Olympus E520 -- some pros and cons

About 18 months ago I upgraded from a Panasonic FZ20 point and shoot. For the most part, I was very pleased with the Panasonic, but of course, you always want better, right?
For picture quality I am very pleased with the improvement -- far less noise and a much finer grained image with the Olympus E520. But some things I am not so pleased about. Like the spot focusing -- with the Panasonic it was pinpoint accurate, so I could focus between branches and still get a sharp subject. With the Olympus E520, if anything is between the lens and the subject, it will focus on whatever is closest, every time. Very frustrating, since the birds, my favorite subjects, like to hide behind branches. So when I get a good shot with the Olympus, it looks great, but I miss a lot of shots I could have easily gotten with the Panasonic.

Have you tried setting the different focus points? You can turn all of them off but the center one.

Yeah, definitely set it to spot focus and use the center square to pick your focus point. Focus control is a different animal on this than with a point and shoot, spot is definitely the way to go here.

Also worth noting is that your Panasonic likely did the same thing, but its tiny sensor produces very long depth of field, and so you likely just didn't notice that it had a different focus placement.

Yes please set it to spot focus and use the center square. I also have Olympus E520 it is working fine....

Another Vote for Spot Focus
E-520 70-300 Lens Spot focus used
Sparrow about 15 yards away

i have also 520, i like it