Fujifilm FinePix S9500 Review

A serious piece of kit at a very reasonable price!
Although this doesn't offer some of the more refined capabilities of a DSLR, it has a few tricks of its own. Video mode with on-the-fly zoom, dual storage media (CF & xD) and a massive 28-300mm (10.7x) zoom lens which negates the need to carry around a host of lenses for different situations. Time spent changing a lens and the moment may be gone...
I have to say I've been thoroughly impressed by this offering from Fuji, well worth it for the money and truly head and shoulders above the "Point and click" range of pocket zooms.

I have just bought an almost new one off Ebay,to replace my highly regarded Fuji S7000,and have found it an excellent replacement.
It's a lot quicker to start up and focus,has a lot more features,and the lens is much more useful.
Admittedly,my Nikon D40 is a bit quicker overall,but it's only 6MP,and a lot heavier to lug around with the standard 18-55mm lens,and the 55-200 VR Nikon lens.
The Fuji combines both these lenses in a compact,well built package,and so is more likely to come with me when I go out for the day.
My S7000 produced some super prints,and the S9500 seems even better,and I think that the latest Fuji super zooms just don't seem to offer the picture quality of either the S7000,or the S9500.
Who really needs "face detection" anyway?
Anyone with a bit of know how should be able to take a decent portrait,or group picture
when needed.However,"anti-shake" is very useful,and Fuji's way of doing it is not as good as my little Panasonic FX35,but still copes quite well.
Because the S9500 copes well with high ISO's,it gets away with boosting it to counter any shake,and increasing the shutter speed.
All-in all a great camera,and if you shop around you can get it at a bargain price!

A little postscript to my review!.
I am finding that focussing at the longer zoom(above 200mm)can be a problem in indifferent lighting,sometimes "beeping" to indicate the lens has focussed,but the screen shows otherwise,and, occasionally, just won't focus at all!
Settings below 200mm seem fine,and wide angle is no problem at all,but I do seem to be getting slightly more out of focus,or blurred,images with the S9500.
It could have a focussing problem,I suppose,as I did buy it second hand,but it is in excellent condition otherwise.
They also seem to all need sharpening before printing.
I don't recall any problems focussing with the S7000,and I even think the images seemed that more vibrant,especially the macro pictures.
The S9500 images do need a bit more work on them it seems,but I will perservere,because the S9500 is so quick to start up,the batteries do last a lot longer,and it has a great lens,much more useful than the 6x zooom on the s7000,and has more useful features.
But time will tell,and meanwhile I have begun to appreciate what an excellent camera my Nikon D40 is!

I have had a Fuji S9500 since new (at least 3 or 4 years ago), I have found it to be a brilliant camera and so versatile. The results are equal if not superior than those I get from my DSLR's (Nikon D100, Sigma SD14, Olympus 500E), after much heavy use and many thousands of shots, it has finally developed a fault, although it works fine still on fully auto mode it will not allow the change of settings of aperture/speed in manual mode. Despite it costing me over £97.50 to have it fixed by Fuji, I think that is a price worth paying for such a brilliant camera. I also have an old Fuji S602 Prozoom, which despite its age still works fine and delivers great picture quality despite only being a 3 megapixel camera, the only downside is the long shutter lag, but then it is old technology. The S7000 I owned for a year or two I sold on ebay as I found it to be a bit of a dog compared to the S602 and S9500 ... I wasn't very happy with it at all, the quality and build seemed inferior and having a minimum aperture of F8 compared to F11 on the S602 and S9500 compounded my feeling that the S7000 had only been bought out as a stop gap by Fuji.
I have the box with my beloved S9500 sitting here beside me as I'm writing this, all packed up and ready to be sent back for repair ...... I shall really miss it while it is away.