Underwater options

I'm planning a trip which includes snorkling on a coral reef and a manta ray excursion. I hope to take some (nice) pictures of the underwaterworld. I'm not aiming for award winning underwater photos (but it never hurts to try! :t3). My options are:
- buy a new underwater compact camera (e.g. Nikon AW100, Panasonic DMC-FT3)
- buy a hard case underwaterhousing for my compact Olympus XZ-1
- buy a soft case underwaterhousing for my compactc Olympus XZ-1

I'm not keen on taking my D7000 along on the snorkling trip, unless there really is no other option. In that case I would opt for a soft case underwaterhousing for it.
A new underwater compact or hard case underwaterhousing for the Olympus will set me back about 250 Euros ($315), a softcase about half of that. I've been looking into Dicapac soft case underwater housings.
I'm very curious to your experiences with any of the above options (or options that I have overlooked). Is underwater shooting with a compact camera an option at all, given the lower light conditions? And are the new all-wheater, water-proof compact cameras up to par with high end compact cameras regarding IQ?
Thanks a lot in advance for any advice!

Hi Jerry,

We just did a week long trip to St. John doing snorkeling and diving. The AW100 my wife was using was fine for 3 1/2 days, then 20 minutes into a snorkeling session it flooded. It is simply not sealed well enough around the battery/card slot to be robust day in day out. I have looked at those soft cases and would not trust my camera in one and the controls would be very hard to use so I would stay away from those. I was using an Olympus EPL-1 with the Olympus housing and it worked great. Good pictures, and very good control function. The XZ-1 is a good camera, and Olympus makes a very good housing for it. I have not used it, but I am very happy with the one for the EPL-1. Plus you already have the XZ-1, and the housing is cheaper than the AW100.

Here is a shot of a Trigger fish from our trip taken with the Olympus EPL-1.

Thanks Patrick! This hands-on experience is really helpful. The triggerfish looks fanastic, much better than the kind of photos I imagined were possible. I hope the XZ-1 produces similar results under the lower light conditions under water.

I have an OLympus 8080 and had great results with it. It is not for sale with the housing, awaiting an offer. I don't use it now and it is a great starter u/w system.

Thanks Steve, I just found some photos on the net taken underwater with the 8080 and they looked very good indeed.