What digital camera to buy

[sntm]

I have a stipend from serving on a committee that has to be spent at the university bookstore, so I'm planning to get a digital camera. I have up to $1000 to spend on it, so I'm looking for good recommendations.

My must-haves:
*HIGH resolution
*fast picture taking
*small/lightweight

My wants:
*lots of memory
*easy to download pictures, preferably to multiple sources (like, to my laptop or to computers at work)
*hard to damage
*easy to use

What I am using it for:
Both pictures at home of Jack (ergo, the need for fast picture taking!) and at work for interesting interoperative findings, physical exams findings, etc. (which is why I want it small, lightweight, and hard to destroy).

Any suggestions? Or ones NOT to look at? The bookstore had the Canon Powershot S50 which was nice but a little bigger/heavier than what I wanted or the SD200 which was very cute and tiny but lower resolution. What resolution should I be looking for?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
shannon
not-even-pregnant-yet-overachiever
trying-to-conceive :)
PREGNANT! EDD 6/9/03
mama to Jack 6/6/03
http://www.gynosaur.com/assets/ribbons/ribbon_sapphire_24m.gif[/img][/url]
Breastfeeding 2 years & counting

[dianna]

We just bought the Canon SD500 and we love it! Its a 7 megapixel camera, so you can get as much detail as you want. Sounds like it would fit your needs very well. And its tiny!

We paid about $475 for it.

[pb&j]

Hey Shannon -

In general, get the best resolution (highest megapixels) that you can afford! In my part of the U, we've got 2 Canon Powershot A75's, which I think have been discontinued and replaced by the A85 and A95. I think the A95 has higher resolution (5 megapixels), and may have less of a delay. They're both very small and lightweight. You should have no trouble downloading pictures to any computer, Mac or PC. As for memory, that will depend on what size card you buy. They come with a card, but it's usually something totally useless, like 32 mb. I'd recommend shopping around for a 1 gigabyte card - they're easily under $90 these days. All point and shoot digitals will have some kind of lag between when you press the shutter release and when the picture gets taken.

We send ours out with all kinds of people all the time, and haven't had anyone come back and say they couldn't figure out how to use it. When you're first starting out with it, just keep it in automatic mode, and as you get comfortable with that, try reading the manual and playing with other modes.

HTH!

ETA: Since you have to spend the whole stipend AT the bookstore, don't bother shopping around for that card. They have them there, I think for about $100. And don't forget a case!


-Paige,
mom to Emma, s/b 11/04/04
and Max, edd 01/15/06 - it's a BOY!

http://lilypie.com/days/060115/3/25/1/-5/.png[/img] ([img)

[Oct. 04 mom]

Ditto on the Canon. I have an S400 that I love. My husband, a professional photographer, bought it for me after lots of research. My co-worked bought an SD400 -- much smaller and lighter.

Don't skip out on the camera case. Lowepro sells one for $10-15.

Also, get as big of a card as you can afford. A 512 MB card holds about 200 pictures. The 32 MB card it comes with isn't worth much.

This line also takes short movies! We had a great time with it on the beach last week.

[amp]

Love our Canon A70 (I think they are at A85 or 95 now). Anyway, it takes great pics. It does have some frustrating lag time between shots when the flash is charging, but that's pretty common among cameras. Also, it takes short videos w/ sound, which we really like. The memory card it came with didn't hold many high res pics, but we bought a larger memory card for it, and that's worked out well. It is a slightly larger camera than some of the dinky ones, but we like it pretty well and it's still compact.