Lovely JUBBLY (Canon Digital Ixus 400)

Member Name: thehud

Product:	Canon Digital Ixus 400
Date:	08/07/04 (304 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Decent price and spec

Disadvantages: Not too many

Amazingly, for such a decent digital camera, the Canon Digital Ixus 400 is offered for sale at Amazon at less than £250 according to Google, although when you click the link, the Amazon says disappointingly, ?This item is not in stock or has been discontinued?, although it goes on to offer new and used versions at just £220. I daresay that all that will soon change, however. Kelkoo suggests prices in excess of 300 notes, unfortunately. Best advice is to shop around.

Also known as the Powershot S400, the Ixus is a compact, 4 megapixel digital camera, finished in the obligatory, ultra modern silver, sporting a zoom lens which offers three times optical zoom, although Canon?s own site maintains that the zoom goes right up to 11 times (Hmmm?).

Featuring in the not quite ultra-budget end of the digital camera market, the Ixus is a decent bit of kit with an awful lot going for it, feeling reassuringly chunky, solid and robust, although it is nice and small (see picture at http://www.dcresource.com/reviews/canon/powershot_ s400-review/). Canon boast that the body comes with a Super Hard Cerabrite case, which is substantially more damage resistant than most other cameras.

It also offers the neat touch of being able to shoot short videos with sound, although if you really want such things then you?d be better getting a proper DV camera. Being jack of all trades can often mean you?re master of none, but the Ixus is a decent, value for money digital camera which does its core job really well and offers a lot for the price. In fact, it?s cheap enough for anyone to buy without fear.

The package includes a 32Mb compact flash card to store your photos, although inevitably you will need to get a larger, more spacious memory card for any serious use. Still, that?s a pretty standard issue for all makes so no black marks for
Canon, especially as they also include a battery charger as standard, when many other manufacturers ask you to fork out for this as an optional extra ? Harrumph!!

There?s a decent package of imaging software included, although you will need one of the better packages if you?re serious about playing with your pix, and Adobe Photoshop is the recommended package.

The controls on the back of the camera are a bit fiddly, although when you get to grips with it, there?s a lot you can do with this camera, and plenty of flexibility for the money. I mean 250 quid is absolutely nothing these days, and if you really want a load of bells and whistles then you should be looking at a more expensive range.

But down to the most important thing about any camera ? does it take decent photos? Well, happily, yes it does, bloody good ones which are nice and sharp with good natural colour and a fair amount of flexibility. In the settings to boot.

The Canon Digital Ixus 400 comes with many recommendations in its class, and if you want a really good camera at that sort of cost, then there are few better options around. The whole range of Canon cameras comes out very well, and PC Pro sticks with the make for both premium and value marques on its A-List, although it?s the Canon PowerShot A80 which takes the honours in the value range rather than the Ixus.

However, I?d have very few qualms about recommending this particular camera and certainly for beginners.

JUST FOR ANORAKS - SPECIFICAT IONS: 4-megapixel CCD, 2,272 x 1,704 maximum optical resolution, 3x optical zoom, 3.6x digital zoom, shutter speed 1/2,000th second to 15 seconds, 50-400 ISO sensitivity, +/-2EV exposure compensation, 1.5
in TFT LCD, built-in flash, up to nine-point AF, evaluative, centre-weighted, spot metering, 320 x 240 15fps movie mode, PhotoStitch panorama mode, 2.5fps continuous shooting mode, 32MB Type I CompactFlash, lithium ion rechargeable battery, USB cable, ArcSoft PhotoImpression and VideoImpression software, wrist strap. Dimension: 87 x 57 x 27.8mm (W x D x H). Weight: 222g (including battery/card).

Summary: