In Japan they have cell phones with digital cameras built in. They promote them either for sending a photo to your friends cell phone, like instead of a true blind date you can send your pictures first.  Or, you can catch a politician in the latest scandal and instantly send it to the news.

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READ my new advice

If you are seriously going to study Japanese I STRONGLY STRONGLY urge you to get a Japanese Windows CE palm−size pc.  Note: This is not a PALM computer like the Palm Pilot or the Handspring Visor or Sony CLIE.  This is a Microsoft Windows CE palm−size PC or Pocket PC made by companies like Casio, HP, Toshiba, Compaq etc...

I'm not partial to Windows CE.  In fact for the purpose of a PDA (personal digital assistant) the palm has it's strengths.  But, for the purpose of studying Japanese the Japanese Window CE machine wins hands down.  Why?  Because Japanese Windows CE machines have Handwritten Kanji Recognition Built In!!!!   Kanji is the single hardest part of Japanese to learn and without a computer that recognizes Kanji it will take you 2 or 3 minutes PER Kanji too look them up.  Imagine trying to read a simple paragraph in Japanese where every word you look up takes 2 or 3 minutes.

It turns out that it's a pain in the butt to type on my cell phone so I've been looking for solutions.

J−phone, has 2 keyboards but both only do e−mail and I need web access to update my webpages. But, in the course of looking I found out that my Windows CE palm−pc will attach to my cell phone, no special hardware required.

Unfortunately it costs regular cell phone charges to use vs the cell phone's web access which is free but typing on the palm−pc is at least a little better than the phone

About a year and a half ago I bought my first color printer. It was an Epson PM−770C which is I believe the Japanese model of the Epson 750. The Epson 750 is the "photo" model that uses 6 inks. 5 colors + black.

Nikon Super Coolscan LS-2000

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I bought this scanner to scan 5000 old family slides all taken before 1984.

It's not a bad scanner but there have been a couple of disappointments.

I recently picked up the Sony DCR-PC100 camera through a friend from Japan.  I own the Sony TVR9 also but just like my digital still cameras, I found that because the TVR9 is not small enough to fit in my pocket I almost never used it.  By that I mean that I've owned many digital still cameras and it turns out of if it's not small enough to fit in my pocket I won't use it.

About a year ago my company purchased a Sony DSC−F1 camera for me. For the last year I've taken it almost everywhere. A also personally own a Canon ELPH APS camera (not digital). Usually I carry both cameras. I use the Canon for outdoor pictures and the Sony for indoor pictures. Specifically because with the Sony, I don't need a flash to take a picture and also, since I don't have to look through a viewfinder, I can take pictures inside stores and malls without anybody knowing I'm taking a picture. (Usually if you try to take a picture in a store you are told to stop and desist.)

Here are some pictures of Disneyland to compare to the Sony images on my other page.   Click on them to get a larger version of each.