Digital-Camera Reviews

Excellent picture quality, I am no expert, yet I can easily see the diffence between my pictures and my friends' Canon and Kodak cameras. Size is pretty decent, I carry it everywhere in my pocket ( that's if I don't mind a bulky pocket though ). The night vision makes people go aaaawwww, but is not as practical as it initially sounds. I got a 256Mb pro stick for movies, and I am pretty happy with it. I could use a stronger optical zoom, and certainly a different location for the built-in flash.

Bottomline, I love my camera. It's helping me store my memories in better quality than ever.

the sony dsc-v1 is a top-notch camera that is more portable than its competition. it offers full manual control, 5MP resolution, and 4x optical zoom. i do have a few nits though...

pros:
- 5MP, 4x optical zoom.
- great image quality.
- above average resolution, good tonal balance, good color response.
- full manual control.
- images exhibit very low noise, even at higher ISO.
- image processing parameter control (contrast, saturation and sharpening).
- very fast auto focus!
- quick startup, fast shot-to-shot times (except when shooting TIFF).
- fast write times to memory stick.
- has NightFraming which allows you to focus and compose your scene in total darkness with the aid of the infrared emitter, then shoot a full-color shot using the built-in flash. very cool.
- better than average movie mode.
- compared to the competition (canon g5 and nikon 5400), the dsc-v1 is more compact: dimensions are 4.0"W x 2.6"H x 2.3"D weighing 10.9 oz.
- solid build quality.
- bright, high resolution LCD monitor with anti-reflective coating that works.
- battery charges in-camera, charger doubles as AC adapter.
- hot shoe for external flash (limited to specific sony flashes, though).
- many optional accessory lenses (telephoto, wide angle, filter lenses) available.
- histogram in Live view, Record review and Playback modes
- USB 2.0 means faster downloads.

cons:
- colors a bit washed out.
- noise levels higher than expected
- some purple fringing.
- mild chromatic aberrations visible.
- higher redeye occurrence.
- RAW format not supported.
- saving a TIFF file locks up the camera.
- continuous shooting capability limited to 3 frames.
- minimum ISO setting at 100.
- zoom control is oriented differently so it will take a few tries to get used to it.
- ergonomic issues: tiny menu and resolution keys, very easy to block the flash and optical viewfinder with fingers, left index finger falls right on top of the pop-up flash, suppressing it.
- lots of key functions are buried in menus.
- below average battery performance.
- no separate user settings.
- like most sony products, you pay a premium, pushing up the price.
- expensive memory stick pro cards.
- uses a proprietary battery so add a few bucks to buy a spare (or maybe two given the battery performance).
- the supplied 32MB memory stick is inadequate - again, more $$ for more memory.
- you'll need to remove from tripod to get to the battery or memory stick.

sony has succeeded in delivering a camera that has virtually the same feature set as canon's g5 and nikon's 5400 but in a more compact package. it's not perfect though. RAW format is not supported and writing a TIFF file still takes way too much time. and there are some ergonomic nits that is uncharacteristic of sony. still, this is a great package and worthy of consideration.

i hope this helps your buying decision. peace.

Before you buy DSC-V1, here are some tips about it:
The camera is excellent, considering image quality and features. You can manually set the functions or set the automatic mode (helps beginners but provide features for more advanced photographers - get the manual in Sony Website). The image is better than P92, for V1 has bigger Carl Zeiss lens. P92 is very very easy to use, but V1 has a range of features not available in P92.
1) it requires extra memory stick (which, as you might now is more expensive than compact flash). 256Mb is recommended. 128Mb provides 80 photos full-quality. (any 5.0 Camera, whatever the brand, needs extra memory though.)
2) Spare battery would be useful. The NP-FC11 lasts about 80 minutes and take 2hrs to recharge.
3) Unlike old Sony cameras, you can take pictures faster (whether P32, P92 or V1), but when using V1 with flash, you need to wait few seconds to energy recharge (a bad thing if you need the flash and don't want to miss a thing) - but it's like 3 seconds.
4) A very nice feature is the nightframing and nightshots - it has infrared visor for very dark places.
Comparing to P92, the improvements are amazing. I used them both and found P92 easy to use, but V1 has many useful features, better for those who want to make creative or art photos.

With the Sony 828 coming out in January, the 717 may soon be a relic. But at this time it is hands down the finest digital camera in the Sony line and strong competitor in the $750-1,000 range.

I've only given this camera 4 stars primarily because the price is misleading. For all practical purposes you can not operate a camera like this with the small Memory Stick provided by Sony. You'll need to upgrade to at least 128 or preferably 256MB or you'll spend more time downloading files than taking photos. So tack another $100 onto you bill. Also consider a UV filter to protect that protruding (and thus vunerable) lens (add $20).

PROS
- overall outstanding image quality
- best-in class low-light photos (helpful at Xmas!)
- optional manual controls and hot shoe add flexibility
- Burst "feature" allows three essentially simultaneous shots.
- surprisingly quiet
- decent battery life

CONS
- bulky
- zoom is ergonomically difficult to get used to. Practice before a big event!

Also check out the Minolta Dimage and the Nikon Coolpix 5700 --- comparable cameras with a lot to offer and have a more traditional SLR feel. I ultimately chose the Sony because reviews showed it outperforming the others in low-light, a situation I find myself in frequently.

Pro:
* Preforms well in low light even without a flash.
* 5x optical zoom
* The ability to manually focus
* Controls easy to navigate
* Excellent picture quality
* Special settings such as sepia
* Three burst mode for action or hard to capture shots (Beware of long write time before you can take pictures again if you are using a high resolution setting)

* Manual control of white balance allows for color correction
* The battery life is really good (however if you plan a long day of picture taking an extra battery is essential)
* Ability to manually set shutter and / or aperture

Cons:
* On high resolution can take a while to write to
* Bulky compared to a lot of other digital cameras (but not so much so when compared to a good 35mm)
* Memory sticks have historically cost more than other digital cards but I find that prices have come down significantly
* Sony really should ship this camera with a 128MB memory stick. The 32 it comes with captures only a few pictures at a high resolution.

Things I would recommend to get along with the camera

* Extra memory sticks.
* Memory stick case
* A UV filter. You don't need to get the one that Sony makes for the camera. Any 58mm-thread filter will work.
* Tripod
* Sony's shutter remote
* A Neoprene camera strap
* Extra batteries

This is a great camera and I would recomend it even over the 827.

IM NOT A PHOTOGRAPHER BY NO MEANS. BUT I LIKE TO HAVE A CAMERA AROUND TO TAKE PICTURES WHENEVER I CAN EITHER OF MY BOYS OR BEFORE AND AFTERS OF PROJECTS AT THE HOUSE. I ACTUALLY GOT A CARRYING CASE FOR IT AND ACC. I TAKE IT EVERYWHERE I GO. ALSO GOT A PRINTER TO GO WITH IT. WHAT WONDERFUL PICTURE THAT I CAN TAKE. IMAGINE IF I KNEW ANYTHING ABOUT TAKING A PICTURE WHAT I COULD DO. A FRIEND HAS SAME CAMERA AND HE FEELS THE SAME WAY.

I have a C-2020, which is a slightly older version of this camera model. This has been a fantastic camera both in terms of quality, reliability and battery life. Between some friends and myself we have just about every model in this family (C-2000 through C-3040) and we all love our cameras.

Quality: I have taken hundreds of shots, mostly outdoor. I tend to shoot at the high-quality jpeg level so I bought a 64MB smart media card. Paired with my HP DeskJet 952 I regularly printout 4x6 prints on photo paper that are absolutely perfect. I have printed a few 8x10 pictures and they are fantastic. No one can believe they were taken with a digital camera. I have to zoom in quite a ways with my photo editing software before I can see any pixels. The only negative thing I can say is that I wish it had a better macro mode.

Reliability: It has been rained on, splashed by a wave, and dropped a short distance onto a rock. Despite all this it is still going strong a year and several hundred pictures later with no negative affects.

Batteries: I use the rechargeable batteries and during heavy use they last 2-3 weeks. During light use they last 3-6 months. Compare this to most Kodak or Nikon cameras that last a few days of heavy use.

A few comments on my accessories:

Forget the 16MB card that comes with it. I keep only mine as a back up. You will want a 64 MB smart media card.

I bought the Olympus T-CON14 tele-converter lens 1.45x (152mm equivalent) and I am very happy with it. It can retail up to $200 but I shopped around on-line (I went to cnet.com and looked under "Latest Prices - Camera Accessories - Lens") and found it for around $79. My next purchase is the wide-angle lens.

I bought the Olympus Accessory Kit (which is the same for C-2000 through C-3040 models), mostly for the UV filter, adapter tube and 43mm-55mm step-up ring, and AC adapter. I bought it for about $95, which is close to what all those things cost separate. The mini-tripod, software, and case that come in that kit are not overly impressive but I considered those 'free'. The lens cleaning kit is handy.

Other reviewers have wrote at lenght about the technical aspects of this camera, you should read them. My c-2040 has been wonderfull as well. I like very much the lens wich is very clear, allowing pictures imposible with other cameras. It also has a lot of pro options wich makes it great afterwards. The learning curve is a little bit steep with some of the options, but the manual is very informative (yes , you have to read it) .I was amazed by the fact that this camera use the same interfase of the Olympus E-10 digital SLR, the only difference being the fact that the E-10 puts almost all the controls as buttons (great: you don't have to go in to a menu to change options before a shot).
Do buy two 4 reachargeable batteries sets and a fast charger, this puppy eats power like crazy .

I own this camera and have used it for almost 3 years now. It has been through Christmas, Easter, Birthdays, Anniversaries, trips to Yellowstone and Disney World. I always get the best pictures. The pictures my husband and I took at Yellowstone were phenomenal. They rivaled many of the post cards we saw for sale, especially of the Lower falls. This is a very easy point and shoot type camera. I only wish the optical zoom was greater than 3X.

My interest in digital photography began with my mother's Sony Mavica FD-75. I began taking photos of flowers in our backyard, but hated lugging around floppy disks wherever I went, and found the bulky body too cumbersome for my delicate subjects.

Following my love of Sony products, I went for the Cyber-Shot P-30, a much more compact version of the previous camera. The MemoryStick media was much more convenient. But after less than a year, my photos were becoming more detailed and 1-2 megapixels just wasn't enough. I was also sick of tossing 9 out of 10 photos because they were out of focus.

I needed something better, something that could focus within an inch and had all the bells and whistles so I could fine-tune before I even shot.

Enter Olympus Camedia C-5050 Zoom. This camera is totally custimizable, with buttons for most everything and menu functions for the rest. It can focus on a subject while the lens rubs against it, with SuperMacro. And it can handle most of the standard memory media, including the new xD format. It can capture and associate sounds with your images, apply special effects to them, and then save them DPOF format directly to your digital printer. Even more exciting, this one doesn't use interpolation like almost every other digital, so you don't end up with grainy images. When they say 5 megapiexls, they mean it.

My new best friend.

Typically, digitals have suffered from two major problems. Shutter lag and poor performance in low light situations. The Olympus cameras (particularly this one) suffer none of that. The shutter opens when you push the button which is crucial when your subject is a two year with the attention span of a gnat. Additionally, the f1.8 aperture lens is as good as it gets for a non-slr and consequently this camera does a great job in low light situations. Combine this with the incredible # of features (umpteen shooting modes, you can shoot the shot in Sepia, save to SmartMedia, CompactFlash, & XD picture cards), this is one great camera. I simply could not be more pleased. Finally, if you learn to master a decent photo editor (e.g., photoshop, paint shop pro), you can produce near works of art with this camera that people are willing to part money for. I have.

For more than ten years of mountaineering, running rivers and exploring remote corners of the world, my OM-1 was my constant companion. Although not a professional, I was passionate about photography. In 1990 I was experimenting with low-light color photography. In a cement health clinic in a roadless corner of Nicaragua, my OM-1 suffered a fall and a fatal head injury.
I had bought and experimented with half a dozen cameras since, but none could begin to replace my photographic partner. After only a week with my C5050, I am still learning just how to get the precise image I envision - but already I am capturing wonderful light effects, the color is true, the display almost as good as the SLR. The brilliant optics, the feel of the shutter, the sophisticated but not unfriendly programs and manual override, and the ease of in-camera composition echo this camera's great film predecessors. My beloved OM-1 is reincarnated for the 21st century. I can hardly wait to get back into the wilds.

...Good things:

1. Color. Second camera of all I tried afterNikon Coolpix that delivers color as bright, right and clear.

2. PC Connection. Once you connect this toy to your USB port, Windows senses it, asks for drivers and when you supply those, the memory stick in your camera appears as just another (removable) drive to your Windows, the drive that works at least as fast as my hard drive.

3. Battery. They have lithium ion rechargeable one like on best Sony's camcorders.

That's it. Now bad things that made me bite the [bullet] returning it back to Fry's:

First thing -- financial trap: pretty typical for Sony, you basically have to buy about 1.5K worth of stuff to be comfortable with this product. The supplied 8M memory stick stores about 4 to 5 maximum resolution pictures, and the best stick they have (64M) stores about 40. Usually when I go to a trip I take about 200 shots, so I had to buy 5 (five) 64M sticks...Additional lenses...Small stuff like floppy disk adapter, adds up quickly. It's much worse than with a Sony camcorder -- I bought a good one for about a grand and added about half of that of stuff. They say -- you can delete some pictures you don't need which is BS - the display on the camera is too small and the quality of the picture on a TV delivered via AV out is too poor.

AV video signal out - useless. I guess it's there to view the pictures and "movies" on the TV, but because of different resolution, the pictures appear mangled, distorted beyond recognition, you can't enjoy them, you can't decide which to keep which to erase.

It's awfully slow when it comes to grab focus and especially KEEP IT focused! Making pictures with this camera is like dancing salsa with a sloth for a partner. You can take still pictures of an object which is really still, rather totally, ultimately still. If it moves it's useless.

5 sec MPEG -- useless. It's jumpy, skips moments and you can't control which moment it will skip, can't control resolution, the camera can't keep the focus if the object is moving back and forth.

Often it turns on unable to focus at all -- you have to shut it down and turn it on to regain ability to control the focus.

It's faster than many other cameras I tried, but still not enough. It's still slow, slow to start, slow to make next pictures. No fast draw.

Resizing - useless, and especially bad if you got some straight lines on wrong places in your picture. Depending on source resolution, target resolution and moon phase - they may appear curved and Sony does not deliver the magic of avoiding it.

The bundled software -- worse than your average. Can't even autobalance exposure.

Bottom line: too expensive for a toy, too poor to be a practical tool. If you want a toy, Canon ELF S100 would probably be a better choice.

By the way on one of the included booklets they describe self as "Sony CyberSh t" with a one of their hot lenses placed between h and t. Interesting insight. I guess, I just picked a letter to put into there on the top of their lens.

I bought the S70 about two months ago and I shot a lot of pictures with it: its light weight, compact size and ease of use even with one hand (the right of course :) ) make the perfect digital camera for ME. I was really impressed by the quality of its pictures (colors, shades, contrast...) although I've read a pretty bad review about it in a magazine. As many other digital cameras, there are many features such as crop/resize a picture, choose between 6 different resolutions, zoom in a picture (to look for a specific detail for instance), USB connection to your PC (which is a lot faster), optical and digital zoom (even though I don't recommend using the digital one unless you're perfectly still), several effects (sepia, black and white, solarize, negative and two or three others), a viewfinder with a focus ring (very convenient at night, believe me, you can't see anything using the LCD display)... you can even shoot a movie with it! Why only 4 stars ? Simply because it comes with a 8Mo memory stick (come on Sony! we can't do anything with 8Mo unless we use the 640x480 resolution!), there is no carrying case or something to protect it and the menu is not that intuitive... it can get pretty complicated to find what you're looking for when you don't know your camera. However, it's still very easy to use... turn it on, point and shoot... delete if you're not satisfied and try again! Want to have a look at your pictures ? Turn a switch to "play mode" and use the arrows of a small pad to navigate among them, delete, resize... then just plug your USB connector to your PC and with the driver installed, a removable disk appears on your machine, just like a zip drive or a hard drive! Drag and drop your pictures where you want. The stamina rechargeable battery allows you to know exactly how much time you have. In short, I think the S70 is worth the price you pay for it even if you'll have to buy another memory stick (around $140 for a 64Mo but you can go with a 32Mo). It has all the features of the other digital cameras of its range of prices plus others, the quality of the picture is commendable (and again I'm not talking about the 3.3 megapixels resolution which is obviously excellent but the colors, contrast...) and it's easy to use, except for the menu. I've used it in trade shows, parties with friends, during weekends (sceneries...), I've even taken some pictures from a plane! Last but not least, even if I print a lot of pictures with this camera, using a pretty good Epson printer (but not a photo printer, no need for it), I still have a good 35mm when I want to have a professional result. That makes sense, doesn't it?

Our Sony has given us trouble-free service on an around the world trip. We ran out of memory sticks pretty quickly and found the price for the 64 mb stick to be pretty expensive. Overall the image quality (on 2048 3:2 mode) is excellent. The colors are vibrant and we are able to easily print A4 copies on high quality printers.

After much shopping around on the internet, and reading reviews I decided on the Olympus D-40. It's my first digital camera and so far I'm VERY pleased. Its compact size makes it easy to take with you. The biggest selling points were (1) the 4 megapixel capability, (2) the size AND (3) it has a remote! I love this feature, it means I can take pictures of myself with my family/friends without having to do the run back and forth routine that you do with a timer. (It does have a timer for those that still want that option) The remote works for a few feet - enough to get a pic of you with that awesome scenery, monument, etc. behind you. Also, you can manually set all settings - shutter speed, etc.

The drawbacks are (1) the zoom and (2) the lag time between the press of the shutter button and the actual picture being taken. The zoom doesn't go as far as I wanted. I would have also liked the capability to put an extra zoom lens on. Sometimes the lag between pressing the button and the photo being taken is enough to miss the shot. For those reasons I've given the camera 4 stars instead of 5.

Overall, this camera has been a great starter for me and I bet would be good for a repeat digital camera buyer who wants a bunch of features in a small package.

P.S. Get the big (128MB) memory card.

I've used Olympus point-and-shoot cameras for years, starting with the XA. Though my 'main' camera is a Nikon F3, over the years I've opted to carry the small Olympuses for travel. If it can't fit in my pocket or purse, it doesn't go!

Finally... there is a pocket-sized digital camera that rivals the resolution of a film: the Olympus D40Z. It has more bells and whistles than the average photographer will ever need, but it also runs just fine in the 'PHD' AUTO mode. And the quality is fantastic! Another feature I really liked was the drag-and-drop feature that allows you to offload pics direct to a PC hard drive through the USB port makes download a snap. On a short boat ferry, I powered up my laptop and had the pics downloaded in less than 30 seconds. (One friend uses his Olympus to transfer files from one PC to another at home!)

Battery life has not been a problem - I've run several hundred photos through the camera and am still on the original battery. I don't however use the viewer much - I save battery life by downloading photos to the PC rather than viewing and editing them in the camera. Nevertheless, purchasing the rechargeable batteries is recommended in the long run.

I was looking at the Nikon CoolPix 990 and 995 before this camera was released. Though the quality and durability is very good, I was put off by the larger body size and weight of the Nikon (if it's not small, it will probably be left in the drawer more often than not). So if you're in the market for a digital camera and need small size, high picture quality with enough features 'headroom' to allow a high degree of control over the image, you should definitely consider the Olympus D40Z.

i have had an olympus digital camera for 4 years now, and have been researching for the last 6 months on a new model.. just got the new d40 in time for christmas and also ordered the bu-100 charger and a 128mb extra card... buy both! amazon's service on these products was just great! ordered them 1 week before christmas and got them in 5 days....the camera takes great pictures and the featuers are easy after you play around with the camera.....for christmas my son also got me the olympus USB smartmedis reader which i really like useing to save the battery power...the quick time video uses alot of battery power but the sound and pictuer quality is just amazing and the zoom featuer works really good....compact size makes it a breeze to carry around in the shirt pocket...i mainly use the 1600x1200 sq1 mode
and the COLOR quality is just amazing.....get one now!!!

Sony has just about infiltrated every electronic marketplace possible and the digital camera sector is no exception. When I was researching to buy a camera, it came down to the Canon A40 vs. the Sony DSC P71. I went with the Sony because it was smaller and I didn't want to carry around the larger Canon. I wonder now if I made a mistake as Canon cameras are constantly being raved about.

The P71 being my first digital camera it would be unfair to say I was disappointed. It has a decent zoom 3x Optical and 2x digital. The form factor of the camera is a huge plus. It's very small and light and easy to carry in a jacket pocket. The LCD is 1.5" more than large enough to see images clearly. The 3.2 megapixels has allowed me to develop beautiful, clear 5 x 7 photos. Even the 8 x 10 pictures come out very well.

The strength of Sony digital cameras lies in taking outdoor pictures. The colors in natural sunlight are vibrant and clear. The pictures taken outdoors always come out beautiful - especially in areas where flowers, trees, and grass are present.
I have seen very few digital cameras that take nicer outdoor pictures than the Sony P71.

The navigation is very intuitive even if the buttons are a little small. Sometimes I find it hard to find the center "ok" button - I often accidentally slip my finger to the right or left. When going through pictures taken already, the preview images render very quickly on the LCD. The camera offer a plethora of options for shutter speed, contrasting, picture quality and resolution, as well as view.

Battery life is good. I can go through a 64 MB memory stick at high resolution on one set of batteries (and flash). Sony also provides a free set(2) of rechargeable batteries and a charger with this camera. This is a very very nice addition and accessory for this price. I bought an extra set of rechargeable batteries to keep as a spare (one set always charges while the other set is being used).

Also provided is a USB cable to hook up to your computer to download images. This is an extremely easy set up with Windows XP - just plug the USB cable into your computer and camera and XP automatically recognizes your new hardware. You don't need to install the provided software if your computer already has a default picuture viewer.

Now the reasons this camera received just 3 stars:

1) Remember how I mentioned that this camera takes great outdoor pictures? Well as great as the outdoor pictures are, the indoor pictures are as equally horrible. I don't know if it's the flash or Sony's interpretation of artificial light, but every single indoor picture is dark with an orange tint. They are clear, but the coloring is always off. It's like I'm looking at pictures through sunglasses.

2) I wish Sony would have configured this camera to leave the flash on when I turn it on. The default setting for the flash is always "off" so when you turn the flash on and the camera is idle for a minute, it turns itself off and sets the flash to the off position. This wouldn't be annoying if it didn't take the camera so long to re-initiate the flash. It takes a good 5-7 seconds to re-initiate. Furthermore, what would make most sense would be if the camera just sensed when the flash was needed and turned it on itself. That's what most cameras do.

So there you have it - a layman's review of the Sony P71. I'm not a hobbyist or a professional photographer, I just use the camera for fun to basically record memories. The Sony P71 is an decent camera. If you take a lot of indoor pictures, stay away from it, otherwise, it will serve its purpose.

I am a first time digital camera user. When I finally made my choice, I narrowed it down to the Sony DSC-P51 and 71 and also the Fuji Finepix models. The DSC-P71 is a truly incredible and great camera! I love the zoom capability of the P71. The manual is easy to read, the instructions easy to follow and the camera itself is easy to use, whether you are a pro digicam user or a novice like myself. I never had so much fun taking pictures with this camera! I had no problems downloading the drivers and the camera has functioned properly. I went to many electronics stores looking for the Sony DSC-P51 or 71 and I was lucky enough to snag a P71. These cameras are hard to get! The picture quality is truly astounding and Sony's imagestation.com has easy to download instructions on how to view and print your pictures. The only negative is the included battery charger. It takes 13 hours to charge 2 batteries! Go with the STAMINA Starter Kit instead. Also, it is recommended that you upgrade the Memory Stick to at least 64 megs. Other than that, you won't be disappointed with this camera. I for one was amazed at how great simple-looking pictures turned out. And the design of the P71 is pretty cool-looking too! Sony does it again!

I have used several digital cameras in the past couple years... The DSC-P71 is not the most expensive, but is by far the best I have used yet. This is my second Sony digital camera, and Sony has always impressed me with their digital imaging. The lighting and color interpretation and contrast really make the pictures spring to life! Often the pictures look far better than reality. Pictures on overcast days actually look like it's sunny out. In the same price range is the Canon S330. It is a great camera as well, and VERY small and easy to use. A real nifty package! But it only has 2.0MP resolution, whereas the Sony as 3.2MP. The optical zoom is the same, both have rechargeable batteries, and both come with 16MB memory cards. Sony is at least as good a brand in my mind as Canon, especially for electronic products. Hands down, my vote goes to the Sony.

My S45 has broke twice in the 6 months I have had it. I am very disapionted. I've always bought Canon but will look somewhere else next time! Very poor quality.

I recently purchased this camera after having previously owned a Fuji Finepix 2600. After owning the 2600 for just over a year the lens mechanism got stuck and the camera completely broke. It had a 1 year warrenty which had just expired, and there's no use paying to fix it. I figured it was time to upgrade, so I spent hours and hours searching CNET and other review sites for 4MP digital cameras and I finally found this one. I would have gone with the Nikon Coolpix 4300, except Canon had their Digic chip which was supposed to allow the camera to go from shot-to-shot faster. Also I own an old Canon SLR camera, and I trusted the brand. This camera is a very good transition from my SLR, much better than my old Fuji. I wanted something with image quality close to that of my film SLR, without the bulkiness or price of a digital SLR. So far this camera has done that, producing some wonderful shots. It has plenty of features ranging from customizable shutter speeds and lens aperture to exposure compensation and 12 scene modes, making it great for shooting in any condition. One of the great features is the AF lamp, a breif light that goes off before the picture is taken that helps focus the image. It works great for low light shots. Another astounding feature is the ability to set ISO speed, just like you would on a film camera. My last camera was almost the same price as this one and has none of these features. I guess that shows how much prices have come down in the past year. There are not many cons about this camera. It's amaller than most cameras with the same amount of megapixels, but it's still not as lightweight as some of the Casio models or Canon's digital Elph. The pictures on ISO 200+ have significant noise, even with noise reduction, and the optical zoom could be larger, and the macro is sub-par, but that's really all that is bad about this camera. Battery life is great, although it uses a proprietary lithium battery. Here is a list of pros and cons:

Pros:
- Digic image processer.
- Large array of features.
- Great quality photos.
- Panorama stitch mode.
- Great battery life.
- Movie mode with sound.

Cons:
- ISO 200+ has significant noise.
- Poor macro mode.
- Lithium battery instead of AA.
- Optical zoom could be larger.

Overall this is a great camera and many other reviewers agree with me. It's not too expensive but has features of cameras almost twice as expensive. If you're a beginner photographer you might want to stick to someing simpler, as the features are more than you need you, but if you're looking to move up from an old digital camera I guarentee this is the best deal you're going to find.

What i like about this camera:
1) fast buffer (there aren't much waiting for the last picture to be saved before shooting another one, kodak's camera made me wait up to 13 seconds a few time!) this one is within 5 second if the picture quality is high. When it come to taking 10-16 rapid fire shots, there aren't much waiting in saving the file too!

2) Features, features...so many. You got photo stitch, a great way to make a 360 picture just about anywhere.

3) manual controls, flash control (most digital cameras dont have flash control...but what if flash is too bright for some areas? what you going to do? , canon solves all of these !)

4) fast zoom optical lense retract, 1.8 second before first shot taken... beats minolta f100, 6 second! you'll miss a shot before you know it.

5) movie mode, up to 3 minutes (which is a lot!) great sound very clear, video quality is good, better than others i have seen.

6) customize sound start up screen! (put whatever you want as sounds, it even got themes you can upload from the cd software that is included....tons of stuff to play with.

7) replay control... browsing through tons of photos that
just got taken? no problem, easy navigational system! love it, you got to check it out.

8) solid metal case, nice nice nice but do becareful as well

9) zoom optical lense is in the center rather than on the far left side like minolta f100 and sony's digital cameras. This way you wont get your fingers in the way too easily, and plus if you let someone else use your camera , it's better to know that they won't accidently mess up the lense~!

10) softwares provided is great, fun to play around with, cool graphics too to try.

11) compact flash memory,....... up to 1 gig mircodrive.but honestly you only need 256, = 200 high resolution photos.!

12) small, but not too pocket-sized. Surprisingly easy to handle and comfortable. Still i say is smaller than most digital cameras I have seen.

things I wish they had done better

1) the lense cover, you slide it open to turn on, slide it back to turn off.. have to be careful about this thing. very fragile cover. I wish they used a on off button instead.

2) battery is not AA. You have to use their charger + battery, .... ... But i wish it was AA because I have AA charger already. I have to buy spare, which is "costly"

This camera is an upgrade for me and I'm embarrassed by how much I paid for so little camera last time around. So, I chose carefully and have not been disappointed.

Best shooting so far has been at the Tidal Basin last Friday just past the peak of the cherry blossoms. The camera took some amazing shots of the Washington and Jefferson monuments surrounded by the pink splendor. I displayed the shots on my big screen TV to the whole family without any problems. Color was perfect and the automation in this camera really frames the shots well. I'm a so, so photographer so this is a big plus.

Next I tried it out at the Dolphin show up at the National Acquarium in Baltimore. The results were excellent, especially the zoom. I caught the dolphins in the midst of almost every trick including the huge leap to the top of the auditorium to touch the ball. I also took some incredible photos through the glass of the seahorses. The exposure took some tweaking but I was able to figure it out with less than 10 shots. The family oohed and ahhed when they saw them.

For those of you who own Minolta and have grown used to the interface and quality of features, this is a no-brainer. For the price, I expected a bit less and have been consistently amazed by the quality of pictures it takes, especially in automatic mode. My SLR has been sent to the cabinet until I really need it for more complicated shots.

Be sure to have at least 2 sets of batteries and keep them in your bag. Each trip I exhausted the batteries and had to change them. Also, for the $$$, I recommend a 256MB card so you can take 100+ high quality images. That's what 4.0MP is all about.

I've used this camera for two months now and I'm really pleased. I researched digital cameras for about a month (reading reviews on the internet, visiting local camera shops and talking to people who own digital cameras) before I made my final decision. I wanted a camera that was easy to use, took nice enough pictures to print for framing and/or photo albums, and wanted to stay within a budget of $500.00

The S404 was the only camera in my price range that was 4 megapixels and a 4X optical zoom. I did compare it with the Sony DC75 and the Olympus 3020 and I think you can see a difference between the 3 megapixel and 4 megapixel when you have pictures side by side. The Sony and the Olympus did have more in manual controls, but only a 3X optical zoom and the Olympus didn't have sound with it's video. Another nice feature on the S404 is the voice memo you can attach to the picture. This, plus the fact that subject program buttons (Macro, Portrait, Landscape and Night), the flash/red eye and zoom are exactly like my 35mm point & shoot camera, a Minolta Freedom Zoom 140EX. This was an added bonus for me, I felt like I already knew the S404.

...

Now the fun began. I wanted to try every feature on the camera. Outdoor pictures were great, however in bright sunlight I do adjust the white balance to "daylight". The Macro is fantastic, you can see every detail (very close to my SRL shots), the Portrait mode is a really nice feature and gives your pictures a professional look. I used this for my daughter's high school graduation pictures. After reading some people were having problems with indoor pictures, I tried the different ways and found the best pictures were when I was using "auto", they look great to me. I haven't had the opportunity to use the Night Portrait yet, but I know it works beautifully on my point and shoot and I'm hoping for the same with the S404. I did view some photos other people took of fireworks on the 4th and they look great!

I take all my photos in the 2274 x 1704 imagine size and the fine quality mode. I started using superfine, however I really didn't see much of a difference, and fine uses a lot less space. I do download my pictures using the Dimage Image Viewer Utility, save them, and then I can open them in any other program.

I just started using the print index feature and having 4 X 6 prints made at the local camera shop. (I found this is where the flash card that came with the camera comes in handy, I can drop this one off and I still have one in my camera). WOW!!! YOU CAN'T TELL THE DIFFERENCE FROM PRINT FILM!!! Although I have been getting beautiful print outs with my HP 930C, I have been using a lot of ink and photographic paper. From now on, pictures I want for the photo album I will have printed at the camera shop. The paper is a little heavier, it's probably cheaper and saves time.

This camera is easy to use, fits your hand nicely, and takes beautiful pictures. I met all my objectives with this camera. If you can find one, I highly recommend it!

Problems
As mentioned in other reviews, the auto focus sometimes misses. However the more I'm using the camera, the less this is happening. I really dislike the lens cap, I wish Minolta could have figured an internal lense cover which would close when the camera is turned off.

This camera is great. I agree with everything written above. The only negative is the way these digital cameras eat up batteries, but that's across the board. Make sure you get the NiMH AA batteries, rechargable if possible. The quality of the pictures is awesome, but what impressed me the most was the features. You can do anything automatically or manually. You name it, this camera does it except for the effect processing things like B&W or sepia. These things I prefer doing on the computer anyway and don't want to pay for it. Speaking of paying for it, yes that's the real price. I thought compared to the prices of other cameras, either this was a wrong price or the camera was junk. Especially with the zoom factor. But the price was real and the camera's anything but junk. The main reason I'm writing is to let all the Apple users know that this camera does work with OS X and iPhoto perfectly. No software install needed with a Mac. Just plug the camera into your keyboard and it launches iPhoto automatically. Click Import and your done. Beautiful.

I bought this camera about 2 weeks ago. It's a pretty good one. Picture quality for outdoors are excellent, even it only has 2MP. But indoor pictures are not very clear. Anyway, what do you expect for a $100 DC?. I am very satisfied with it.

I've been thinking and thinking and thinking of buying a digital camera for a long time, but kept putting it off. Everytime I saw something that looked promising, it seems there was a purchase killer somewhere-too expensive, no LCD display, too few pixels, whatever-and I kept passing.

Then my sister told me she was getting a grant from her school to take her kids on several field trips and had $100 to spend on disposable film cameras. Then the light bulb came on over my head. Why not get a digital camera, said I? So I rounded up the usual web sites for research, came upon the FujiFilm A205, and was impressed by the specs. Where, oh where, thought I, can I find some reliable real world reviews? Amazon, of course. After reading the reviews I bought the camera and a 64Mb memory card and I'm delighted with the results.

You need not hesitate any longer if you've been considering getting a digital camera. This camera is a real bargain. Picture quality exceeds my expectations, and I've even taken a few experimental pics at night and with a little more refinement of technique, I'll even be getting better night shots.

I'm a total newbie to digital photography. I do maintain web pages for my students (college writing) and figured a good "starter" camera would be a good investment. I came across this one through an Amazon deal.

It was priced well within my budget, under $100.00, and was a nice little complete package. (Even with batteries!) Instructions were clear, and it's basically usable right out of the box. It comes with PC software that makes it easy to transfer your pics to your PC. And, a nice surprise, they even included the USB cable!

Well, it's so simple to use you think you're doing something wrong. I've had it for a couple weeks and tried both indoor and outdoor shooting. The zoom is very easy to use, and it's very simple to immediately check out your shots. It's got all the features of a moderately priced, film camera (red eye, auto focus/flash, etc.) Only personal glitch for me...there is a momentary delay between pushing the button and the actual shot, which I learned the hard way by taking shots of my daughter riding her horse. I had a couple of my daughter actually riding OUT of the frame. Still...more my mistake than the cameras. Still, this is easy to adjust to, and other pictures came out fine.

I'm no pro with photography, but this is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED for anyone wanting to cut their teeth on taking digipics. I still need to find a camera case for it, but that's easy to do. Somehow, I'm sure Amazon will manage to add accessories to my page... :-)

Try it out!