Rating: 
Summary: It's A Great Digicam
Review: I've used a Minolta SRT 201 35 mm SLR since the early 80's and took the plunge with a Nikon Coolpix 2000 when I decided to try out digital photgraphy. It became obvious that the 2Mp Nikon was rather limiting and I got a Dimage 7Hi last spring. All of the positive points in the other reviews are accurate. This is not an entry level camera, and there is a learning curve, but the results are worth it if you use a decent photo editor, and print on high quality paper using a decent printer for your serious work. I use Adobe Photoshop Elements 2.0 (will be upgarding to 3.0) and print on a Canon i960. I still use the Nikon when non-serious photography is appropriate.
As for the negatives noted in the reviews, all Minoltas are notorious for draining batteries so at least one spare set of rechargeable high capacity NiMH AA's with a 15-minute battery charger are highly recommended. Regarding the USB down-loading issues, my PC came equipped with a card reader, so I just insert the CF card into the reader and there are no USB issues as far as I am concerned.
Eventually, when the technology reaches the 10Mp resolution stage, I'll upgrade for the last time, but until then, the 7Hi does the job very nicely.
Rating: 
Summary: Not bad, but not great
Review: I've you've never used a high-end camera in your life, you would think this is a pretty good camera. But I have, and I'm pretty disappointed.What disappointed me:
- Wrong subject focused. If you let the camera's artificial intelligence pick the subject to focus for you, you're likely to have to refocus a lot, unless you fix the focusing point.
- Impossible action focusing. If the subject is moving, you can forget about getting it in focus in the continuous focus mode. You'd have to prefocus.
- Slow focusing. Even slower than some compacts.
- Power hungry. Make sure you get spare batteries. I have a feeling that most of the power goes to heating the CF card, since the card gets pretty hot when reading/writing. What kept me from trashing it:
- Picture quality is pretty good.
- Adobe RGB colorspace can be useful (if you use it).
- Good lens range (28mm-200mm equiv.), with decent quality throughout.
- Pretty good macro performance.
- Manual zoom, but this is subjective.
- Comfortable to handle, though slightly small.
- Useful view modes, like grid or crosshair.
- Useful manually controlled focusing point.
- Allows screw-on filters. So should you buy one? I'd say that if you do any form of action photography, be it sports or just cute kids running around, look elsewhere. But if you like landscapes, architecture, still life, portraits, etc. where the subject doesn't move around, this might be for you.
Rating: 
Summary: Old technology!
Review: Minolta Dimage 7Hi along with Nikon CoolPix 5700 and Sony F717 are well known as the leading 5 Megapixels in the market all have advantages and disadvantages over each other. The Dimage 7Hi offers the most manual features familiar to traditional SLR users and professionals because as with most photographers who wants an elements of "control" over the outcome of the picture it appeal are geared more to the "tinkers". However the Dimage 7Hi has poor battery performance, USB 1.1 and the noise on the images for a camera this price call into question no matter how many manual buttons and options you can play with the final picture is of little if any improvement over the competition. Compared to the Sony F717 which has the least manual features it let the camera do the talking with its more advance faster USB 2.0, long life lithium battery, histogram that gets every picture focus rights in whatever lighting condition, excellent nightshots and with additional infrared filter add on can use as an Xray cam and to top it all a versatile Carl Zeiss lens.
If you wants to buy the Dimage 7Hi and you dont mind all the controls then this might be the camera for you, the Sony F717 does not offer as much for you to play with but shoot faster yet both produces equally good pictures (Cons for the F717 is the slight red saturation, the Dimage 7Hi is the noises).
My impression of an ideal digital camera is that it do all the hardwork for you, the Minolta does not handle all the hardwork itself but instead gave that back to the user, however I am not a professional photographer and like most mortal I like something that automatically handle most of the work and produces equally good picture as what the Minolta or Coolpix can do, this is what gave the Sony the edge for me.
Rating: 
Summary: Bad Quality
Review: My Minolta Dimage 7 took great pictures, but it lasted for less than a year of very light use. The problem is the plastic body. It lets condensation build up inside the camera, and the result is electrical malfunction. Unfortunate, because if not for this problem I'd have really liked it.
Rating: 
Summary: Not exactly what I paid for
Review: Reasonable price, good flexibility but some focusing issues and a real killer-I get an "error" message frequently (perhaps 90% of the time by simply turning it on). The thermal circuit attempts to protect the camera-even when stable at room temperature. I have not cracked the code on getting support. This problem is difficult to work around. Bad enough not to recommend this product.
Rating:
Summary: Just get some excellent accessories and you'll be fine!
Review: The best batteries for this power-hungry camera are probably the Maha Powerex 1800's. The Sanyo rechargables that shipped with my 7Hi are almost useless. One flash picture and they're gone. Two or three sets and a charger and you'll be able to shoot through the heaviest holidays. I took 91 pictures during christmas and didn't have to change batteries once! My friends continually praise my 7Hi's quality (as if the photographer had nothing to do with the results!!!) Get in line for a 7Hi, and you'll be rewarded with great photos for years to come.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent camera if you are willing to pay the price
Review: The price is rather steep, but in return you get a feature-packed camera. Like most Minolta products you have total control over all settings, which implies a bit of a learning curve, but gives you great flexibility one you're broken in. My only complaint is a somewhat short battery life. Fortunately it uses standard AA size NiMH batteries, so you can purchase an extra set anywhere and carry it with you!
Rating:
Summary: Great camera - lousy assembly / quality control
Review: This is a wonderful camera that produces extremely high-quality photographs [ images] and is easy to use. The problem is that the quality control is inadequate. The USB connection on the camera was installed improperly and was wobbly and loose from the get-go. It functioned, so I worked with it, but it eventually failed completely after just over 30 days of use.
Without that connection, the camera is useless. For this reason and even though the camera is a terrific unit, I would have to advise the purchase of something that provides a bit more reliability in everyday use. This is a $$$ item that functioned for just over one month. Not good.
Rating:
Summary: Great Camera-Steep Learning Curve
Review: This is Digital Camera #4 for me. Started out with a Fuji Finepix 2800 and loved it. Moved to a Fuji Finepix 4900 and loved it. Wanted a small digital camera to carry in a pocket so I bought the Sony P5. I still keep it with me where ever I go. Wanted to to move to a Prosumer type camera and after hours of research I decided on the Minolta Dimage 7Hi. GREAT CAMERA - I had to go back to Photography 101 to remember all the different aspects of photography once I left the fully automatic mode. This camera is nearly professional level, only missing interchangable lens. This camera may be my last digital camera purchase.
Rating:
Summary: Great Camera for prosumer Highly recommend
Review: This is my fourth digital Camera and my second DiMage camera, I had the DiMage 7 when they first came out for couple of years, then I upgraded to DiMage 7HI about 3 months ago. This is a great camera, the most annoying thing about a digital Camera is you have to wait to take the next photo, but DiMage 7HI has 64mb of internal memory that allows you to do continous shooting, another point it uses AA batteries, I bought 2 additional sets of 1850 MAH rechargable batteries, $20!!, in addition to one set that came with it, I never run out of power compare that to the proprietry battries from SONY!. Compact Flash CF media is very affordable, I use an IBM 1GB microdrive with this camera, it makes a great combination. Just realize that IBM microdrive has much faster write speed than regualar CF cards that also help speed up your recycle time between shots. You can also use a new hard drive called Magicstor 2.2GB for $250, I take this camera on vacation for a week, come home with 400 shots of the highest quality!. Auto focus is %99 accurate. 7x optical zoom, fantastic quality. Auto or manual focus, why do you need manual focus?, let's say you want to take a photo of a shiny item, like a diamond or water falls, autofocus will not work with any camera, you have to switch to manual to get the correct shot.
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