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Average rating:
4.48
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Canon PowerShot S403.9 megapixels | 1.8" screen | 35 – 105 mm (3×)
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Average rating:
4.48
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Opinion: I bought this camera several years ago, and have used it extensively. This may sound silly but I never liked this camera from the day I bought it. I find that the S40 takes grainy, fuzzy, out-of-focus pictures more often than it should given the price that I had paid for it. It's a poorly thought-out, poorly implemented camera. The only thing that I can say it has going for it is its overall construction; it is built like a tank. Do not buy this camera - even if you get find it used at a great price.
Problems: Where to begin?
1. The S40's auto-focus mechanism/algorithm is unbelievably poor. If you operate in "Auto" mode, you may as well count on the fact that 1/2 your pictures will be out-of-focus. Or worse, parts of the picture are in focus - just not the "parts" that you wanted to have in focus. If you switch to program mode, or spend an unbelievable amount of time trying to get the focus mechanism to focus on the zone that you're interested in seeing "in-focus", you may improve your odds so that over 60% of your pictures turn out
2. The camera's focus mechanism simply does not work in low-light conditions. Again, the outcome is out-of-focussed pictures.
3. Canon issued one minor software upgrade to this camera. I would have expected to see more, but I guess their engineering team went on to bigger and better things?
4. The camera has this keypad control for selecting and choosing menu options/features that behaves oddly
I could go on, but either a) the complaints have been written about by others over the years, or b) I'm just kicking a dead horse. The point, however, is to tell you not to bother looking at this camera - either new or used.
Opinion: This camera packs a lot of features into a convenient package.
Problems: (1) In very dim light, horizontal bands appear across the image. This has been discussed on dpreview, I believe.
(2) Macro mode is poor.
(3) Autofocus shots come out blurry more often than they should.
(4) Only goes up to 3x zoom -- not a problem per se, but a feature I wish were improved.
(5) Flash is often too powerful, washing out the photo.
Opinion: Good camera with good picture quality. Would be nice if you could have user programmed settings rather then having to set up the same settings every time you turn off the camera
Problems: The toggle button failed in less then 1 -year. Two other friends have the same camera and there button has also failed.
Opinion: Last year I started using this camera and I'm very happy with it. It's an easy to use 'take it anywhere' camera with very good photo quality. Rich feature set and good size for handling. Panorama/stitching mode is excellent. AE sets are excellent as well. Sound and movie capabilities had better not be in there: poor quality. Red eyes is a problem. LCD screen is not covered, it's best to have a bag. Lens cap and connection protection has a poor feeling to it. Battery life is better than I'd expected: simply not use startup sound and use low LCD light. Very good interface, very intuitive controls. Software is good, but I don't like the user interface. RAW converter could be better. Overall a very good camera. When I purchased it the price/quality was very good. I'm not switching anytime soon.
Problems: None whatsoever. Only software related: MacOSX compatibility for all app's wasn't provided, but Canon did an excellent job on my support request.
Opinion: A big camera in a small package, the S40 accomplishes the "take-anywhere" mission excellently. As is to be expected, AF is sluggish enough that technique needs to be adjusted to get it to work well. Image quality is superb, apart from slight corner softness wide-open at maximum wide-angle. I've had the camera well over a year, and it's still going strong.
Problems: The three-point "AiAF" is just plain stupid -- locks the wrong AF point two times out of three. The single-point one is much better. Optical viewfinder is poor, and the rocker switch is hard to use accurately.
Opinion: Overall, I'm a little disappointed after a year's use. I upgraded to the S40 as my second digicam from the Fuji 4700Z, and the truth is, I prefer the images I got from the Fuji - they were sharper and more richly coloured, the S40 is a bit insipid in comparison. It does have manual focus and gives better low light images, but I feel I should've stuck with Fuji.
Problems: The manual focus is a real fiddle and hit and miss affair. You can't beat the old knurled ring you got on the old 35 SLRs with TTL!
Opinion: This is my third digital camera, and I've had it for close to a year now. In good light, it takes superb pictures with hardly a miss. Superb color and exposure every time, with only occasional focus problems on fast moving subjects. Exposure is great even in backlighting with snow! Color balance is right on every time. There's no need to use the "instant fix" feature in my photo editing program with S40 pictures, since they come out correctly right out of the camera. Nicely constructed with intuitive controls.
Problems: The one poor design element is red eye when taking pictures of people with flash. Virtually every picture will have red eye, even when the flash is set for "red eye reduction."
Opinion: My third D-cam. Quite unpredictable in the quality of photo in terms of exposure and noise level. Sometimes really excellent and sometimes noisy and underexposed. though I use raw Av all the time. Difficult to handle in high contrast/back lit situation: typical for point and shot camera. Good battery power, no lens cover, quick response are favoured. Colour and optical accuracy is great. (better than my earlier nikon 880) My extended family now own three of this cam, it must be the best buy for the past whole year.
Problems: Buttons too meticulous to handle even with my small Asian hands. Scratches on the LCD screen. Small size of lens and ISO 50 low noise raw mode is not a very practical package indeed. I hope technology could advance by one stop in my next camera. (low noise at ISO 100 for the same or brighter lens)
Opinion: Great pictures. Excellent capacity with microdrives. Easy to carry around. Great underwater case.
www.pbase.com/scubadiver
Problems: Flash pictures are worse after the firmware was upgraded!
Pity you cannot set flash to on at all times when auto mode underwater. Could do with underwater profile preset to get better colour rendition.
Wish Canon offered a trade-in promotion so I could get an S50!
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 | 22.3 megapixels 3.2" screen Full frame sensor |
