Canon PowerShot A430

Opinion: Very Fast, perfect that's what I needed.
I own a DSRL Oly E300, the A340 will be used as a P2S.

Opinion: Extremely fast start up and review times. DigicII really shines on a smaller pixel camera. Great movie mode. Decent zoom range. Viewfinder! Great first camera for new digital buyers who don't want to spend lot's of money. Has advanced features too when they increase their skills. With only 2AA batteries and tiny sd/mmc memory, it's small and lightweight but feels solidly built. This should be a real popular seller.

Opinion: Purchased this camera for my wife as she doesn't like the weight of my S2IS. She wanted a camera that was lightweight, easy to use, built-in flash, and zoom. I wanted something that used regular batteries, would work with SD cards, at least 3MP, had a viewfinder as well as LCD panel, reasonable response time, inexpensive and reliable manufacturer. This was the perfect camera - bought from CircuitCity at $140 (online with store pickup).

The two downsides I've experienced so far are:
- the flash doesn't trigger where the lighting will cause significant noise in the image
- writing to the SD card takes longer than I like

Overall, this is a great deal and my wife really likes the camera.

Opinion: I have been using a Canon S45 for a few years. I wanted a bit smaller camera that ran on AA batteries instead of a propriatary battery pack. The A430 has some good features.

1. Quick start up time.
2. A quality lens and Good zoom.
3. Fairly compact for a camera that runs on AA's.
4. Canon quality images.
5. Movie mode and good sound capture.
6. Good variety of picture shooting modes and settings.
7. Optical viewfinder with zoom.

The camera does not have,

1. Shutter or apreature priority. You wont be able to shoot long exposure night scenes, but I have the S45 for that.
2. Only 2 stitch modes, right to left, and left to right. This doesn't matter too much, I was doing stitches by eye through the veiwfinder and stitching them after. You have to watch the exposure this way, but it's do-able.
3. A small view screen. I just mention this as so many cameras are advertizing a large veiw screen, usually sacraficing the optical viewer. With those you have to run the screen all the time. I typically have the screen shut off and I use the optical viewer most of the time to extend battery life. I have a computer for viewing the pictures in a large format.

For my needs this camera fills the bill nicely. It is small enough to carry in the pocket and the images are Canon quality. 4 megapixels is more than enough for the images I print (8.5 X 11 at the most) so I am not getting caught up in the 'Pixel Wars'.

A good camera for under $200.