Olympus Stylus 770SW

The Quick Start Guide can be accessed any time from the top of the window where a host of icons and functions are listed: Transfer, Slide Show, E-mail, Print Menu, Edit, RAW, Panorama, Options, Update/Language, and Help. Pictures can be viewed in albums or folders organized at the left side and viewed in pages of thumbnails on the right. When users double-click on a thumbnail, a larger preview appears with editing choices to the right.

The editing features are fairly vast when compared to included software with other point-and-shoot digital cameras. WIth this version of Olympus Master Software, users can tweak tone and gamma curves and adjust brightness, contrast, hue, sharpness, and saturation. Colors can be balanced, blur and red eyes can be reduced, distortions corrected, and text inserted. Typical cropping and resizing tools are available too. Monochrome and sepia filters can be applied and they look much better than the on-camera versions because the contrast can be easily changed on a sliding bar.

 

Overall, the included software provides the basics plus a little more for point-and-shooters. Images can be viewed and organized, edited and printed all from the software.

Jacks, ports, plugs (9.0)
Many digital cameras have a flimsy cover for their jacks, but the Olympus Stylus 770SW protects them behind a sturdy door with a plastic lock that snaps into place. The door is located on the right side and springs open nicely when the lock is released. Under the door, there is only one jack that connects to everything: USB, AV-out, and DC-in cables. In the setup menu, the AV function can be set to NTSC or PAL standards.

 

The door to the jack isn't sealed around its edges. There is only a rubber pad that surrounds the smaller jack itself. After dunking the camera in water and snapping a few pictures in the sink, I set it out to dry for an hour. After that time, I opened the door so I could transfer pictures with the USB cable. To my dismay, I saw water droplets in the sides of the compartment. Sure, they weren't in the jack itself, but they could have streamed into it if I had been tilting the camera the right way. It's an accident waiting to happen; the door should be better sealed as Olympus touts the 770SW as being a completely waterproof digital camera.  

Direct Print Options (6.5)
The Olympus Stylus 770SW comes with several effects in the playback menu that make it a prime candidate for direct printing. Users can create ready-to-print cards and calendars within the playback menu. This can be done via the USB cable since the 770SW is PictBridge compatible. Users can also create print orders from the playback menu. They can choose to add all photos to a print order or scroll through pictures individually and choose how many of each to print from 0-10. They can also opt to print the date and time on them. Once the order is made, it can be transferred to the connected printer with a touch of the designated Print button. If users want to print an occasional picture, they can do it with the Easy Print option.

Battery (5.25)
This camera comes with a rechargeable lithium-ion battery that packs in 3.7 volts and 740 mAh. The Olympus Li-42B battery is skinny. It is the same size as the one in the 720SW that got 300 shots per charge but is a version Li-40B battery. According to the specs, the battery gets 200 shots in the Stylus 770SW. On the LCD screen’s view, there is a battery indicator, but it only shows two levels of power. It begins to blink when it has about 5-10 minutes of power left. The camera comes with a battery charger and a cable that connects it to the wall. It takes about 5 hours for it to fully charge according to Olympus.

Memory (4.0)
The Olympus Stylus 770SW has 18 MB of internal memory to hold 4 pictures at the maximum resolution. There is a xD-Picture card slot next to the battery in the bottom compartment, and the camera can accept cards up to 2 GB. An Olympus-branded xD card is required to access the panorama mode and backup feature in the camera.

Other features (8.5)
Shockproof - The Olympus Stylus 770SW can withstand the impact of a 5-foot fall. My toddler dropped the camera from his height a few times and I tried it from 5 feet, although I was more nervous about scratching my hardwood floor than destroying the camera. The Olympus Stylus 770SW is quite a hefty chunk of metal too, so I was more worried about my toddler using it as a weapon against me than throwing it on the ground. Users probably won't be chucking it against the wall on purpose (although the specs make it tempting for users to try, I'm sure), but it's nice to have a camera that will definitely be able to survive a few hits in a bag and falls to the ground.

 

Waterproof - This is one of the camera's main features and one of its biggest draws. The 770SW has four underwater scene modes that cater to this feature. It can withstand depths under water up to 32.8 feet, which is an improvement over the 720SW that could only go to 10 feet. The newest waterproof Olympus has seals around the jack, memory card slot, and battery slot, but not the doors themselves. After a dunk in the sink and a tan on the windowsill for an hour, the Stylus 770SW still had moisture droplets in the edges of the door. These could have leaked into the jack or slots if tilted, but I wiped them away. Is the camera waterproof? Yes. But caution should still be used. If users want to go deeper than 33 feet, an optional underwater housing is available for $299. It can go 40 meters below the surface of the water.

 

Freezeproof - According to the specs, the 770SW can function in weather as cold as 14 degrees Fahrenheit, which is about when breathing through the nose becomes painful. I put the camera in the freezer for a half-hour and when I took it out, it functioned normally. This makes the Olympus 770SW an attractive choice for hikers and adventure-seekers because not many digital cameras will function during those frigid mountain climbs.

Crushproof – Just to make this camera the sturdiest ever, the Olympus 770SW is also crush-proof to 220 pounds. If your weight falls at or under this number, put the camera in your back pocket and take a seat. Nothing happened, you say? Good; that’s how it should be. Takes a bruising and keeps on shooting…

Demo – If you forget just how cool this camera really is, you can find this demo in the menu system. The demo consists of a slide show that displays text like "7.1 Megapixels" and "3x Optical Zoom," then goes on to the fancier features: "Waterproof 33 ft," "Freeze Proof 14 degrees." It then shows examples of pictures taken with and without the digital image stabilization, for example.

Voice Memo – This feature can be turned on and off in the shooting menu. When enabled, it records four seconds of monaural audio – so if you use it, speak quickly. It records just after the picture is taken, so there is about a half-second delay between the picture and the start of the audio.

Panorama Mode – This mode isn’t very impressive. It can only be used if an Olympus-branded xD-Picture memory card is in camera's slot. It only aligns panoramas from left to right and doesn’t provide any overlay of a previous image to line everything up. There are guidelines, but they aren’t as handy as overlay images. Lastly, the camera doesn’t stitch the pictures together. Users have to upload the photos to a computer with Olympus Master Software that will then attempt to patch them together.

Manometer – This feature can be turned on and off in the setup menu so that it can measure air or water pressure so users know their depth or altitude. Users can calibrate the manometer by entering their current elevation, which ranges from -10 to +5000 meters. The manometer isn't very sensitive when above sea level; it can be adjusted from 0 to +5000 meters in increments of 200 meters. From 0 to -10 meters though, it can be adjusted every half-meter. This setup isn't very functional for me because I live 4 meters above sea level, so locations that are even a 200-meter increase in elevation are a long drive away. The manometer could be useful for hikers or scuba divers who want to record their elevation into the file info though.

Pixel Mapping – Found in the setup menu, this option is available on most other Olympus digital cameras. This procedure scans the image sensor and finds any dead pixels, then uses the surrounding pixels to interpolate the values. Olympus recommends that this feature be used about every six months. It’s like a check-up for your camera. It takes less than ten seconds for the process to occur, which is nice. Cameras by other manufacturers must be sent in for this service and can take weeks or months to return.

 

LED Flashlight - In the setup menu, the LED illuminator can be turned on and off. When the camera is turned off and the Menu button is pushed, the white LED on the front of the camera lights up for 30 seconds. This flashlight function doesn't provide a bright spotlight but does give enough light to find keys in a bag, for instance. I wouldn't rely on it during a camping trip, but it comes in handy.