It's difficult to imagine a way to spend £300 and get more for your money than you do with the S6500fd. It's simple to use, the manual lens is flexible and there are some useful features on board. It doesn't handle like a true bridge camera, but then it isn't priced like one either.
Also consider:

FEATURES
PERFORMANCE
BUILD QUALITY
EASE OF USE
VALUE FOR MONEY
FINAL SCORE

Great camera

Reviewer: cgmeaden, Auckland, New Zealand

I bought the S6500fd after my S5600 was stolen while on a trip to South Africa. All I can say is wow, it has served me very well. I will be up grading soon to a Nikon D80 but the S6500fd will always be my backup and quick shot camara. I have had the pleasure of using if for a year now and have had very good results.

S6500fd

Reviewer: RichardG, Banbury, UK

Bought this camera just prior to travelling to Tuscany - read the manual on the plane, and within a few hours of arriving, could almost intuitively set any feature I wanted. The camera is very nicely weighted with good positioning of controls and straightforward, comprehensive menu options. The picture quality is excellent, capturing high levels of detail, especially considering the modest sensor. The only quality issues really are a degree of chromatic aberration at high contrast edges, and some softening at the edges of the frame at the 28 mm wideangle setting. Telephoto and macro images are superb. Paid £170 for it at Amazon, and easily worth twice that... superb.

S6500fd

Reviewer: krennon, Kingston Surrey, England

Superb camera, easy to use good battery life especially if you use the EVF instead of the very clear LCD screen. My only criticism of this camera is the Macro is not there you can't get really close to the subject. Apart from that loads of functions easy to use all round an excellent buy especially for those looking to upgrade from a compact but can't quite stretch to the outlay of a full DSLR kit. Now less than £200.00 (paid £179.99 for mine)

S6500fd Fuji-film Digital Camera

Reviewer: leeeckersall, fareham, united kingdom

Best camera of its type on the market, feels comfortable in your hand.Virtually idiot proof, Manual focus very precise and accurate, takes bright and colourful photos.
Can take photos using view finder and using large lcd viewing screen well worth spending £300 on it

Almost Perfect

Reviewer: pauld481, Stockport, U.K.

I have been using the S6500 now for about a week and am rather impressed with it, the manual twist zoom is a nice touch and very accurate, another nice touch is the 1cm super macro mode and the large lcd, the quality of the pictures is also very impressive.
The down side to the camera I think is the rather cheap looking control knob, lens cap and the lack of auto zoom.
Over all its a great camera and doesnt fail to impress but doesnt feel as solid as the S5200 which it replaced and what I upgraded from, having said that it is worth every penny.