Canon PowerShot S50 or A80?

[uziemac]

I've been looking for a digital camera for the past few weeks, my girlfriend enedup buying the A80 which I tested for a week up in S.F. I've enjoyed using it, it takes good pictures but has trouble with night shots, but overall its a very nice camera. But the S50 apeals to me more and it has few extras, and even thought its a MegaPixel greater I know the images dont differ much in comparison, as I saw in a review. One trouble I have with the A80 is the LCD screen, since the A70's and S50's are superior; and with the S50 is the battery, as in not being able to just walk in to any store to re-power the camera. Does anyone own a S50 or both and like to share any comments?

 

[bubbamac]

I've got an S45. Close enough.

I can't say enough good things about the camera. It takes wonderful pics, I can take around 120 pics on a charge, and my 256MB card holds them all. The battery recharges from flat in 1 to 1 1/2 hours - pretty quickly.

Downsides? Redeye is a HUGE issue. I've given up turning on the redeye mode on the flash. Auto AWB doesn't work too well in incadescent light, I've got to manually select "tungsten" to get the best shots. The flash recharges a bit slowly, but I'm usually trying to take pics of my two kids, who are moving around at the speed of heat. Kind of compresses time for me.

 

[ThomasJefferson]

I just took delivery of a Powershot A80 after reading product reviews and user comments on several sites. Unfortunately, I have had it out of the box only a few times in the last week, due to work related issues. So I can not give my own independent review right now.

What are strong points for one digital camera, will be weak points on another. Digital cameras are very finicky. Here are two great sites to make your own informed decision based on your needs/habits in photography.


http://www.dpreview.com/

http://www.dcresource.com/

 

[MoparShaha]

What a coincidence. I had a friend up here in San Francisco this week who also took some shots with an A80. I was very impressed with the photographs. Very nice camera. Given the price difference between the S50 and A80 is only $50, and you get a whole megapixel more with the S50, I'd just go for the S50. I also think it's more of a "pro" camera, something that will be useful as your photographic skills develop.

 

[uziemac]

I got the guys at the Good Guys to throw in an extra battery pack and got the PowerShot S50. Now I am trying to find out if the Compat Flash 2 is better than Compct Flash 1. Thomas thank you for the links, http://www.dcresource.com/, was one I hadnt looked at, and I did look at many. Bubamac check out the link, it has some tips on the redeyes issue, I hope I enjoy the S50 as you do with the S45.

 

[FuzzyBallz]

The idea behind so call instant power up for digicams using AA batteries is actually really dumb. Given digicams are monster drainers, thus rechargeable batteries are recommanded, you'll be throwing money away by buying alkaline AAs. On the other hand, proprietary batteries that come w/ the Canon S series digicams have excellent power/picture ratio. You can get equivalent from ebay fairly cheap ($10) vs. original retail.

Costco is having a sale on S50 for $400 though from 2/9-2/15. Comes w/ 2 batteries, charger, leather case, and 32MB CF card.

Also check steves-digicams.com out for digicam reviews.