Oregon Scientific DS6688 Digital Camera

I didn't actually pay anything for this camera, so I'm not suffering from buyer's remorse. It was an award from my wife's home business. I do enjoy taking pictures, but I'm not even close to being a professional photographer.

Picture Quality
Brights are easily washed out, while darker areas turn black. The light sensitivity of the CCD seems to respond to a narrow range of illumination intensity.
The picture is rarely well focused. You need to have very steady hands while taking pictures. There is a three position slider on the side of the camera to adjust the focus range. If you forget to set it for each situation, you end up with an out of focus picture.
Color reproduction is poor. A beautiful nature scene will be reduced to the question "why did I take a picture of that?" I bought a digital camera back in 2001 for $199 that takes better pictures than this model. I wish I could upload samples comparing the two here.

Shutter lag
It takes about one and a half seconds between the time you press the button and for the camera to take the picture.

Sequential Pictures
Taking pictures in rapid succession is simply not possible with this camera. It takes about 8 seconds between pictures. If the flash is used, it seems to take forever between pictures, but it's only about 22 seconds. Although it has a video mode, video needs to be taken in well lit environments.

Design
The lens has no cover or any way to protect it from getting dirty. It's nearly impossible to keep from getting finger prints on it. You need to wipe it off before taking pictures.
But the slim design allows me to carry it comfortably in my jeans pocket.

Menus
Overall, the menus are fairly easy to use. Some features are cryptic and require the owners manual. Under the play menu, the meaning of DPOF isn't readily apparent to me. But the setup menu is pretty self explanatory.
Under the record menu, you can slide the mode between single picture and movie, but if you forget to hit the select button to confirm, it doesn't switch modes like you intended. Other options under the record menu are size, quality, white balance, metering, ISO, and EV. I'll need to get the owners manual to refresh my memory on ISO and EV.

Controls
The main control for navigating the menus is a knob that acts like a four position joystick. You have to press it sideways with your fingernail. To select, you press down on the button. Most controls on the outside of the camera are labeled with cryptic icons. The exceptions are the on/off switch, and the menu button.

Battery Life
I use two Energizer AAA cells rated at 850mAh each. Without the flash, I can take over 100 pictures. But I haven't actually tested the battery capacity.

Conclusion
Oregon Scientific would have a potentially nice camera if they fixed a few things. First of all, they need to get a much better CCD. This one is so bad, it's unbelievable. Second, and this is a very important feature, is the shutter lag. It's so slow, I actually thought I was finished taking the picture and got a picture of the floor instead.