Why I buy this one ?
- 4 megapixel sensor creates 2,272 x 1,704 images for photo-quality prints at 11 x 14 and beyond
- 3x optical plus 3.6x digital zoom (for 11x total)
- Twisting LCD for shots at any angle; up to 3-minute videos with sound; 9-point AiAF
- Compatible with Type I CompactFlash memory cards; includes 32 MB card
- Powered by 4 AA batteries (alkalines included, rechargeables recommended); connects to PCs and Macs via USB 1.1

What our customer's say!

"Love this camera, having trouble finding a good replacement", I purchased this camera back in 2004 for $350 from Best Buy. It has served me well through the years, and while it still works I am now in the market for something smaller & newer and am having trouble finding something that I think will live up to its standards.

One of my best friends liked this camera so much she bought a newer almost identical looking version of a Canon in 05, unfortunatly her lens shutter was broken by her kids a few months ago, but she too really liked the camera and will be inheriting mine if I ever can replace it!

Pros:
I love the flip out screen, this is not a feature you can find often on newer cameras, probably bc it requires a larger camera size. Its really handy if you are someone like myself who doesnt like to ask strangers @ Disney World to take my picture.

It runs on AA batteries! New cameras seem to only run on the rechargeable lithium ion batteries (again to make the camera more compact), which normally I would prefer, but I am about to go to Europe for a month and I hear that finding a reliable power converter is difficult, so most likely I will have to take the Canon with me there.

It has a viewfinder!! I hate that new digital cameras that arent SLRs dont have a viewfinder! I may not be a photographer, but I dont wanna just use the screen either!

Easy to use, although there are a LOT of features on it which I have never even tried to mess with.

Cons:
Battery life. This I think is due to the age of the camera, bc I dont recall having such issue with it in the past as I do recently.

Start up time. It always seemed a little slow to start in picture viewing mode but now the camera is older it also is slow in picture taking mode & to view pictures takes almost a minute.

Size, but for the time period when it was made, it was considered small then.

It uses Compact Flash cards not SD. Poor Canon made the wise choice back then to go with CF not SD for it's memory, this has since changed, but it sucks for people stuck with their older cameras to have to pay more money to get outdated technology.

"Did it's job", Over all I think this is a pretty good camera, I got it in the beginning of 2004 and have used it and dropped it many times... it didn't stop working until earlier this year when I dropped it on a concrete floor and it has since refused to turn on... I was very abusive to it, so I expected it to one day just die and it did... over all I took very good photos with it, it was a bit slow after taking the picture, but over all pretty good... top of the line for 2003/2004... now a days I just got a better and faster one for 1/2 the amount I brought this one for...

"Great Camera with Lots of Features", I've had this camera for around four years now. It's been taking excellent photos the entire time. The reason I got this camera is because the PowerShot series was (and maybe still is) the only series of low-mid-range cameras that actually have manual focus abilities. In fact, this camera has a full range of manual settings: ISO, aperture, shutter speed, white balance, and of course focus. All of these work well, and are reasonably easy to access. It also has automatic settings, of course! The only annoying thing about it is the fact that the videos are limited to about 2min 30sec.

The other awesome thing about this camera is a feature that's now VERY hard to find: The rotating LCD screen. You can take photos at any angle. The only cameras that have this now are the Powershot S5 and TX1, which are very large and very expensive, respectively.

It's a shame they don't make a camera that's exactly like this one, but with updated higher resolution...

"A metal encased piece of junk", I bought this camera new in 2006 based on reviews at the time. Since then I have a much more accurate review to submit.

-Metal case is sturdy and looks great. This is true. I dropped the camera and the only thing that broke was the plastic, zoom thingy which snapped like a twig.

-Takes wonderful, clear pictures. Yes, if you can get it to turn on. Mine comes on about 75% of the time. The rest of the time the lens extends and that's it. No display and no pictures. I wrote to Canon because a lot of reviewers have had the same problem and Canon said that they had never heard of that problem. There are now lots of reviews of people that have bought this camera and it wouldn't turn on. Don't miss a photo moment because your stupid camera won't turn on!! I missed a picture of a bear because of it.

Right now my on-screen display won't work. You should be able to choose between view standard settings, view detailed settings or off but mine doesn't work at all which means you don't have any idea of your settings, can't change your settings or use any of the functions.

After about a year the zoom, set, menu, func. disp., and camera/play buttons became very hard to move or push. I have a chunk missing out of my thumbnail right now because I took the camera on a project and had to switch between camera and play a lot.

For the money, you can buy a much more reliable camera.

"Ok for casual use", I got this thinking it would be substitute for SLR. I needed to decrease bulk and weight on trip to Europe. It was successful for that but it lacks in ability to capture special shots. It is ok for occassional user. Operations not much different than SLR. Close up and telephoto add on lens are a joke. You can buy smaller cameras to accomplish decreased size, but go with SLR if want flexibility.

Read this reviews before You buy...

"DON'T BUY - IT FAILED IN LESS THAN 2 YEARS!", We had our PowerShot A80 less than 2 years and the internal hardware failed so the camera could no longer take pictures....despite the fact that we took excellent care of it. Same problem as others have reported -- the image sensor apparently failed because the camera would only take totally BLACK IMAGES. You could only see a black blackground through the LCD viewfinder when the power was on.

We paid several hundred dollars for this camera and it didn't even last 2 years! Canon does NOT stand behind their cameras when they fail after one year so their tech support line told us that we would have to pay the shipping and repair costs which are quite expensive. We will NOT pay Canon another penny in the future when we buy cameras, photo printers, etc.

Save yourself a lot of frustration and expense -- buy another brand of camera!

"Fantastic Camera", I have always brought Canon products because I find them to be good quality products for the money. This camera is no exception it take superb pics (it is just awesome) and it is worth the money paid. Need a great digital camera try canon, you won't be disappointed.

"Doesn't last: not worth the money", I have had this camera for two years. It was a very good camera until recently. It began to intermittantly show only black through the camera and only take black pictures. Now, the camera will not work at all. Canon thinks it is a harware problem and it will be expensive and time consuming to fix. The camera has been well treated and never dropped or exposed to harsh conditions. I expected more from Canon. You can bet that my next camera will not be a Canon!

"Good Pictures but Cheaply Made.", The camera took good pictures in various lighting conditions. Color balance good as reported by various reviews. Shutter lag is annoyingly slow as reported by others. But the biggest complaint is the camera stopped working right before a big vacaction. The camera was only two years old with less than 500 pictures taken. The camera simply stopped taking pictures as if the shutter was stuck in the close position. The camera does seem fragile. I would think twice now before purchasing another Canon.

"the infamous e18 error", this error does indeed exist for those you that still doubt. i purchased this camera in july of last year and just last week, the camera lens stopped retracting and the screen displayed the dreaded "e18" code. approximately 2 months after the one year warranty ran out...so just about right on schedule so that canon won't fix it nor acknowledge the seemingly widespread existence of it. cameras shoudln't break this easily with normal use.