I have been using this camera for more than a year and I am more than satisfied with its performance. Being a hobbyist photographer I take different kind of photos, ranging from portraits to landscapes and macros etc. Almost everywhere I got excellent results with this camera.
Let me sum up the pros and cons of this camera:
pros:
Excellent colour reproduction(this is what Fuji has been renouned for)
The lens moves through the outer barrel and doesn’t move the camera. This is useful when you keep the camera on a surface(when you don’t have a tripod handy) and don’t want it to move from its position while zooming. This is also useful when taking photos in rain with the camera wrapped up in a transparent sheet.
Excellent macro and super macro facilities.
The viewfinder is actually a small LCD, so you can use it to review your shots instead of the rear LCD screen to save battery.
The optional display of axes to get a perfectly levelled shot.
Accepts different types of memory cards, so you can use your existing one.
You can get an optical zoom while video-recording. Wont get this feature in every cameras.
It has a battery discharge capability. Before charging a NiMh battery its wise to discharge it completely to avoid "memory effect".
Excellent grip.
A bunch of features for higher end photographers - Continuous shooting, manual focus, Aperture & shutter speed priority, Program mode, self-timer(for 2 sec and 10 sec), high-speed shooting mode, macro, etc.
The anti-blur works really good, even at extreme zooms.
Cons:
A little bulky for those who want to keep the camera in the pocket(still a lot smaller than SLRs)
Needs four AA sized batteries, which makes it heavy.
Lower shutter speed can’t go beyond 4 seconds.
The manual focussing is not very friendly.
At the extreme zoom the picture gets hazy, unless there is sufficient light.
Noise occurs at low light.
Response time is less.
(The last three in the cons’ list are true with any Point and Shoot. These are the reasons people go for SLR afterall)
You can have a look at the photos I took with this camera at https://flickr.com/photos/aranyasen
To summarize, if you are planning to hone your photography skills but don’t want to spend a lot for a Digital SLR camera, this is the best one to start with.