Nikon COOLPIX S9900 Digital Camera with 30x Optical Zoom and Built-In Wi-Fi (Black)

I have had this camera for several months now and had a chance to use it in a lot of different situations. It is excellent! When I first received it there were a number of features I wasn't too sure about but as I use it more the features in question are great. On several occasions I discovered something that I didn't like but when I actually took the time to read the instructions whatever I didn't like was easily changed. It also took a little adjustment for me to use the view finder as it folds out to the side but that feature makes it easy to take photo's in awkward positions and now I wouldn't trade it. I have used the camera to take some spectacular time-lapse photo's of sunsets and night skies. When using it for night photo's of city lights it is possible to take the pictures without a tripod and yet the pictures are sharp. I have no idea how that works, but it does. It also does an excellent job on video. For a camera of this size to have a 30x zoom capability is amazing. One of the features that really appealed to me when purchasing was it's small size as we travel overseas a lot and getting everything in the allotted space is often a problem. The camera does everything that I want plus some. We are very happy with it.

Excellent Camera.I am an early adapter for Cameras. I always carry a camera. I am a Canon DSLR shooter-- D30, 1D, 1D MkII, 5D, 70D. My lenses include 400 f2.8, 200 f1.8, 85 f1.2, 70-200 f2.8, 100-400 f5.6+/-, 100 Macro, 24-70, a sigma 15-20 and probably a few more. My point and shoots used to be canon, but for the past four years have been using Nikon. I have purchased over 10 Nikon S6500s, most of them for less than $100. I am hard on cameras. I go through two or so a year. I also shoot a P510 for its long lens.With the Nikon S9900, I am almost at the tipping point to sell my DSLR. There are very few images that the Nikon S9900 cannot do well. I like the manual settings. I don't shoot raw and don't care its missing. There are three areas the camera lacks- sunsets, fast lenses (for bohke) and multiple fast images for sports photography. Otherwise, this camera pretty can pretty much take any image. I have been waiting for the P990 to become available and I can see my camera bag with only this camera and a P990 for the zoom. I may be ready to sell my 15k+ of glass.I included two images. One is wide zoom of the white house with a secret service officer on the roof and the other is of different secret service officer on the roof at full zoom. What a zoom!!!

Overall I'm very pleased with this camera, my fifth Coolpix since the 880 Coolpix model that I bought in 2001 (for $750!). Each Coolpix model has been an improvement over the prior model, including this S9900. I typically replace the Coolpix every two or three years, mostly due to fair wear and tear knowing that the later models will be better in performance and features, Of particular value to me is the ability to select A (Aperture priority) and S (Shutter priority) in addition to full automatic.I have not tried to use the GPS or WiFi or NFC - these are "bells and whistles" that I don't need for casual picture taking from a compact but powerful camera that I can easily take everywhere (including inside arenas where the ruling is "point and shoot cameras allowed, no video or DSLR types".The pop-up flash, while a nuisance to many, is a great addition to remove red-eye and unintended flash bounce from reflective objects in the scene.Taking another five seconds to pop it up is not a big deal! It quickly snaps back safely into the body when not needed.The battery life is not great - it uses the same Nikon battery (EL-12) as prior Coolpix models and does not hold up well for video or multiple flash PIX (both of which are power hungry). I carry two other fully charged Nikon batteries and typically need to replace the first one after about 200 shots. While on vacation I expect to change the battery at least once per day. Unfortunately the battery must be recharged inside the camera, so I do a lot of battery exchanges. An AC powered charger would be a great addition and was standard on earlier Coolpix models.And there in lies the problem with this particular camera unit. Changing the battery resets the internal RTC (Real Time Clock) even though the camera has an internal power source (another rechargeable or a super cap?) intended to keep the date and time accurate during a battery change over. This is well documented in the users manual, but apparently not well understood by the Nikon support people.After complaining to Nikon (on-line chat) and following their advice to "Reset the camera" (remove memory card and battery) and later to "Upgrade the firmware" from 1.0 to 1.1 (a 75Meg download that has to be put on a Nikon formatted SD Card and loaded into the camera) the problem was not resolved (because it's an internal hardware problem - probably a manufacturing defect in just this unit).The next advice from Nikon was to send this unit to Nikon for repair, or more likely replacement with a "reburb" unit. This is a brand new unit that I bought from Amazon, why would I 'upgrade' to a refurb that's already been repaired once? What a huge turn off! I returned this unit to Amazon! Caveat Emptor!!!

Camera is absolutely rubbish, it messed up memories from few family events - DO NOT BUY.We had S8100 before which was great until it failed - the objective wouldn't retract in. We thought this one is the next gen and purchased without much thinking but NO, this is just not like anything else Nikon makes, this is a complete failure. The autozoom is all around the place and the sensitivity is unpredictable so photos are purely random - here and there they are great but very often the picture has visible grain and the lighting has nothing to do with it. Using manual settings doesn't help much, again, it will occasionally do a great shot but there's something wrong with autofocus most of the time. We also have Nikon DSLR and it is great, we have nothing against Nikon as a brand but this particular model is a big time miss.We missed return window and couldn't send it back, so if you purchase this camera, make sure you test it in and out before return period lapses.