Hi there in the civilised world,
I'm working and travelling in the DR Congo for more then a year, but friday my camera got stolen. As I don't encounter that much power outlets I have a little solar panel to charge my cellphone, MP3player, ...

I'm now looking for a camera that I can charge in the same way. Do you happen to know one that can charge its battery trough a mini-USB port or socket that resembles a common mobile phone one? Let me know!!

More information:
- the solar panel I got is the powermonkey explorer (www.powertraveller.co.uk) There you can find my available connections as well.
- My current camera was a canon ixus 50. I did liked the compact size and strong body, but I want something with a bit more capabilities.
- needed: tough body, reasonable compact size, strong build quality, more manual options then the ixus 50, ....
- camera's where I was looking at but don't have the charge function: panasonic dmc-tz5, sony W170, sony H20, sony H10, casio V8...


any suggestions?


I got a week to decide otherwise I don't get it here.

Thanks a lot

I don’t have a direct answer to your question. But out of curiosity I googled “solar batter charger”. the very top link was a place called “Solar Sundance”

http://store.sundancesolar.com/solbatchar.html

And sure enough the fist link on their page was for digital cameras. They have chargers for all the major brands.

I would think that rather than buy a camera because it has the right kind of plug. You would be better off Buying a camera you like and that serves your needs. Then getting a charger for it.

What I saw came with the solar panel and therefore cost over $100 ( I didn’t really look the site over) but if you shop around you might be able to find a charger that will work with the panel you have. Just make sure you can get the charger before you buy the camera.

Thanks a lot for the reply,

It is a bit expensive and very very slow to get onto the internet here so I don't have the time to look things trough. A connection sounds ideal but I don't seem to find it. I think I will continue to look for a camera that charges its battery inside and then hope that it fits my solar panel/battery pack.

Or if anyone hered of a batterycharger that works with a USB port that's fine as well.



If you know of a decent camera with an outstanding battery life, that could help as well.



Hoping to get some more tips



Greetings from the Congo

Hi There,

I was also looking for a thing like this. I looked it up on google and I found some cool solar chargers and gadgets on http://www.freenergyshop.com

They where mentioning below that these chargers are ideal for people who travel allot.

I hope I helped you with this.

the panasonic zs20 charges the battery inside the camera. it's very compact (a hair larger than an elph), very fast performance, all manual settings, decent zoom, and i really liked the touch screen. i found it noisier in low light than its competitors, but did pretty well in sunny to semi-sunny conditions.