25 August 2009

new camera!



i tired of the online comparisons, of trying to decipher the Canon numbering scheme, and instead headed to a local appliance superstore and had a look myself.

though i really, really liked the specs of the 970, not to mention its cool navigation wheel and superior onboard OS, I walked out with the Canon Powershot SD780 IS for a cool (pre-tax) $214.

what sold me was the compactness of it. there was a competing Nikon Coolpix of similar diminutive size, but I'd already gotten the hang of the Canon OS and, frankly, didn't feel like doing a whole 'nother round of research.

the 780 has (only) 3x optical zoom, and its shot lag is a bit more than i could have gotten for $100-150 more, but it really is the right size for me.

hurray! the battery is still charging, so no fun yet.

now i must decipher the world of "SD/SDHC/MMC/MMCplus/HD MMCplus" and decide what to get to replace the $7 1GB SD card i got to go with it.

anyone know which format is fastest? and if it takes longer to write to, say, a 32 gig card than an 8 gig one?

4 comments:

pyker said...

You're joking about the 32 GB card, right? How many pictures are you planning on taking? I use a 4GB card (SDHC) in my dslr and shoot in RAW.

zim said...

i'm not getting a 32 gb card, probably a pair of 4 gb cards, like this class 6 SDHC one.

i was just curious if the write speed increased with the larger sizes.

mns said...

I recently bought this same camera, and went with a handful of 8GB SDHC cards. I figured if they're fast enough for me to write HD video to on the Panasonic camcorder I have, they should be fast enough for a still (well, mainly still) camera.

So far, so good.

Top tip: the camera is not waterproof. I learned this the hard way. On the other hand, letting it sit for a week restored full functionality.

zim said...

good tip, mns.

my pair of 4GB cards arrived today. i ended up with some more pricey Sansdisk ones, in the hopes that they will never, ever fail.

ever.

there. i should be safe now.