Camera shopping in Thailand

[Bubble Dragon]

Hi there!

I'm looking to buy a Canon G12+housing in Thailand. Most likely seems to be BKK, but I am now in Khao Lak, which is far closer to Puhket. So, where can I pick up my goodies at the best price? I was even thinking of going to KL or Singapore, but imho the ticket-price would cancell out most of the price difference, right?
All advice is most welcome ;-)

 

[watboy]

In Bangkok, Panthip Plaza near Pratunam has good prices. I was there last week and S95 and G12s camera and factory housings were easily found. Also a few Oly and Sony P&S housings. I didn't ask about the G12, but I got quotes for S95 w factory housing for under 20,000 baht. Why the G12? The S95 is a much better camera for underwater use. The G12's long lens travel causes major lens port issues and the DC34 housing does not let you use the front control ring, while for the S95 you still can.

 

[Bubble Dragon]

Well, I was totally crazy about my old G9, so I thought I'd go for a G12... Why do you say the S95 is "much better"?

 

[lord khram]

In Bangkok, Panthip Plaza near Pratunam has good prices. I was there last week and S95 and G12s camera and factory housings were easily found. Also a few Oly and Sony P&S housings. I didn't ask about the G12, but I got quotes for S95 w factory housing for under 20,000 baht. Why the G12? The S95 is a much better camera for underwater use. The G12's long lens travel causes major lens port issues and the DC34 housing does not let you use the front control ring, while for the S95 you still can.

That looks very expensive to me 20 000bt = around £400

My friend brought me a housing for a S95 from the UK a few weeks ago for £159

It was purchased from Awooza.com, they are selling the camera with the housing for £438, thats around 22 000bt for the lot.

 

[watboy]

That looks very expensive to me 20 000bt = around £400

My friend brought me a housing for a S95 from the UK a few weeks ago for £159

It was purchased from Awooza.com, they are selling the camera with the housing for £438, thats around 22 000bt for the lot.

Well, then thats 2,000-3,000 baht more expensive from Awooza than from Panthip.

 

[watboy]

Well, I was totally crazy about my old G9, so I thought I'd go for a G12... Why do you say the S95 is "much better"?

The S95 and G12 uses the same image sensor and circuitry, so on that regard they are the same. The issue is that the G12 has a very long travel lens. Thus the factory housing has a huge lens port on it and that mean that the lens can be very far from the front glass. There's negative optical ramifications of that, making the G12 very poor for wide shots and there's little you can do to fix that. There are some after market domes you can put on the housing, but it only partially restores your viewing angle. For macro, the G12 lens is better than the S95, but the size of the G12 lens port blocks the built in strobe, it will cast a shadow on the right side of all your shots. Thus for macro, you will need an external strobe, and for wide shots, the G12 is horrible. So for underwater use, if you just wanted to keep it simple with the factory housings and are not getting external strobes the S95 is the far better choice. There's also other bits, like the DC34 for the G12 does not give you control over the front control ring, any adjustments you make will require lots of fiddling with buttons. The S95 housing gives you front control ring (but not the rear one), and IMO thats a significant advantage. And to top it off, the S95 w housing is $100 bucks cheaper than the G12 w housing and is much smaller and more compact.

 

[Bubble Dragon]

Aha, interesting!
Most of our customers use the S95 with an Ikelite housing. Any reason for that too?

 

[watboy]

Aha, interesting!
Most of our customers use the S95 with an Ikelite housing. Any reason for that too?

I haven't seen the Ikelite S95, but I assume its very simlar to the S90 model. There's a few pluses with the Ike, I think the main one being that the lens port has 67mm threads on it, so you can easily attach wet lenses to it. If you got the Canon DC38 and wanted wet lenses, you would have to buy some 3rd party mount to attach to the housing and these are at least $100. The 2nd reason for Ike is the supposed build quality, but personally i'm fairly happy w the factory housing quality as is. But there are some minuses to the Ike housing, the biggest for me is that it blocks the internal strobe almost completely. You would want an external strobe if you went with the Ikelite. I think if you are not going to add wet lenses or external strobes, the S95 with the factory housing is a great setup.

 

[lord khram]

Well, then thats 2,000-3,000 baht more expensive from Awooza than from Panthip.

Sorry my mistake i thought you was talking about just the housing.