash to the lens will result in some backscatter. But the internal flash works well enough that you can use that as a starting point and then you can decide on external strobes later. I would go with the 5050/PT-015 option, it is a nice u/w setup and the PT-015 is quite cheap now.

Jeff, that shot with the macro lens is absolutely stunning! Congratulations!

What is the effective life of an O-ring? I have an Olympus PT-005 (C-4000Z) and am still using the original O-ring after two years. The housing has only been used for about 30 dives, and I have made sure to take good care of the O-ring. But I didn't know about the possible compression problem during storage and have kept it in the housing with it closed. The problem is that it is very difficult for me to get original replacements, so it is not as simple as just being conservative and replacing it.

It's a good question, and I would also like to see the answers to this. However, I don't live in the USA, and it would be even more difficult to have a PT-0XX serviced here. Considering that these housing are relatively cheap, and servicing would be expensive, is the answer not to just replace the housing after a certain time. In this case, when would start to regard these other O-rings as being unreliable???

OK, back from my Indian Ocean coral reef weekend at Sodwana Bay. Great weather and great diving! Surge was just a bit strong, couldn't keep still long enough for many nice pictures. In any event, I am very happy with the 4000. I can understand Jamesw's point with respect to the supermacro mode, but that still makes the 4000 better than any other Olympus in the x0x0 class except for the 5050. The 4040 doesn't even have supermacro or mymodes, which I found invaluable on the 4000. I will probably move to to 5050 (or 6060) later, but for the moment am having fun with the 4000. The shutter lag, however, just kills me. I am fed up with fishtails. Part of the problem is that I still have the original PT-005 housing, and it doesn't have the leveraged shutter release, with the result that it is difficult to do a half depress of the release. One just can't do such a sensitive depress of the button. Maybe I should just sell the PT-005/C-4000Z as a package and upgrade to the PT015/C-5050Z. But it would be very difficult for me to get hold of a PT-015 where I live.

Jamesw I have a 4000 (replaced an older 3040) that I was planning on using for scuba. But I see that you are right, the flash gets disabled in macro mode. I wasn't aware of this, I don't take many macro shots on the surface. Does anyone know of a solution to this? Such as a firmware upgrade,etc. If I can't solve this I may have to dump the camera and go back to a 3040 (I have a PT-005, these are the best models that fit into this housing). Late Edit: I have done some tests, certainly flash works in macro mode when camera is set to P, A, S or M. But on one of my mymodes, where I have full manual and macro, the flash does not work. So this is not a total negative, I just have to find out exactly what is going on. I will report back once I have solved this in case someone is interested. Maybe it is a bug in the MyModes, or maybe some other setting. Anyone know? Later Edit: I just had the mymode set to fast shooting, then the flash gets disabled. So flash works with macro in all modes, just not for fast shooting. I use max resolution with SHQ, I don't now if this plays a role at all. I don't know whether this issue is related to a small buffer on the 4000, or whether it is just a flash recharge issue. The flash does not work at all in supermacro, but this is understandable, it is just too close (4cm). What is the case with the 5050, does the flash work when in fast shooting mode, and does it work when in supermacro mode? Anyway, I am now happy that the 4000 can do everything that I require. Am diving tomorrow, will provide feedback on how the 4000 performs. My only problem with the 4000 is the shutter lag. But considering that you need at least USD6000 (good dSLR & housing, etc) to solve this problem, I guess that I have to live with it.

Clearly the 5050 is a great camera for underwater imaging. But don't throw out the 4000. Even though it is a lower-end model than the 4040, it is much newer and has features that the 4040 doesn't have. Like four MyModes, real-time histogram, super macro, etc. And it is much cheaper in case of a flooded housing. I think that it is a great camera for scuba, especially for beginners. I will move to the 5050 (or 6060) at some point, but at the moment I am having great fun with my 4000. I just hope that the next model after the 5050 uses the same housing! Oh, and one can get replacement O-rings for all the Oly housings. At a price, and not available everywhere. Try www.oceanbrite.com and www.marscuba.com

Yes, but the GBP20 is normally a flat rate, and for a large transaction this is fine. But to buy widgets from some online store it is just too expensive. But I agree that it works well. And postal costs are often a more irritating factor than bank costs. For me to order stuff from the USA the postal costs are prohibitive - I live in South Africa! I do have the problem that hi-tech items are not always available here, or are prohibitively expensive. And to get them from overseas you have bank costs, transport costs and import duties .