With all the storms that have battered the U.S. in the past few months, perhaps Olympus has the right idea in giving the Stylus 800 an all-weather finish. You won't be able to take the camera underwater (use the Pentax OptioWP for that), but its water-resistant finish will withstand drizzle or light rain. Unfortunately, despite having a good price ($399.95 list) for an 8-megapixel camera, excellent on-screen help, an all-weather finish, and other cool features, the Stylus 800's picture quality keeps it from being a real compact contender.

The lens has a 3X, 8- to 24-mm optical zoom (a 35-mm equivalent of 38- to 114-mm) with a maximum f/stop range of f/2.8 to f/4.9 across the zoom range. The camera has 19 scene modes, as well as antishake, auto, shutter, and aperture-priority modes. You can shoot Motion JPEG video at 640-by-480 resolution, but at only 15 frames per second.

The camera does have some positives. We really like the big LCD screen and the Guide button, which presents the precise directions for exposure compensation and for adjusting the white balance. The steps appear right on the LCD in a way we haven't seen on many digital cameras. We also like the live histogram on the LCD, which is nice and large, so you can see the display clearly.

Unfortunately, the Stylus 800's picture quality was not as clear. Our simulated-daylight shots were decent, but revealed some non-colored noise throughout the images, which made them a bit soft. The daylight shots had very good color saturation and accurate color matching, though, there was no fringing in the image, and contrast was decent.

Our flash test shot displayed more problems. Coverage was mediocre, and the colors were muddy because of noise and underexposure: The purple color swatch on our color chart appeared almost black. There was no pure white, and shadows were muddy, which caused the image to lose detail. There was a little fringing in the image too.

Resolution averaged 1,425 lines, which is low for a 6MP camera but inexcusable for an 8MP camera like this one. Bootup time—just 2.7 seconds—was fast, but at 4 seconds, recycle time was pretty slow. We also noticed a hint of shutter lag. There was no pincushion distortion, but barrel distortion was above average. When we used the image-stabilization mode, the camera worked quite well in both low and bright light.

Overall, the Olympus Stylus 800 feels like a solid and well-made camera, but the picture sharpness and resolution need to be better. If you're looking for compact alternative, you might consider the Fujifilm FinePix E550, which is now quite inexpensive. It gives you a little more zoom and takes very good pictures, although the sensor is only 6.3MP. If you want more megapixels, you might try the 7.2MP Sony Cyber-shot DSC-P200, which gives you excellent performance and very good shots. You'll also get better video clips on the Sony.

Compare these cameras side by side in our comparison table, and view their benchmark test results.