I have a Panasonic DMC-Z57 that I love, and it cost about $265 two Christmases ago. It has a Leica lens without the high price. After I take the photos I use the cord that came with it to transfer the photos to my PC via the USB cable. Then I can upload to Facebook or another website for sharing with family & friends (I use Dropbox for that).
The camera takes excellent (crisp and clear) photos of all types of scenarios, indoor, at night, sunny, etc. I can use the flash or not. It has GPS capability if I want it. I bought an extra battery so I can change it out when the old one is drained, then recharge that first one for the next use.
I can’t say enough good things about it! Love my camera!
I can echo that...I too have the ZS7.
Under most conditions, you will be very happy with the results.
In good light, you could even do a decent job of photographing sports events, but probably nothing indoors.
It also shoots excellent HD video with full zoom, albeit the zoom works a bit slowly.
The ONLY two things that I dislike about it are that it tends to get grainy quickly at high ISOs, and it lacks the ability to “infinity focus”, which means that it can be hard shooting timed shots from a tripod in low light. The only thing to do to mitigate the problem is to set the camera to manual and shut the aperture down as low as possible to ensure the best chance of everything being in focus, but then you have to crank the ISO up to compensate, and everything comes out grainy.
But, for most everyday shooting scenarios, it’s hard to beat.