My pal

I wished for a decent replacement for my DSLR to carry 'always' with me.
I wished for a camera that did excellent RAW files and had a powerful lens. Because I often missed my DSLR.
It should be fast in terms of readiness and focusing. It should be compact so I could carry it with me always and everywhere. I found the XZ-1 to do this job.
I carry it around for almost a year now and took about 10000 pictures with it - including experiments and stuff I deleted.
The Art-filters are a nice addition to me because they invite to be creative and take pictures differently.
Also because I always only use RAW and when - sometimes - using Art-filters, it automatically uses RAW+LF (HQ JPEG).
The screen might be swivelling, but the wide angle of view is great. It is better visible in bright sunlight than loads of screens I have seen so far and in normal light it shows impeccably beautiful pictures. Some friends find it to have a greenish tint: in immediate comparison to a DSLR that seems true, but when using it, I have to convince myself that the tint is greenish...
The mode dial is fairly easy turned and thus I always check it before taking important shots. Although either mode is good when using RAW, the shutter speed and aperture might not be ideal of course.
I use all ISO-values up to 400 to achieve very good pictures. Using ISO 100 is mostly - well lit - comparable to a prosumer DSLR. ISO 2000-6400 results in bluish and blurry pictures, but for views up to 1920x1200, ISO 800-1250 does a very good job and 1250 can be adjusted easily. (But I rarely use it over 400 - no need to).
The focus Tracking mode works excellent and even when the object runs off the screen and returns, the tracking recognizes it. This however does depend on the form. So far I had the best results with faces and signs and basic forms.
I might say that the camera is ready within less than 2 seconds, but when you would also like to zoom in before taking a shot, it takes another 2-3 seconds for the zoom to react.
I used my old Olympus T-20 flash on auto mode and the bright and colourful photos overwhelmed me. No noise, just sharp and clear pictures. Besides: it synchronizes up to 1/2000 of a second; also with the T-20!
Using Olympus Viewer I get immediate good (RAW!) results - although rendering HQ takes longer than i.e. the E-420. I don't know why, but perhaps the RAW of a DSLR has a different structure than the RAWs of the XZ-1.
Using RawTherapee with Amaze-demosaicing, I get mucht sharper images and Photivo does a very good job using DCB. Using Capture One 6 leaves me with excellent results that compare to nothing but astonishing.
I was amazed when getting the most out of a completely dark image I did not erase: using RT for 15 minutes tweaking, I actually saw a door which in real life I could impossibly have seen. The XZ-1 used ISO 100 and 1/2 exposure time. This leave me to a trick: setting it to ISO 6400 and correcting in Manual mode; then setting it to ISO 100 and taking the picture which is processed in the computer, leaves me with an even so grainy picture, but better sharpness and colour-retention.
Because I often leave it on (or stand-by) when walking in the city or elsewhere, I have two spare batteries of which I use 2 at most so I still have one for photographing at home while another is charging.
As the title says: the XZ-1 is my pal - I never wanna leave without it any more!

Problems:

I found dust particles on my images. As if it were a DSLR without dust removal. The annoying part is that with my DSLR I use a blower to remove such persistent 'dirt' - this camera has a fixed lens!
There was no dust on the sensor however, but it sticked on the rear lens element. That did not cost me money for the XZ-1 was still under warranty, but the worst: I had to walk around without it for three whole weeks... 22 days!!!