Looking to get a new Digital Camera. I'd like to read some good comparisons of the different models.

One of the things that interest me is battery life. My current Nikon lasta about 24-40 pictures with flash on it's proprietary lithium ion battery. I have to carry 2 or 3 batteries around to fill up a 128 MB compact flash disk.

I am looking for...

4 to 5 mega pixels
Compact Flash
Point and shoot style with a good size.
Good flash coverage
Optical and digital zoom
Excellent battery life
Direct upload from camera to PC via cable(so I don't have to always remove Compact Flash) card.

I'd like to stick with Nikon, Canon, Olympus, or Minolta

$400 or less

I thought about getting the Canon Digital Rebel so I could use my Canon EOS AF lenses, but I couldn't justify the price or the big size.

http://www.dpreview.com/

http://www.steves-digicams.com/

I have been looking at a new model that Canon came out with. I take a lot of close shots and need a wide angle lens. The s60 comes with a 28-100 equivalent lens.


http://www.steves-digicams.com/2004_reviews/s60.html

Just got my dad a Sony Cybershot P93 for his birthday
Nice camera, easy to use (point & shoot), 5 megapixels, good flash and very compact/light weight, 3x optical zoom
The go for about $350

cheers,

Jeroen

dpreview.com is a GREAT site...incredibly detailed reviews and sample shots.

I just got my wife a Canon Elph S500 for her birthday. Great little camera although over your $400 target (closer to $500). 5megapix, 3x optical zoom. Also be sure to budget for larger memory cards as most cameras still come with really wimpy ones. This camera came with 32MB and I got an extra 256MB card. An extra battery (or two) is also a great plan.

My older Nikon uses regular AA batteries which sure is convenient compared to the proprietary battery packs, but obviously not as compact. I carry arround 3 sets of NiMH AA's as it toasts them pretty quickly.

I have my eyes on a Nikon D70 SLR for myself later in the year. The pocket cameras take great pics and are super easy to use, but there's no comparison in ultimate quality or control or lens options vs. the SLR's.

One great improvement in today's digicams is they are so much FASTER than the ones from 2-3 years ago. No more of that crap where you shoot and then wait 5 seconds for the save operation before you can shoot again. They use fancy buffering techniques to improve responsiveness.

There is no comparison. The pics I get out of my D-Rebel are just awesome. It is expensive though.

I just picked up a mint-condition used Canon S400 for times when I don't want to carry an SLR around. I'm having a lot of fun with this tiny camera.

We just bought the same camera, I love it, super easy to use and so many features. We paid $329.00 on base, after I gravity tested our 2.0 Mega Pix Samsung...it failed.

Okay, thanks everyone.

I picked up an Olympus 5060Wide Zoom

http://www.steves-digicams.com/2003_reviews/c5060.html

$480.00

A couple of other things you may want to consider:

Battery type: Custom vs AAA or AA.
I personally perfer to use AAA or AA batteries because
the AA/AAA NiMh batteries are WAY cheaper than the custom
batteries, plus you can use regular batteries in emergencies.
AA are better than AAA because they last much longer.
If you are going to remote places, the cost of the many custom
batteries you will need can easily be more than the cost of the
camera. (I'd rather spend the money on more media cards)

Foreign travel: Can your charger work on 220v?
(Seems most are very US centric)
Sure you can lug along a 220 to 110 adapter but its one
more thing to have to remember.
(It is easy to find universal AAA/AA chargers that work on
110, 220 and even use your cigarette lighter)

On the direct connect capabilitiy,
While it sounds great, most require custom software
and many are actually considerably slower than the
multicard readers that are readily available, directly supported
by Windows with no drivers, and cost under $20.
It literally only takes seconds to pop the card out of the camera
and put it into a reader. Well worth it once you start to
view or copy your images to your hard disk.

You may also want to consider the ability to record animations
with sound. Many support recording movies but don't include
the microphone so be careful.
It sounds hokey, but we used it alot when we were in the
Galapagos for capturing animals. In Peru it was great for talking
over pictures or capturing an animated image that is so vast that a photograph just couldn't capture it all. Even captured a few local
parades.

The one I ended up buying last fall was a
Samsung Digimax 360. Very small, under 8 oz with batteries,
2 AA BATs, USB, 3.2 Mpixel,
Takes pictures, sounds, audio attachments to pictures,
movies with sounds, and even
has movie playback with sounds. batteries lasted for hundreds of pictures.
The pictures we took with the Samsung Digital, when
developed, were actually much sharper and clearer
than the 35mm pictures taken with our Olympus IQ90 zoom.
For a few hundred bucks it worked great for us.

--- bill

I much prefer the custom NiMH batteries these days. You get a huge amount of shots with a modern camera and they are way less bulky than AAs. Also, don't buy these batteries at Best Buy or Compusa where they charge a small fortune. Buy generic batteries from places like batterybarn.com that have even higher ratings than the stock manufacturer battery.

Olympus is a great Camera. I have a C-2100 ultra zoom with image stabilizing. It's only a 2.1 but it works fine. I can read license plate in parking lots with that zoom... 38-380 I was 100+ yds away when I took my avatar. My next digital will be like Anthony's, a Canon Rebel. I have a Canon Elan II & IIE so those lens will work on the Rebel. $550 for the body! and 6.3 MP

....b

My current digital camera is a Kodak DC5000.

It's big and heavy. Battery life is okay (4-AA batteries), and uses flashcards. It has a nice tripod mount on the bottom. USB compatible. 2.0 megapixel.

Why did I get such an "average" camera? Because it's waterproof, dustproof, mudproof. I dropped it in the Red Sea, it sank 3-4 meters in saltwater while I (swore repeatedly, then) quickly dove in after it. I brought it up, rinsed it in bottled water, and kept taking pictures. It has o-rings to keep all the critical compartments sealed up, including a optical quality removable/replaceable lense cover. I always shoot through the cover, and my pictures are pretty good (considering I'm only slightly better than Andy at taking pictures).

It's *not* a dive camera (I have a cheap analog camera good to 21 meters); I'm lucky that I caught it before it went any deeper. But for extreme environments - it's great.

-Rusty

read dpreview and see if he has lookedd at this camera yet

Sony
Cyber-shot® Digital Camera
DSC-T1   
1/2.4" 5.1 Megapixel Super HAD™ CCD imager
3X optical lens with 2X digital zoom
2.5" Hybrid LCD monitor
Carl Zeiss® Vario-Tessar® Lens
Ultra compact design allows it to fit right in your pocket

It has a huge viewfinder and is the size of a pack of cards

Neal

I had a C2100uz for about a year now, and it was a great camera even at 2mp, sold it to a friend and got myself a E-100rs!!! only 1.xmp, but @ 15fps!!!

Steve's digicam site is filled with good reviews, I haven't had a question about a camera that wasn't adequetely answered there.




Sang