Digicams that I'm considering

I posted a couple of digicams before, but now I've pretty much settled on a list of 3 digital cameras that I'm considering, and I figured that I'd spit out the list and see if you had any feedback to offer. All of the cameras below have roughyl 5 megapixel sensors:

  • Canon Powershot A610 - this is a new camera from Canon, coming out about now. It's got a 4x zoom lens, which is a little longer than the others. It's the most expensive of the models I'm considering, but when you compare costs of memory cards, it might work out roughly the same as the Sony. I'm still waiting for reviews of this, but it sounds like a fairly nice camera.
  • Konica Minolta G530 - My sister has the 4 megapixel variant of this camera, and the results it's produced haven't been bad. It's also got the fastest startup time I've seen for a digital non-SLR (0.8 seconds). Henrys.com, where about half of my lenses have come from, is actually auctioning one of these on eBay at the moment. An auction they did of the same camera the previous week ended at about $250CDN, so this might end up being the cheapest if the auction ends at the same price this time. It's downside, though, is a proprietary battery, and from what I recall it's only good for a couple of hundred shots (the other two cameras both use AA NIHMs).
  • Sony Cybershot DSC-W5 - Very impressive battery life for a digicam, and what should be a good lenses. Also relatively fast startup time for a digital non-SLR, but easily beaten by the G530 in that respect. The downside, as mentioned before, is that it only likes memory sticks.

Comments

Proprietary battery isn't too bad if you have two of them, but being able to use AA batteries is very handy. Since that particular camera has a fast startup time, you can conserve power by having the camera off more often.

The A610 sounds like what I might choose if I were making this decision. For the most part I've had good experience with Canon's products, the only exception being my old Bubblejet printer, but to be fair I've not exactly had great experience with my Deskjet 895Cxi either. With regards to printers, the more expensive printers are usually better quality. Perhaps the same holds true with digital cameras?

And I'm not just saying that because of my pro-Canon bias. Take AF for instance...9 points on the Canon, versus 5 on the Sony. Plus, as far as photo gear goes, I'd trust the Canon name a heck of a lot more that the others.

I'm not crazy...oh, wait, nevermind.