I've had a new FZ30 for just a week now and have some first impressions.
I'm upgrading from an Olympus C700, so this is a rather large jump.

Over-all, I'm delighted with the feel and the usability of the FZ30.
Noise is a non-issue.  I ran the C700 at its lowest ISO setting and I
do the same with the FZ30.  The manual focus and zoom rings on the
lens are very nice.  Manual focus accuracy is not quite as nice as the
split-prism focuser on my old OM-2n, but is much better than the C700.

The FZ30 can shoot the night sky and actually record constellations,
something the C700 was utterly incapable of.  In "starry sky" mode,
the FZ30 uses dark frame subtraction to achieve results with very low
noise.  

The stabilizer seems to be fairly effective, but I need to do some
more experiments.  Some hand-held long-telephoto shots of Mt. Rainier
in full sun show no motion blur, but are not as sharp as I would like.
This could be trouble with the autofocus, too much haze, or just a bit
too much shake for the stabilizer.

This camera boots instantly, which is very nice.  It also remembers
more things than the C700 did.  Focus mode is controlled by an
external switch, for example, and is not affected by a restart of
the camera.  Things like that are taking a little getting used to.

I've done a rough characterization of the minimum focusing distance
at various zoom settings.  The FZ10 and 20 apparently had a pronounced
step at the 3x zoom setting, with the minimum focusing distance going
way up beyond that point.  The FZ30 lens is clearly an entirely new
design.  Here's what I found:

Distance    MF    AF Macro
6'        420mm    420mm
5'        420mm    420mm
4'        300mm    240mm
3'        200mm    200mm
2'        185mm    165mm
1'6"        135mm    135mm
1'        135mm    135mm
6"        65mm    60mm
4"        45mm    45mm

The focal length numbers are the maximum at which focus could be
achieved.  In MF mode, I did the best I could to judge accurate
focus.  In AF Macro mode, I used the camera's report of whether
it thought it had achieved focus.  (It often appeared to have
good focus at slightly longer focal lengths, but the focus
indicator disagreed with me.)  Focal lengths were estimated
from the markings on the focus ring, and are subject to some
uncertainty.  The table is plain ASCII with tabs.  It will
probably look funny in a variable-pitch font, in a viewer that
doesn't assume tab stops every 8 characters, or whatever.
Sorry about that.

The FZ30 is very definitely not pocketable.  The old C700 would
not fit in a shirt pocket, but you could get it into the cargo
pocket of a rain jacket.  My camera doesn't feel particularly
heavier than my friend's FZ10, but is easier on the hand because
of the deeper grip.  When both are powered off, the FZ10 is less
bulky.

I got camera, a 1GB Ultra II card, spare battery, and a bag from
B&H Photo for $600 and would buy from them again.

Paul Allen