compact digital camera buying advice

[kwak zzr]

i have about £80 - £120 to spend on a new compact digital camera to replace my old fuji 3mill finepix model, question is i know naff all about cameras :pale: the market in my price range is a mine field with 100,s of models to choose from, can anyone give me any buying advice or recommend one which you know is good? fankoo o kind org:)

[Gemaroo]

I don't know much about the technical side but I've had a Casio Exilim and currently have a Panasonic Lumix and can recommend both. I don't really think you can go massively wrong as they all have pretty much the same features, but the Panasonics have a very good quality lens.

[kwak zzr]

ive seen a panasonic for about £120 they seem a quality camera, do you get shutter lagg on all digital cameras or can i get rid of that by spending more?

[Paul the 6th]

anything canon :) nuff said :)

[embee]

See what gets recommended on dpreview (http://www.dpreview.com/) and also try Steve's digicams (http://www.steves-digicams.com/). Both are pretty straight reliable sites for opinions and views.

dpreview has real owner feedback if you search through individual camera model details, often very useful for real-world opinions.

I like Canon stuff, but many compacts are really very good these days, a friend bought a very cheap digicam for her daughter a while ago, around £30 I think, and it takes truly nice pics because it has a decent lens, simple as that. Knobs and whistles can sometimes be overkill if all you really want is a point and shoot.

[kwak zzr]

i decided on the casio exilim EX-Z100 in the end due to it being 10mill pixels, 4x optical and a wide angle facility, at £127 from argos it seemed like a good deal.

[fizzwheel]

ive seen a panasonic for about £120 they seem a quality camera, do you get shutter lagg on all digital cameras or can i get rid of that by spending more?

You'll get it on all the compact small camera's I suspect, the only way I can think you'll reduce it is to spend more money on a "Bridge Camera" or go the whole hog and get a DSLR, which you'll struggle to do on your budget...

[kwak zzr]

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0801/08010709casioexz100exz200.asp

[kwak zzr]

whats surprised me fizz is the lack of lagg on the little exilim, it seems to shoot straight away :)

[fizzwheel]

whats surprised me fizz is the lack of lagg on the little exilim, it seems to shoot straight away :)

Cool, TBH I'm not surprised, march of technology etc etc, The shutter lag was the main thing that made me go DSLR in the end, I got so fedup with taking picture of grass / tarmac and no bike when I went to places like Donnington / Thruxton to watch the bike racing :D

[kwak zzr]

this happened to me also with my old fuji fine pix lol they have come on leaps and bounds and the only advice i can give is just to spend as much as you can. one thing that has surprised me tho is how cheap memory is now :) i just ordered a 8gig sd card off ebay for £11 delivered :)

[Daimo]

Advice???

Spend more money.

Difference between a "up to £150" camera and a £200+ camera is simply mental. Amount of quality you can get vastly improves. It'll last a good 5 years, shell out more for one is my advice.

[Viney]

Dont read reviews, it confuses the hell out of you and makes a normaly simple decision much harder. It took me 3 months of uming and ahing as to wich camera i should get. I wanted a DSLR, but in reality, it wouldnt have got used as much as a compact, so after much deliberation, i got a Panasonic Lumix TZ5 and to be honest, its unbelievable. Now that the TZ6 & 7 are out, you may be able to find the TZ 4 or 5 for a lot less. I payed £200 for the camera, bag, extra battery and memort card form Jessops. Once you get used as how to take DSLR type pictures with it, its stunning. The fact its pocket sized means it will get used a lot more, and its 28-280mm (eqivilent) lens is superb...and basicaly the camera is a Leica camera in a different body. I am more than impressed. IUf you want to see the quality of photos, let me know, i can either email you some, or link you to my facebook.

[fizzwheel]

this happened to me also with my old fuji fine pix lol they have come on leaps and bounds and the only advice i can give is just to spend as much as you can. one thing that has surprised me tho is how cheap memory is now :) i just ordered a 8gig sd card off ebay for £11 delivered :)

holy cr*p thats cheap, I need a new card will check out ebay me thinks !

[kwak zzr]

here it is fizz - http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=370162390038

£10.49 delivered.

[Spiderman]

Wont recommend a camera cos there are more clued up peeps than me on here for that.

However i will suggest www.pixmania.com as they are very well priced and offer some models that you just cant get here. Example my Olympus Mju was only avaible here as a 7m pixel and in black or silver and form pixmania for the same money or could get it at 8m pixels and in black,silver,blue or orange.

[embee]

holy cr*p thats cheap, I need a new card will check out ebay me thinks !

Two places I can recommend for such stuff, had very good service from both places.

7dayshop (http://www.7dayshop.com/catalog/default.php?cPath=777&PHPSESSID=f290f53485cf85412cd26b86a5867a3e)
http://www.memorybits.co.uk/ (http://[URL="http://www.memorybits.co.uk/")

One tip with memorybits, if you go on and browse, sometimes when you go to leave the site it'll pop-up with a "special" discount offer if you buy now, so try leaving first!

[trickywoos]

Pixmania are just a branch off of a well known big company, where they put slightly cheaper things...........they can be found on amazon a lot too.

I'm watchng this with interest as i need a smaller compact to go with my DSLR (My DSLR has the 300mm lens on most of the time, and need a compact for people shots!)

[Paul the 6th]

Pixmania are just a branch off of a well known big company, where they put slightly cheaper things...........they can be found on amazon a lot too.

I'm watchng this with interest as i need a smaller compact to go with my DSLR (My DSLR has the 300mm lens on most of the time, and need a compact for people shots!)


or possibly a run of the mill lens like 18-55 maybe? :razz:

I bought one of these: Canon Powershot A1000 S

10 megapixels (more than enough! anything more than 5mp is a waste if you're not going to be printing them out)
4x zoom which does a decent job...
Turn and shoot time is around 1 second on full batteries.
Oh and it has the same digic processor as canon use in their DSL-r's apparently, so you can shoot something 2 or 3 frames per second continuously.. great for shots like the one of the bmx'er at the bottom
http://www.letsgodigital.org/images/artikelen/6/canon-a1000is.jpg

http://www.letsgodigital.org/images/artikelen/6/canon-a1000-is.jpg

http://lh6.ggpht.com/_c5nU_S1VtbY/SeOTuPtCPZI/AAAAAAAABYo/KmKiW8AxYGk/s640/IMG_0336.JPG

http://lh6.ggpht.com/_c5nU_S1VtbY/SeOTc7EzkyI/AAAAAAAABW8/Gz8hGlTDKgE/s640/IMG_0324.JPG

http://lh3.ggpht.com/_c5nU_S1VtbY/SeOTn2MkRyI/AAAAAAAABYA/nis-6FCWm44/s640/IMG_0331.JPG

Oh, actually this last one was taken with my canon 350d but gotta throw it in to big up canon anyway :)

http://lh4.ggpht.com/_c5nU_S1VtbY/Shb_Q4m2zCI/AAAAAAAABlg/nmBFhcIvo4Y/s720/IMG_0349.JPG

[Spiderman]

Pixmania are just a branch off of a well known big company, where they put slightly cheaper things...........

Really, which one is it? I'm curious now.

[Paul the 6th]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pixmania

[Spiderman]

fang ewe