Always reliable - even with kids (Canon Powershot A300)

Member Name: hillcrestsan

Product:	Canon Powershot A300
Date:	06/01/08 (47 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Small, good pictures and robust

Disadvantages: dated now . naff software if you use it .

This is just a quicky review so I apologise in advance for it's brevity and lack of details. Check the product information for the specs.

I have used this camera in school where I teach for quite a while now. It's used by staff to capture those 'special moments' along with a couple of other models.
The camera has proven to be quite a robust and reliable snapper without being to complicated. It gets a lot of usage from lots of people including the kids and has never failed.

The resolution is low at 3.2MP compared to newer camera but it does us fine for snaps around the school. The digital zoom is OK as far as a digital zoom goes but sometimes the deterioration in quality isn't worth the effort. there is no optical zoom.
Picture quality I have always found surprisingly good. When we first got the camera it was really wowy by comparison to the old sony we we're using with a floppy disc in it!! Nowit doesn't look so good by comparison to the 7MP models but to be honest - when do you NEED 7MP. Again, it serves us fine. The video recording in avi format has had it's uses but memory capacity without an upgrade makes it a bit pointless.

The supplied 16MB card is obviously limited if you need to take a lot of snaps so an upgrade there is essential, we use a 256MB card.
The supplied software is a bit clumsy and downloading via USB is a pain and a slow pain at that on school systems. I use a card-reader and ditch the software.

The 1.5in screen is good enough and the menu system is intuitive. Nothing special even on and older model like this.
One reason we liked this model was it's compact size. We we're used to a huge clumsy Sony so it was nice to have something we could slip in a pocket.

Anyway - I'm starting to waffle. I really just wanted to give the model a quick thumbs up due to it's reliability, good pictures and compact design. We paid about £150 for it about 30mths ago - it'll be a lot cheaper now. if it isn't - don't buy it. you can get a lot better for the money now. If it came up on ebay for a tenner I'd still buy it though :-)

Originally posted on Ciao by myself - dhillcrest

Summary: A good emergency snapper if you get it cheap.

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