->Buy
I've been a Canon SLR fan since 1993 when I bought my first EOS Rebel for a trip to the Amazon. Several years ago, I bought a Sony Cybershot(old school generation), entering the digital era, but found that I missed so many shots that I quit taking pictures for a time because the SLR was just too much camera to travel with and the digital was too slow.
I bought this camera to take on a recent trip to Greece, knowing I couldn't miss the photo opps of a lifetime! I LOVE IT! The digital zoom worked great to get details I couldn't even see with the naked eye. I took moving shots from our vehicle and with the image stabilizer got consistent, clear shots I thought I'd missed. The combinations of manual mode, auto mode, and sceen selection mode gave me lots of options to get everything from macros on cool plants to stitching together a fabulous sunset horizon over the Aegean Sea.
Six megapixels and the large viewing screen made reviewing details easy and while I haven't used the editing software yet, I feel certain that I'll get great cropped images, too.
I experienced only one challenge with this camera that I'd say is a negative attribute. It's small size makes it a little difficult to hold securely. It's sleek metal design is attractive, but it slipped out of my hands several times, and I've got relatively small hands. I learned to slip the wrist strap on immediately after it hitting the ground twice, thankfully with nothing more than a small dent on a corner. So, the "4" rating is strictly based on the ergonomics. Otherwise, with the quality shots produced and the great features on this camera, I'd give it a solid "5."
->Comparison
Digital point-and-shoot cameras have come a long way recently. I'm not a photography expert by any means, but this camera works suprisingly well for me.
Especially nice IMO is the manual mode. I recently too a huge number of pictures in the forest, where flash is pretty useless but light levels are too low for most point and shoots... and the image stabilization plus the abilty to set the ISO and color balance by hand made a huge difference.
However, the "image stabilization" isn't really *that* good. It makes all the difference for some low-light no-flash shots which would have otherwise been impossible, but isn't enough for many more shots I wish I could have gotten. This is the first point-and-shoot I've had where I really wanted a tripod! Not because the camera is bad, but because it is actually good enough to get the shots / quality where a tripod would make a difference (and most point-and-shoots, at least older ones, would be hopeless). BTW: There is a 2 sec delay mode which is obviously intended to make up for the lack of remote.
->Deal
I have been a Canon fan for quite some time. My previous camera was the S400 and I upgraded to the SD700 six months ago. The SD700 has been wonderful. The pictures are outstanding and the IS feature is worth it.
In addition to the still picture quality, the movie quality was unexpectedly powerful. The sound and picture was very impressive (especially compared to my previous S400).
I recently had someone accidentally dropped the camera which did not have much physical damage on the outside, but significantly damaged the camera overall. The camera didn't open and close and the lens was blurry. I sent it in to Canon and shockingly they did not charge for the repair and now it is as good as new! The repair took approximately two business days from the time they received it and they sent it back FedEx.
->Purchase
I love this camera. It takes great pictures and it's easy to use. BUT, when you're in low lighting and need the flash, it can use up batteries in 15-20 pictures. During a day, I've used three sets of batteries, so be sure to take batteries out when you finish for the day and to bring an extra set with you at all times. Make that two extra sets.
->Sale
I wanted this to replace a 3-year-old Minolta, I needed it very small and I wanted good picture quality. I was particularly frustrated by the very slow shutter speed on the previous camera. This one is great for my use, takes perfect pictures of traveling and babies, the shutter speed is very fast -- feels almost instantaneous -- and the picture quality is excellent.
In addition, I dropped this on the floor from chest high and the shutter mechanics broke. Canon gave me good repair services, it took about a week, and cost $147.
->Best Price
This is a very nice camera! Easily pocketable, and produces well exposed, sharp results. My other camera is a Konica-Minolta Maxxum 5D (also 6MP)with Tamron 28-300mm lens. This combination produces sharper results (straight out of the camera) than does the SD700, but the latter is very acceptable. I notice this on-screen (22" widescreen LCD). On PhotoDeluxe, I am not sure I can see a difference.
I particularly like the display where the option chosen shows up as a larger size icon. With this (for example), I can choose flash on or flash off without having to put on my glasses.
->Buy
Get this camera while you can! It's been out long enough that Canon is replacing it in the product line with other models that may not be significantly better.
The image stabilization really works. You can do available light photography most of the time because of the IS and the relatively fast lens. Avoiding the built-in flash makes for better photos most of the time.
I got it as a birthday present for my wife and she's loved it in the two trips she's taken since.
->Deal
I have had my Canon for a few months now. The picture clarity is amazing. I really like the digital macro for close ups. The camera also captures great video clips. I was impressed the quickness of the shutter speed/picture lag. I have a SanDisk Ultra 1MB and it can rap off pictures pretty quick with great results. I did buy an after market screen protector for mine.
->Deals
The picture quality is bright with colors. What I like the most is the Image Stabilizer where it allows me to zoom in and still take clear pictures.
Lightweight.
I took it with me on my recent trip to Fossil's Springs, Strawberry in AZ. All the picures I took turned out great!!.
Overall, I like it. Highly recommend it.
->Affordable
We bought this camera after extensive research and it's perfecrt for our needs which included pocket-size, fast successive picture taking, ease of use and double view finders. Highly recommend it!!
->Buy
Canon PowerShot SD700 IS 6MP Digital Elph Camera with 4x Image Stabilized ZoomThis camera is easy to use and kid friendly. It takes great pictures. It takes a little bit of time to process to be able to take the next picture. Otherwise it has great features and the software that comes with it makes it even more fun to use. I recommend this camera to anyone who wants a small digital camera that will fit in your pocket and has many features that make it easy to use.
->Sale
Our previous digital camera was approaching 5 years old and its pictures were not what they used to be. So I picked this on because of reviews i read on CNET and elsewhere, because it is small enough to fit in a pocket, image stabilization, and 4x zoom. So far we are not disappointed. It has many pictuer modes that we don't use, but pictures are good.
->Buy
I did a lot of on-line research and went to stores to get a "hands on" look before I decided to buy the Canon. It takes wonderful pictures and it is easy to use. It has just the right amount of extra features for a point and shoot. It has a good, solid, feel and is easily transported. If you want more, a digital SLR or a regular film SLR is the way to go.
->Prices
This was a well researched late Christmas gift, as a replacement for a digital camera, whose flash had ceased flashing.
It was a big hit. My daughter and son-in-law love to take movies with it. We have movies of my 11 month old granddaughter's virtually first steps, and a series of seven steps. They filled the two gig memory card in six days. They love it because it is so small and "can't take a bad picture."
It does have some of the latency typical of digital cameras, which is an irritant.
->Cheap
I love this camera! I noticed that many of my photos with my old camera were coming out blurry and we were taking the kids to Disney - so I HAD to have a camera to capture the memories clearly! I had a few requirements #1 being an image stabilization feature. I also wanted a camera that used a lithium rechargeable battery, could take multiple pictures in succession (my old camera had about a 10-15 sec. wait time between snapping photos - very frustrating), lcd screen and was fairly compact. I have previously owned two different Kodak digitals that use SD cards and had recently gotten a 1Gig card, so I was in the market for something that also used SD so I wouldn't have to buy new memory cards/sticks. I did some research, looked at many different manufacturers and narrowed it down to a few choices. I called Cannon to inquire about some other models to find that they didn't have the true image stabilizer feature that I wanted, and the rep was VERY helpful. Armed with the info she shared and my research I decided upon the Canon SD700. I took over 400 pictures on our vacation and the quality of the photos is terrific! The image stabilization feature is awesome - in pictures where my kids were running the photos are crystal clear!! I'm a point & shoot person, so there are some extra features on this gem that I haven't mastered yet, but I haven't really spent tons of time with the instruction manual - once I take the time to do that, I'm sure I will be better able to utilize all the extras. Oh- almost forgot - this camera is so compact it fits into your pocket! I would definitely recommend this camera!! This is my first time writing a review - so I hope I included enough info to be helpful to you!
->Buy
I haven't really used it too much yet but it seems extremely impressive. I have a Canon G3 and paid $600, which is a great camera and I bought it about four years ago and it was great but it takes blurry images.
Canon SD700 takes really nice images. My husband took a photo of me as I was turning around. It took a crisp image. The G3 would have blurred. Also if you have shaky hands it will work well and takes good pictures. It has an image stabilizer in the lens.
It has even more options than I expected. I do agree that the weel is a bit flimsy, but I mostly use the manual mode, havn't tried the video yet, waiting to get a higher sd card. Just so you know, the camera comes with a 16mb sd card, which is just enough for about 5-6 high quality images. You do need at least a 1gb card to enjoy the camera.
Did I mention it is tiny. A bit bigger than an sd450 but still really small. The body seems metal, not as plasticky as most small cameras are. Looks very durable.
I read a lot of reviews and out of the sd series, Canon Powershot sd700 is the best out there in the market for crisp images. If you need video, just get a nice video camera.
It also has a digital macro mode which is very useful for take a lot of close ups. Sometimes the optical macro mode just won't do it.
->Sale
After several weeks of research, trying to figure out what camera would give me the most bang for my buck, I settled on the Canon Powershot SD700. I am so glad I did. Other reviewers have accurately assessed the numerous functions and features of the Canon SD700, so I would just like to say that this little camera, though pricey, is worth every penny. My husband and I often take it with us on our mountain and desert hikes, and the shots we take are so clear it is almost better than being there. Inside shots are equally nice. The only downside to this camera is that it does not come with a carrying case or a large digital memory card. So, when you buy, be sure to go to your local Wal-mart or Target to purchase a $10 solid carrying case and look for deals on memory cards like this one: SanDisk SDSDH-2048-901 2 GB Ultra II Secure Digital Memory Card (Retail Package).
Highly recommended!
->Cheap
I typically shoot with professional level SLRs. I wanted something small for vacations and just to carry around. This little thing is great! Great images. More control than most cameras this size.
Only 4 stars because it could be a tad bit more on the customizable side. Id like to see an apreture priority or hey... full manual would be nice.
But, this is not the audience Canon was trying to target.
Great lil' camera!!
->Compare
I took this camera to Paris the end of April '07 after only having the camera a couple of weeks. I have some of the best pictures I have ever taken on a vacation! Clear, crisp, close up or far away, they are great. I can't say I was always positioned correctly - etc., but the Image Stabilization (IS) was good to use with the zoom. I have the gargoyles on the top of Notre Dame clearly, using the zoom from the sidewalk. I didn't have to climb endless stairs up the tower. Wonderful. I really enjoyed the modes, I took lots of pics on landscape and they are really great - the gardens of Versailles - beautifully captured. Only draw back is how easily it scratches. I bought a great case for it locally for less than $10.00 but often just kept the camera handy. It came home scratched - but I have great photo/memories forever. I highly recommend this camera. Not the 800, not the 1000 go with the 700 it has better lenses and the image stabilization for zoom clarity. Enjoy!
->Prices
Product is good even though the delivery was late bcoz of unavailability of stock.
->Lowest Price
Fast startup, easy to use and good price for features. Highly recommend over many other cameras.
->Discount
Even though this camera had mostly excellent reviews, I remained skeptical about its quality. However, after a few months of fooling around with it, it has surpassd my expectations. It's small, yet sturdy, the picture quality is fantastic, maybe a little too good. The zoom feature enables you to see in perfect quality every little hair folicle, nose hair or blemish in high detail, so watch out for that :) I love the brand Canon, and I love this camera, not one 'con' so far to report on. Well worth the money spent!
->Buy Today
I've really come to love photography but don't want to spend thousands on a big souped-up camera. This one is really perfect: fast loading, lightweight, big screeen with viewfinder, easy review & picture setting capabilities and looks very cool. My only complaint is that major areas of sunlight (big windows, etc) tend to wash out to a big white square rather than capturing whats outside the window (trees, sky,etc.) but that could be my ameteaur photog skills getting in the way. Anyway, this is a great camera, really fun to use.
->Best Price
Terrific -- light, lots of features. Downside is it takes a while to learn all the bells and whistles, but worth it. Low-light stabilization (or long telephoto) worth the price
->Deals
I bought the SD700 for by less-than-tech-savvy parents, and they absolutely love it! It is a very user-friendly camera with buttons and functions set up logically. The pictures are simply perfect. I have a 5mp Kodak that I thought took great pictures, but there is no comparison - these are amazing. The LCD is one of the best out there - pictures and video files look like they are in HD. Long battery life and cool photo editing software. It doesn't come with a case, but I found a great little padded case on Amazon that fits the SD700 nicely for a great price (Bag, D-pods 10, Black, by LowePro) - weird name, I know, just copy and paste in the search box. The only drawbacks are that the camera won't tell you how many pictures you have left to shoot (my Kodak tells me how many more photos my memory card will hold) only the amount of space left on card, and there is no external AC adapter that pugs directly into the camera, so you have to take to battery out and put it in its charger to charge it. Those are the only downsides, but nothing that should deter anyone away from buying this camera. Great price and better than the SD1000, which has had a drastic price cut shortly after it was released, which usually means bad sales.
->Deals
This tiny camera is excellent. The image quality is awesome, the battery lasts forever, the features are great, the auto-mode is really useful.
The only lack is the ISO level. You can't beat the ISO level using of the Fujis, but it's OK for me. Besides, the video files take too much space in memory, so it is impossible to share a video on the internet or by e-mail.
Whatever, I recommend this camera a lot!
->Affordable
We bought this camera to replace/upgrade our 3.2MP Olympus Stylus. However, we have been extremely dissapointed with the qaulity of the pictures vs. the older camera. One of our biggest frustrations is the amount of Red Eye in all of our pictures taken since we bought this camera. We use the "Red Eye Reduction" setting but this doesn't really seem to help. The Olympus simply took better pictures despite being a lower MP camera.
We are now going back to Olympus. Not only was this camera a waste of money but, more importantly, we wasted those precious moments since we bought this that we did not capture with a better camera. We have shared our frustrations with others and were surprised to learn that many others have had similar complaints (especially with the amount of Red Eye in Canon cameras).
->Buy
I chose this model for it's shutter speed and have not been disappointed. It is fast, the resolution and sharpness are good and the image stabilization feature is very handy. I take many snaps of kids and pets and other candid shots and I have been very happy.
->Prices
This is the camera I wanted last year for Christmas. Unfortunately, the SD700 I received from Amazon had a defective image sensor resulting in a blue spot on every photo. I returned it for an exchange, but Amazon stopped carrying it for awhile, so I tried out the Pentax A20. That camera took very grainy indoor photos and I returned it in disappointment but then saw Amazon carried this camera again and I re-ordered it. I was not disappointed the second time around.
The camera takes fantastic photos and the indoor shots that were grainy on the Pentax came out clean on the Casio. I much prefer a lower mega pixel camera that can take clean photos at the highest resolution than a higher mega pixel camera that has noise at its highest setting.
I took the camera to the Tulip festival and took lots of terrific photos. The camera did a great job on close ups and distance shots and this camera is really good at taking quick photos that are not blurry.
I only wished I had this camera for use earlier.
Although not part of this review, I thought I would like to mention that Amazon went out of their way to get this camera to me in time for the Tulip festival including getting a last minute change to their shipping department to change the address and delivery method. I ordered 2-day shipping Wednesday night but changed the method and address Thursday morning, after Amazon started the fulfillment process. The Amazon representative was able to cancel the fulfillment at the last moment and re-order it with the updated information. Amazon got me the camera Friday at the correct address. Although not part of the review, I thought I should give Amazon credit where credit is due.
->Buy
Very easy to use, even manual controls. Barely needed to look at the manual.
Great quality images.
->
The camera works great. It's much faster than previous cameras I owned, which is very important for me so that I can take pictures of my kids when they are playing. I can also shoot high-res videos (although the camera picks up a lot of background noise).
The only significant problem is that the LCD in the camera had a faulty pixel when I received it. I could have returned it for a replacement, but it was probably not worth the trouble. My rating would have been 5 stars if the LCD were perfect.
Overall, I'm quite happy with it.
->Deals
If your like me and don't like a complicated camera, this one is for you. I decided that when I take pictures, I want 3 things: speed, image stabilization, and a cute camera. This camera comes on quickly and it is ready to go. I have yet to create a blurry pictue with it, even when I had other people using it who were not familiar with it. Also, with such a large screen on it, you can really truly preveiw the pictures your taking. The cute factor is high, as well. I wanted a tiny camera that is easy to take everywhere. This fits in my back pocket, and I love that. No more big bulky camera to drag around on vacations. It even has different sound options for different camera actions. If you want it to howl like a wolf on start-up, you can. The picture look great, but thats compared to my 3.2MP camera I used to have. Honestly, unless your a professional photographer, you are never going to use all the bells and whistles of the more expensive cameras. I had a hard time picking out a camera, and I couldn't decide between this one and the other canon's with more megapixels. I choose this one because it felt so much more solid in my hand, and I wasn't planning on making any poster sized prints. My 4x6 prints look great without 10MP.
->Comparison
Great digital camera. I have bought quite a few and did like the picture quality from my previous cameras (Kodak & Fugi). These pictures are clear and crisp. Great features and easy to use. The IS is a huge plus! Would highly recommend to all looking for a small digital camera.
->Prices
After 4 months, my camera suddenly stopped transmiting videos to the computer. Whan I try it, the camera locks up and the lamp remains blinking forever. I had to buy an USB SD Card Reader (like a pen drive) to continue making videos and moving it to the computer. Another problems: the flah range is too short and it doesn't have a "battery remaining" indicator (it's incredible!).
Despite of that problems, that camera has an excellent picture quality (especially at night or indoors), considering this is an amateur camera.
->Compare
..and keeping this little wonder with me at all times. What a benefit to have such a great camera around when you want it. So instant and portable, I take ten times as many shots now, because it's not a project dragging out the equipment.
Love it!
Jim Cooper
->Discount
This is really a great camera! All the photos I have taken are very nice-looking. And IS works great as well; I even tried shaking the camera explicitly when taking a picture and it was still good especially compared to my old camera (with no IS).
->Compare
This camera has everything I wanted. I was afraid to buy something that I had not actually seen and I do not know anyone that actually owns one. I went by the reviews and they are right - it is a great camera and well worth the cost. Canon is the way to go. I had looked at other less expensive compact cameras but the Canon quality of this one outshines other brands.
It is very small and compact, easy to use, takes great pictures, red eye is not a problem, (even in my animals pictures) and it takes great pictures in dark or low light. It is easy to download the pictures to my PC. I highly recommend this camera for everyday use.
->Comparison
It doesn't take the place of a digital SLR, but it sure comes through in spades for filling in the gaps requiring someting fast and reliable with quality results, and the video is astounding for something so small! With image stabliization included it's a quality product at the price.
The one drawback I found was a noisy image when using the digital zoom. The optical zoom, however, is easy to use and flawless.
->Buy
After using it for 20 days I feel this camera is worth buying.
1)Starting with, I must say picture quality is very nice. I took few snaps at postcard size and they were very clear.
2) Image Stabilizer is one of the best feature. With my older camera many snaps got ruined due to lack of IS.
3) I dont find view finder a very lucrative option, instead it wud have been nice if it had 3'0 inch LCD.
4) Zoom is also one of the problem with these small cameras. Though it has 4x zoom( much better than 3x which u can notice very easily) still i feel sometimes u miss the capabilities of higher zoom.
->Lowest Price
This is a great little camera. If you are looking for a small camera that you can fit in your pocket this is it! It starts up super fast and is ready to shoot in less than 2 seconds. The battery lasts a long time and it even has an "AUTO" mode so you can let the camera do the thinking. You can spend much more on an SLR camera (they are the big cameras you see around peoples necks) and they are better, or so the people who have forked over the cash for one say but do you really want to walk around looking like a Japanese tourist? If you want a camera that is not a nuisance to carry that takes super good pictures this is it. Did I mention it takes video with sound to boot!
P.S. For about $30 more I would recommend you get an extra battery, a leather case and a 1Giga bite SD memory card. You can find this on that big auction site (you know the one).
->Buy
A powerful tinny camera. X4 optical zoom is great. Especially love the Digital Macro mode, in which I can get almost ZERO distance from lens to subject and get it easily focused. I got great Macro shots of tinny components on a printed circuit board, which is normally done by a Photo Microscope costs 60+ times more than this little guy.
->Compare
Easy to use and doesn't take too long to get the hang of all the various settings. I would highly recommend.
->Deals
This is a fantastic camera for the money (my third Canon Powershot digital camera). It takes great pictures, and the Image Stabilization works very well. We also love the 3" LCD. It's a great value.
->Comparison
I bought this camera because of its small size and the excellent reviews it had already received. It performed very well and best of all it is simple to use. The screen is bright and easy to see in all the outdoor conditions I encountered. It starts up quickly and there is little delay. The picture quality is good.
->Sale
It does everything you want it to, without delay in shutter speed and with fabulous quality.
I love it!
->Deal
This camera is exceptionally good value for the price and the feature set.Though a litlle low on the memory front as it comes packed with only a 16 mb it was not much of a problem for me as I already had a 1GB memory card.With Optical Zooms upto 4x the pictures came out absolutely fine and the Image Stabilization feature was just awesome.Overall a must buy product
->Compare
Bought the camera last October and have been happy with it in every way. When I got the camera, I bought a hard plastic cover to put over the LCD for protection (I'm a little obsessive with my gadgets in this way...I treat them very very well). A couple weeks ago, I took it out of its case (where it had been sitting on my desk for a few weeks), and discovered a crack had formed in the LCD screen UNDER THE PROTECTIVE COVER. The crack appeared to radiate from the optical viewfinder. I sent the camera in, and predictably, they would not cover the repair under the warranty. The kept telling me that I had to have applied pressure to the screen for this to happen. And they ignored the fact that I had a 1/8" plexiglass barrier on that screen. I paid for the repair because it was cheaper than buying a new camera, but after being a loyal canon customer for many years (this was my 4th Powershot), they will no longer have my business. The 1-star is indicative of Canon's customer service.
->Comparison
I am using this camera since 4 weeks now. Its impressive, Its sleak, stylish and excellent camera !
Go and head.. if you are looking for a normal point and shoot... just buy this.
:-) Happy photography.
Shan
->Best Price
After looking up every site possible for reviews I found this Canon SD700 with good reviews on Amazon. I love to buy through Amazon because it is always reliable and comes on time, etc. Anyway, I really wanted to LOVE this camera, but it just didn't work for me. I've owned several different digitals...an early Sony Mavica that used floppy's and took fabulous shots and a Coolpix 2100 that was also great, but I wanted to upgrade to something with a better battery life (AA's became expensive after vacation!) and I wanted a bigger screen. My husband insisted on a viewfinder although he rarely takes any pictures. Maybe this 700 was too much for me or maybe it was defective???? My pictures were always blurry and since I like to take closeups of flowers, it just didn't work! The image stabilization must not have helped one bit. Otherwise, I think Canon makes a great camera and I ended up sending this one back and buying a Canon SD630. It works great for me and although it doesn't have the viewfinder my husband wanted, I LOVE it. Maybe it's just simpler for a simple person like myself. You know how sometimes things that work great for others just doesn't do it for you....well, this Canon 700is just wasn't for me. I do, however, wonder why it is hard to find this camera? Very few places sell it...in fact, I couldn't find it anywhere in the Nashville area which is why I ordered it online??? I'm real happy with my SD630...Canon makes a good camera and I love this one.
->Deals
I am totally amazed at this camera's capabilities!!! The image stabilization is fantastic and the screen quality is unsurpassed. I love it.
->Comparison
I love this camera. It's the best digital camera I ever had. Canon products are the best. I would recommend this product to anyone.
->Deal
I am an experienced amateur photographer. My primary camera is a Canon Digital Rebel XT DSLR. I needed for a compact camera to use when the DSLR was too big. My criteria for choosing the SD700 where:
1) Compact
2) Zoom to at least 135mm (35mm equivalent)
3) Image stabilization (I have shakey hands!)
4) Optical viewfinder
5) Image quality sufficient for 11x14 prints
After spending way too much time looking at online reviews of compact cameras, I choose the Canon SD700.
I was initially nervous choosing a year-old model, but the specs and price suited me more than SD800 or other manufacturer's newer models. I don't care about face detection or other features on the newer cameras. If you do, or if you like to shoot wide angle, you might want to consider the SD800 instead of this camera.
I have had my SD700 just a few days but I love it! It is extremely easy to learn to use, fits in my shirt pocket, takes great pics, feels real solid, and it is beautiful to look at.
My only (minor) complaint is that AiAF (automatic autofocus selection) doesn't work very well; it often selects the wrong part of the image to focus on. I leave this feature turned off, and just use the central focus sensor.
->Best Price
I'm quite happy with the purchase (except for Amazon's slow super saver shipping). The camera is absolutely beautiful, even though it seems to scratch easily even though I usu take care of my things well. The pictures turn out very well and the manual/night snapshot modes help take pictures at night/indoor. The night snapshot gets pretty noisy but I guess still within acceptable quality limit, I keep my pic in the computer anyway, it's not like I'm gonna blow it up poster-size. For an amateur photographer, it's a good buy.
->Compare
Although the Elph SD700IS fits into a shirt pocket, the 8x10" prints are are sharp from corner to corner. With the help of the Photoshop, sharp 24x30" prints can be made.The distortion is insignificant at the short and medium zoom range but is noticeable at the long zoom end. The lens is better than some of the SLR lenses I have tested. Exposure is very accurate in most cases and the color is good. The optical viewfinder, although not very accurate, is very useful when the LCD screen cannot be seen in bright light. I would not buy a camera without a viewfinder.
The accuracy of the viewfinder can be established by comparing the area shown by the viewfinder to that on the LCD screen.
The power on/off button is too small and difficult to find.
The flash is weak, as in many other compacts. An accessory flash is available but incompatible with the idea of having a compact shirt pocket camera.
Overall, this is an amazing little camera useful for a pro or an advanced amateur as a constant companion to supplement the heavy gear left home.
->Buy
I am a rookie when it comes to picture taking but I bought this camera after my brother told me how great it was. I love it. The pictures are great. It is user friendly... very easy. The image stabilization feature has me taking perfect pics. The battery is long lasting and it takes great pictures in low light without a flash. I love it. I have become a shutter bug.
->Prices
I bought this camera for my wife in September '06 and so far it works great. There are so many cool features and we haven't mastered even 10% of them. The zoom is great especially the fact that you have the extra digital zoom when the optical zoom is maxed out. Overall, it is a good little camera!
->Price
This camera takes clear pictures and is small enough to fit in a change purse. Great for making sure you don't miss that unexpected shot.
->Affordable
This little camera takes some really great day shots. I've had a little trouble with night shots being too dark. Definitely a good buy, very easy to use, and a little better zoom compared to others in the same price range.
->Compare
A great everyday camera. It does the job and then some. I am sure in 2 or 3 years there will be better for the price but for now its a great pick up. Great pictures and fun to use. Easy to carry and fast to set up. will give you years of enjoyment. I think it gives you alot for the money. Basically it gives you alot of usable features. especially when you want to have the person in color but the background in Black and white. At times thats a cool shot.
->Deals
I have found that Cannon's cameras are very reliable and can take a beating. I dropped my elph 320 many times and it never skipped a beat. I love the image stablizer on this camera, it really helps when you are using the zoom. For anyone that is looking for a point and shoot that takes really clear pictures this is the camera for you. I found a great deal on the camera by using ShopLocal.
->Price
Though a tad larger than the 600, the image stabilization and extra optical zoom easily justify the higher cost. Slips into your pcoket, whether jeans or jacket. Had it not been so portable, I would not have taken nearly as many photos during my vacations. Overall photo quality was good, and the night option in scenic mode captures dark images very well. Daytime shots seem a bit darker than my old Oly C4000, but sharper nonetheless. Great camera, and the price coudn't be better for something of such high quality and convenience.
->Price
If I wouldn't also own a Canon PowerShot S3, I would think this camera is perfect. The S3 has 12x zoom and terrific video sound. This SD700 just doesn't zoom or sound as good as the S3, BUT it's a lot less money and so much handier! When I offended Art Garfunkel on stage with the S3 flash, I knew I had to get a less powerful model. The SD700 fits the bill!
->Prices
Quick shutter response, excellent picture quality, nice screen.
Image stabilization really makes a difference. I can take pictures by candlelight (and even though I wouldn't print them higher than 4x6) they are something I could look at.
Battery life so far has been good. I moved from an Olympus 5060 prosumer camera and there is nothing I'm not happier with using this camera. Highly recommended
->Best Price
The SD700 IS is a very nice size and weight small camera for those not interested in the smallest ultra compact on the market. Feature packed, easy to use, and portability are its strengths. I have large hands and am farsighted, which is not a good combination when looking at small electronics. I decided to try this camera because of reviews saying that it is small but bigger than the other Elph's.
Having 35-140 lens along with Image Stabilizer for the going price is terrific! Really love the LCD, it's bright and readable. Used without glasses and could see what I was doing, mostly. Being old school, having an optical viewfinder, is a requirement. Comes in handy to save battery life, use when it's too bright or when in a place that it would be impolite to have the LCD on.
IS is a nice feature that is helpful in low light. You will see a difference with less camera shake which cause blurry pics. If you are not going to fiddle faddle around with the camera the IS will help, not always, but in certain situations. Just keep it on all the time in shoot only mode. Many professional reviews are all positive about this model.
Great battery life! I have taken 650+ shots using the LCD mostly, some flash, playing with the menus and the battery still has a charge! I have charged the battery a couple of times and it seems to go on forever, surprised about how long this small battery maintains the charge.
Nice built in feature that is helpful; My colors- can review shots and compare your pic with all the built in color options like Vivid, Neutral, Sepia, etc. If another one looks better than choose instead.
The wrist strap is adjustable, able to tighten on my wrist. Not using a wrist or neck strap is asking for trouble. Purchased the Canon accessory pack with extra battery, carrying case and neck strap. I like the fact that the straps are easy to take off. Wanted different straps because when wearing a shirt with chest pocket the neck strap will come in handy, otherwise will carry in pants pocket with wrist strap.
I would recommend this camera to anyone!
->Price
This camera is easy to use and gives excellent results. The beginner can choose "Auto" and make good photos without any effort. The more advanced
shooter will find enough functions to enable him/her to fully utilize its
capabilities using "Manual". Only slow shutter speeds are shown,to warn of camera shake but the image stabilizer works very well to ease that risk. It's a pleasure to use,very small and pocketable. The case and a spare battery plus a 1GB SD card makes the SD700IS a fine photographic tool that's fun to have at hand.
->Comparison
This was my daughter's Christmas present. It doesn't leave her hands. She takes it with her everywhere. It takes great pictures.
->Lowest Price
I take this camera everywhere with me! I've been using it for a couple of months now, and find it has a lot of improvements over my former Sony.
For the price, you get many features that are extremely useful in macro, and regular shooting. The night filter works great! The flash is powerful, and the color indoors and out is great.
I'm very happy with this camera. Although I'm not a professional, I love taking pictures and the accuracy of my pictures has greatly improved with the stabilizer.
A great camera for the person who needs lots of features with good results.
Jo
->Buy Now
After trying TWO separate SD700's, I am returning them both. The SD700 has a serious micrphone problem: the overall volume is extremely low, and there is a pronounced hissing noise that dominates the video. This happens at all settings. I have owned other Canon digitals, both large and small and have not had this problem. The primary reason I bought this model was for the image stabilizer, which I found does not really make enough difference to be worth the price. My "old" Powershot SD200 takes better photos and video. FYI, I emailed Canon's service/repair/warranty department about this issue over a month ago, just to see if there was anything that could be done about the video problem and they ignored me. Fortunately I am not dependent on them for help and can just return my camera to the place I bought it. Rethinking my brand loyalty...
->Lowest Price
I bought this camera formy wife for her birthday because she complained about the difficulty using my Cannon S2IS (great camera also but thats for another review) This camera is so simple to use and so easy to cary around I found I was using this camera instead of my own camera. I found the battery life is very good although from past experience i would recomend a spare battery. you never know when the battery is going to run out. The veiw screen is nice and large and easy to see even in high light conditions and the photos are increadable.The image stabilization works great.The photo quality if fantastic. We take an average of 100 photos a month and love this camera. Thats just my opinon my wifes opinion is she loves it too.
->Wholesale
Great shots. Great size. Especially great shots in low light. Does everything promised.
->Deal
# I've had one for 6 months, and I am thoroughly pleased with it. I get very good quality shots both in normal and macro mode; the image stabilization is really helpful. I believe the best evidence is simply to look at the photos in my Flickr stream ([...]), and judge for yourself if what I am saying is true.
# There are tons of manual controls which you can use, and I do use them, mostly for exposure and flash control, as well as panning assistance.
# Low light pictures are quite good, although at higher ISO values you get a lot of graininess. The flash is very good also.
# The only really annoying issue is that it doesn't have an indicator of you battery status, which only shows when the battery is just about dead.
# If you are the type that goes out and takes a lot of pictures, like me, I would strongly advise you to get an extra battery.
->Compare
We chose this camera because it appeared from reviews to be one of the best compact digital cameras, and the price is reasonable for the quality. The LCD display is huge and the menus/settings are generally intuitive and useful. It's a great size and has lots of useful features (e.g. it goes to sleep if you haven't used it in awhile to save power). Not thrilled with the red eye reduction, but I think you'd need to go to a pretty high end camera to fully take care of this. Like most cameras, the card it comes with is really small so you'll need to buy additional memory to take pictures that are large enough to print well. Overall we are thrilled and highly recommend it.
->Purchase
Good one for a good price! :)
Completetly satisfied till date.
->Comparison
This is my first digital camera and I read a lot of reviews before decided on this one. As in other reviews, my only complaint is the lack of notification that the battery charge is low. I have been very pleased with it's performance.
->Lowest Price
I've had this camera for about three months now. So far, I am happy with it. It takes sharp pictures, and the menu functions are easy to use. For under $300, its a great buy. The best part is the stabilization feature. It captures sharp pictures even while you are moving, day or night. Friendly-user menu.
->Prices
canon did it again, awesome little camera, excellent pics and good features (IS, auto image rotation for viewing mode, color accent...). Battery lasts really long at least as compared to my sony dscw7 which was stolen recently. Probably the best advantage over the sony is the fact that I can now take pics of my toddler without having the flash go off 3 times before the pic is taken thus ruining everything...
->Deal
This camera compares well with my older digital camera, a 4MP Olympus C4040. The small size, of course, is great; the LCD viewer is excellent; and the color rendition of the photos is very good. There is not much "color fringing" on outdoor shots, a big problem with the Olympus. It also takes much higher-res movies than I've seen in this type of camera, which was a very pleasant surprise.
On the negative side, many pictures, especially in low-light situations, come out fuzzy; I find that I must discard quite a few for this reason. The camera is certainly capable of taking sharp pictures, but the lighting needs to be better than what is needed for my Olympus. Auto-focusing is fussy and a little hard to optimize. The flash seems limited in range to 6-8 ft. Finally, I have yet to see significant help from the image stabilization feature.
The books (basic and advanced) are quite helpful in decoding the somewhat-complex user interface, though the camera can be immediately used to take basic photos with little reading if desired. I especially wish the camera had a simple manual interface so that focus, aperture and shutter speed settings could be simply dialed in when desired.
Overall the camera is a good value and I'm sure we will enjoy using it for a long time.
->Purchase
I had a nice 5 mb camera with a 10X optical zoom that was just a little too big to fit in my pocket. I borrowed an SD700 IS from my daughter to go on a three week vacation. I thought it was perfect. The Image Stability system let me take nighttime skyline, low light and telephoto pictures with no blurring. It is so small I kept the camera in my pocket the whole time and took hundreds of pictures. Virtually all of them came out great. It does not have aperature or shutter priority manual modes but I didn't miss them at all. The automatic and special scene modes did everything perfectly. Plus the shutter is fast. There is no significant delay to take the picture after the button is pressed. I never had to charge the battery the whole time I was away. I loved this camera so much I bought one as soon as I got home. It is one great camera.
->Compare
I had waited and compared many digital cameras over the last year or so and found this one to be the best value for the cost. It has several easy to use features and looks really nice and sleek. I am able to carry in my purse in my cell phone pocket because of it's size and the large LCD screen is always noticeable and gets lots of compliments. The pictures are clear and very easy to download to the computer. The leather case although it will cost you about $20 on amazon is also a very worthwhile investment for such a nice camera.
->Buy
im no expert when it comes to cameras but i could tell this one was worth the money. esp because my pictures tend to come out blurry and the stabilized zoom on the camera prevents it. 2 things that could be considered "cons" are the smaller lcd screen compared to the canon 630 and weight of the camera. its not as light as the canon 630/canon 600. but, all in all, a great camera worth its price :)
->Best Price
This is an great camera that has all the features that you would want in a small compact camera. A big plus is that it has both the lcd screen and a viewfinder. The image stabilization works well and picture quality is excellant.
->Price
I did a bit of research before choosing this camera and I must say that the recipient(it was a gift) is extremely pleased with its features and the multitude of options as well as it's quality.
->Compare
Purchased this little item, and I mean little, for the wife. I wanted something she could get the hang of immediately and with a small learning curve. When I received the camera I could hardly believe how compact it was. After turning it on and using it for a couple of shots it was clear to see this was an excellent camera. I even considered keeping it for myself but I did turn it over to my wife on Christmas morning. She truly loved the camera and had no issues replacing her Sony CD300. This camera is fun and compact and has no trouble fitting in a pocket or purse. The reviews really helped me make a purchase that was well worth the price.
->Prices
We purchased this camera to carry around and take photos of our 15 month-old. I have a Canon Digital Rebel, but it's too big to stick in my purse. It takes great photos, surprisingly good in low light. We're very happy with the quality of photos, the speed at which it captures the picture and the way the camera works.
->Best Price
I totally love this camera! It has so many different settings and preferences that will take any type of picture imaginable! i would recommend this camera to any person from inexperienced to experienced photographers!
->Best Price
We bought this camera just before a trip to Hawaii, added a 2 GB card, and we spent the trip giving it a workout. The image stabilization outperformed our expectations, and we managed to take a LOT of great (clear)photos from our rental car on the highway... up to 60 mph. Also, the time from turning on the camera to taking a photo is much shorter than the delay with our old Kodak Easyshare camera. The battery lasts well. The special scene modes also work well for nighttime, green, etc pictures, but these are difficult to use without a tripod because the image stabelizer turns off. The camera comes with a 16 MB card, so you'll need to upgrade if you want to store more than 8 pictures on it. Overall, we feel we got a great value for the price!
->Compare
There are two things I will never buy again: a Ford or an Olympus camera. I will spare you the details--I can sum up both experiences with a single phrase: monumental pieces of crap.
On the other hand, I have no regrets about buying the Cannon Powershot SD700 IS Elph. It is extremely compact, light and easy to use. I read the manual literally en route (on a flight to New York) and was able to take advantage of a lot of its features on my week-long vacation. I was able to shoot for 2-3 days at a time (I get a little snap-shot happy), then simply charge it at day's end for a mere two hours and be ready to shoot again. Back at home, I was extremely satisfied with the quality of the photos. The only thing I didn't like was that if you use the viewfinder, you tend to smudge the LCD screen. Still, not enough to diminish my love of the camera. And I would definitely get a case--couldn't find a package deal so I had to buy one seperately. Oh, and a bigger memory card. Another reviewer said the one it came with was worthless and they were right--had I not purchased another card, I would have only been able to take a few pictures--literally. It is so worthless it almost seems in bad taste for the company to include it.
->Prices
The camera is excellent and it takes really good pictures. The wait time for in between snap shots is really fast. The pictures are very true to color and it's beautiful for a compact camera. The red eye is the only weakness with this camera that should be fixed!
->Discount
This camera does exactly what the product description promises and more. The battery life is very long (I have only charged it 2 times in the last 3 months that I have had it). Canon makes an excellent powershot camera.
->
My last digital camera, an HP, had extremely poor battery life, a small LCD display and took poor quality pictures.
This Canon has a great battery life, a very large LCD display and takes excellent pictures (although I have not enlarged any of them).
I wanted a point-and-shoot that would satisfy all of these requirements for me and that my husband could also use and be able to make some manual settings. I found all of that in this camera.
->Best Price
Great product. Top of the line and great value for money.
I'm so happy with this camera. Although there are more
better and later models from Canon, I still think that
this product is still the best.
->Comparison
I'm not a camera expert by any means, but I love this camera! This is my first digital camera and I was afraid I wouldn't be able to use it properly. No worries - you can put it on auto mode and take wonderful pictures right out of the box. The tiny size makes it so easy to carry from place to place.
I actually ordered this camera accidentally. I meant to order another brand, and goodness only knows how I got so confused, but I sure am glad for that mistake.
The menu options are so easy that I'm taking all kinds of "arty" pictures now. The viewing screen is nice and large. The quality of the pictures is unbelievable for such a small camera. Using the manual mode, you can zoom in very close and still get a remarkable picture. There are adjustments for every kind of lighting situation imaginable and a stabalizing feature that adjusts for most movement. I've gotten great action pictures of my cats and super ones of birds at the feeders.
My only complaint is the users manual. It's a little hard to figure out. Also, you will definately need a bigger memory card than the one included with the camera. All in all, this is such a great little camera. I highly recommend it over more costly cameras of others that I have tried.
->Deal
I really don't know as it was given as a gift. The person who received it seems quite happy with it, but I cannot fairly review.
->Buy
Ok...I am not very tech savvy when it comes to photography. I was just looking for an "aim and shoot", easy to use kinda camera. I have had this for abt 4 months now and so far it's working great. Easily fits directly into my pocket, battery lasts pretty good, pictures look great and whats more it looks sleek. I am very happy with this buy so far and would definitely recommend this to folks that want a simple camera (I haven't even bothered to check out all the features). My "Digital SLR type" friends will probably laff at this review :)
->Buy Online
I was looking for a less bulky camera and I researched many different brands and still ended up with a Canon. I still have to learn to fully use the features on this camera, but so far, so good. Sometimes the pictures come out a little dark, but it's probably b/c I have the wrong settings. Otherwise seems good for my purposes and is very compact.
->Price
Very good camera. I have used other brand-rather not mention what brand- but this is the best. I am not a professional photographer but the shots I took makes me look like a pro. Very easy to shoot with. Make sure to learn all the inside out of the camera.
->Deal
I bought the SD700 because I wanted a pocket sized camera with a lot of megapixels and zoom. It is all that. It's easy to use and the pictures are terrific. The only problem is that the red-eye delay is a bit long causing the scene to change sometimes before the second flash. That's OK if you are taking landscapes but not for small children who don't stay still very long. I often don't use the red-eye because I can eliminate most red-eye with computer software.
->Wholesale
Takes great pictures, easy to use, beautiful LCD screen, plus it has a viewfinder so you can turn off the LCD to conserve battery life in those remote locations without power to charge it.
->Deal
I'm a novice but like to have great pics. I looked. I waited. I hesitated. Finally, after shopping, looking and wasting time, I pulled the trigger and stepped up and purchased this camera. WOW- AHSUMM !!
Glad I waited and glad I went w/ my intuition. This CANON is sweeet !
Compact. Great lookin'. Clear pics (really clear). Great rear viewing with the larger display screen. (I had a digital camera and it had the smaller display..........WOW, no contest). THis camera is A+ - no questions, doubts or 2nd guessing. Great purchase and very happy !
PRICE: very competitive and I stopped lookin' and went w/ AMAZON / a great company. I havent done alot of biz w/ AMAZON, but this was simple and seamless. My suggestion: BUY THIS CAMERA. O yea, When using it, its very impressive too !! Everyone has WOWED !!! Many have ordered the camera after seeing, using and handling mine. pretty good, huh ?!?!?
->Buy Today
This is my third Canon. I purchased another brand last year based on reviews but couldn't get satisfactory pix with it. This Canon is just like my previous ones. Very east to use. I don't want to make photography my career. I just want to point and shoot good pictures of my grandkids and keep progress records of our projects. This is the camera.
->Comparison
This was a gift for our son-in-law. He was like a kid in a toy store. The camera is fun and user friendly, small enough to fit in a pocket, and most of all takes great pictures. I may have to buy one for myself.
->Prices
Bought this camera for our son and new daughter. They love it! Ease of operations, large screen and compact size. They are snapping away at every chance!
->Cheap
I previously owned a canon elph sd300. it was
smaller and lighter and easier to fit in my
pocket, but when shooting in low light and
when shooting landscapes the fine details were
often blurry. The sd700is is a little larger
and heavier, but it still fits in my larger
pockets and in the same carrying case. The
image stabilization works well in low light and
when shooting landscapes. It is an excellent
upgrade to the elph line. I give 4 stars and
not 5 because I would have preferred the smaller
form factor of my previous elph, but with the IS
technology included. That would have been perfect.
one other note: I accidentally dropped my new sd700
from about three feet onto a very solid concrete floor
and the camera has worked perfectly ever since. seems
like a solid product.
->Lowest Price
I've been a fan of Canon's cameras for some time. My first purchase was the A300 a few years back. The three problems I had with the product were battery duration, lack of optical zoom, and its bulkiness. Come time for this past holiday season I decided it was time for an upgrade. I was home on vacation for a month and only had to recharge the battery on this camera twice, and it was utilized a great deal. The camera itself has a good build - slim and light weight (Fits quite well on the PSC-55 on one's belt I might add). The optical zoom is good for the size of the camera. Photo and movie options are plentiful and while they take some time to master can benefit a beginner to an experienced photographer.
->Comparison
I have had my camera for 2 months. I loved it at first, but now I am finding it disappointing because of all my pictures that have red eye. The flash is not the greatest and it causes a lot of red eye in my photos. I dont know if I am doing something wrong. I keep trying to find a way to fix the red eye with its various features, but it doesn't seem to be working. Its a great camera because of the rechargable battery and compactness. It is a heavy camera, which I wasn't expecting, but it is a still a good camera if you like the solid weight feel.
->Best Price
I love it, love it, love it. We had/have a very early Elph that is only 2.1 MP and this is a vast improvement in our photo-taking ability. It's super fast (even with a 2 GB card) so we don't miss those precious moments and it takes awesome movies. So much so that we hardly use our video camera anymore. We were debating about a larger camera versus this one and I'm so glad we went with another ELPH. We are 100x more likely to take photos with such a small, portable, handy camera.
->Deals
Just came back from cozumel,Mexico with all my pictures,I also went on 4 scuba dives there with the underwater case. Out of 200 underwater shots I only deleted 10,They were all great! couldn't have picked a better combo.The pictures I have were up to 100' away and still looked good,Some shot in the caves with just the built in flash were increditable with colors,that weren't visable with my eyes and natural light. I captured all my memories and tickeled pink no regrets, and also seen 6 other older cannons with cases for underwater and they were all happy also.
->
I bought this camera for my mom because of the "IS" feature. I've used it and we both love it. I have the SD600 which I love as well. My only complaint is you can't use the time date stamp in all picture modes.
->Best Price
I picked up this camera just before Thanksgiving and found its pretty simple camera to use. Checked reviews from cnet and was rated very well.
So far I'm just lov'in it. A simple point and shoot camera with some really sharp pictures and some cool features too.
->Buy
I LOVE THIS CAMERA! I am not by any stretch of the imagination an expert. I researched digital cameras for months before I finaly settled on this one. The image stabilization ROCKS! All of my pictures have come out crystal clear and the battery life is great! The charger for the battery is very small and portable. I highly recommend that you purchase an extra battery. I keep the extra battery charged and ready at all times so I have never had a problem that was not of my own stupidity :) You simply will NOT find a better compact camera with this many features!
->Price
I have had my canon sd700 for about 3 months now and i can honestly say its one of the best investments i've ever made. The camera is a great compact digital camera. The image stabilization works great and the feature are awesome and easy to learn how to use. This is my third digital camera and canon is by far my favorite brand for digital cameras. The shutter speed is great unlike most sony and some nikon digitals. I compared my sd700 is with a friends sony dsc w50 and the canon shots were of superior quality. we both took pictures of a two year old who was running all over the place and i caught almost every great shot with the continuous shooting feature. The screen is large and clear and after printing out pictures up to 8X10 the qualitiy is great. I also bought the hp c7180 mostly for picture printing and i absolutely love it! You can scan old negatives and print them out directly from the printer and the picture quality is great coming from negatives copies and memory cards. i highly recommend this camera and look into a good printer as well!!!
->Affordable
I like it. It was easy to use and fast to learn. Two minor negatives: The rubber flap over the spot for the hot sync wire does not stay down and in place. Also, the instruction book does not explain what some of the more exotic and esoteric features are. It merely says how to operate them. I am very knowledgeable about photography, but not an expert. It would have been helpful to have a better source so I could expand my knowledge and use some of the very sophisticated features.
->Buy Today
Excellent camera! I love how small it is and how big the window is to see the pictures. The only thing I wish it has was a little faster shutter speed. With having kids sometimes we miss the picture we want because their is a small delay. Overall, we are very pleased with our camera.
->Compare
I'm not a photo "guru", so I don't get even in half of what this camera can offer in terms of manual or automatic setting. All I learned that you can set shutter in auto mode and it will do a job for you in any light. Then you can set the camera to shoot with background (like mountain view), and it will shoot few times focusing differently and the result would be clear picture everywhere, on you and on the mountains as well for example.
So far I'm very happy with the camera.The only minor thing that I could enjoy more, that in the movie mode you cann't shoot the movie to the full capacity of your flashcard. It stops shooting after aprox. 2 minutes.
->Best Price
This is a great compact camera with lots of features. I really like the 4x zoom and the optional viewfinders (can use either LCD screen or optical viewfinder). Surprised that such a small camera is still so easy to operate with my size large man hands.
I do have one minor disappointment, that is some function settings in the manual mode are not saved when camera is shut off or another mode is selected.
->Compare
Perfect camera. Small, high image quality, and with all the extras that you want on a simple point and shoot camera.
->Prices
My wife is very happy with the SD700. It is small enough to carry anywhere and is quickly ready to take pictures. On our recent trip, she took almost 400 pictures and a number of videos. This camera is a strong candidate if you want a simple to use digital that produces great pictures. In a couple instances, she wished she had a greater than 3x zoom, but then the camera would be more bulky and would weigh more.
->Compare
This is a great camera. I research everything I buy to an extream degree and this was my hands down favorite. I own a Canon XT and this camera is the perfect complement to my larger heaver SLR. There are times when I want the high degree of control that a Slr offers and times when I want a small camera that I can throw in my pocket to take pictures and not feel like I am sacrificing quality. My wife loves it too because the image stabilization produces sharp pictures more consistantly and also helps in low light situations. This camera is really designed for point and shoot and delivers consistantly good pictures with very few bad exposures and out of focus pictures. The camera is well designed and has a quality feel to it. My biggest gripe is... well there are none. After shooting hundreds of pictures, I would buy this camera again in a heartbeat.
->Deals
I like this camera because it's a handy and a high resolution camera. Excellent picture quality and stabilized zoom. Price wise very cpmpetitive. I beleive no one will deslike this camera
->Compare
We love this camera, and couldn't find it in any brick-and-mortar store. Amazon had a great price, and delivered on time for Christmas. We've had so much fun playing with the different features, and from what I can tell, the image stabilization really works!
->Deals
The Canon SD700 is a great camera It takes great outdoor lighted pictures, it's small and handy, it has a great zoom and the video is awesome. I strongly recommedn it to anyone who is looking for a simple solution to taking nice pictures. The only down side is that for night time pics, the flash is kind of weak and it does not have a battery meter, and eventhough the baterry last for a good number of pictures, it doesn't let you know where you stand. I also suggest that you buy at least a 1G memory so that you can get many high res. pics and good video.
->Buy Now
I purchased this camera for my husband's retirement gift. He absolutely loves it! It is easy to use and has a large screen and takes wonderful pictures. He is very pleased with it.
->Wholesale
On November 13th, my brother bought this same camera on Amazon for $304.95 (new). Now, the price of the camera is $326. I inquired about the price change several times, but no one at Amazon ever got back to me ? Obviously, Amazon is not always the best place to purchase product for the best price. The product is good, but the price change sucks!
->Compare
I didn't find anything wrong.
The camera is very compact and takes good quality pictures.
You ought read the manual of course as it's not very intuitive in some function.
->
When I am using the video mode during the night and it being faced to any light a straight vertical bright lines appears in the picture. Also when I am taking photo in night using the auto mode (flash ) the focus or the face will become bright and the reaming portion will be dark.
->Lowest Price
I researched quite a bit and decided on spending a bit extra for OPTICAL image stabilization. This makes a huge difference in low-light and shakey scenarios. Canon has always produced the best quality images overall for me. I never liked my Sony camera. The interface is blazingly fast and the feature set is great. I myself am getting a Digital SLR camera soon. This one was for my mom. It is easy to use, VERY sleek, and has 4x optical zoom. The LCD screen is very bright and wide too.
PROS
- OPTICAL Image stabilization
- 4x Optical zoom!
- Sleek build. (Thin ,but not too thin. too thin = crappy camera.)
- It looks nice
- LCD is 2.5", which is nice
- LCD dims, brightens, according to light
- Lots of features, macro mode,
- can take black and white picstures with a single color in them (like a RED dress)
- VIDEO quality is great.
- VERY FAST interface.
-
CONS
- None as of yet. (it's been a month)
->Comparison
I have had my SD700IS for three months and have been extremely pleased with it's performance. I use Apple iPhoto and have been able to very clear and sharp prints. The image stabilization works flawlessly and allows me to take indor shots in low light with no blurring. I like to take close up shots of flowers, and the macro function allows me to get within .79 inches of the subject. I no longer use my video camera as the movies taken with this camera are adequate for my needs. I am also pleased with the battery life. I do have a spare battery, and so I am never without power. All of this in a camera that fits in my shirt pocket.
->Deals
Being a professional photographer I am very picky about the cameras I buy. I wanted a small pocket point and shoot when I don't want to carry around my pro gear. I've carefully researched most of the compact digitals on the market and have always gravitated towards the Canon line (my pro gear is all Canon).
I've been using these Canon Digital Elph Powershots for years now and by far they are the best compact point and shoots out there...and they keep getting smaller without comprimising picture quality.
The newspapers I've worked for have even bought several of these to use as backup cameras that a reporter can grab and easily shoot an assignment when a photographer isn't available. The prints have always looked just as good as if they'd been shot with the high-end pro digitals.
->Price
The SD700 is an amazing little camera. I carry it in my pocket to augment a very expensive digital SLR from the same manufacturer. Terrific, clear images, easy to use, always ready to get the shot that I missed with the big camera. I have some great bird and family photos to credit to this powerhouse camera. These opportunities were available at times when I only had the SD700 in my pocket. This little giant is no toy, but a working friend to carry.
->Compare
I have been an advanced amateur photographer for over 30 years and I am very impressed with this little digital camera. The color rendetion POPS out at you. The macro capabilities are amazing. I shot about 100 pictures of dew on leaves one foggy morning and the detail on each dew drop was amazing. I could continue with more of the camera's abilities but you may want to hear of some of the cons too. During macro shots, I am not able to control the focus point so I take lots of pictures and hope that one picked the right focus point. The view finder shows much less of the scene than will be captured. The flash is weak.
Although I have not tested other cameras to compare with this one, I feel this camera must be a superior value and have superior capabilities. The few weaknesses it did have were acceptable.
->Cheap
Overall I am satisfied with the camera. Its great for what I need it to - take family pics etc. The only thing I'd like to see is the ability to take good pictures in low light. Its better than many other cameras, but not still as good as I want it. For this reason alone, a point and shoot that supports a hot-shoe flash when necessary would be very helpful. Hopefully manufacturers will make that one day. Until then Canon SD700 is the best out there
Also, the menu and preset options are very helpful. I like the slideshow feature on the camera. Downloads easily. Overall its great.
->Compare
This camera is terrific. I am a fan of the digital elph, but these newer cameras that have image stabilization are fantastic, allowing for nice photos in low light without a flash. Also the digital zoom is much improved.
Tiny, with a nice big screen and easy to use. My snapshots actually look like photographs!
->Lowest Price
This camera has everything you want in a very small package. It is well constructed, small enough to carry in almost any type of pocket,has great performance, image stabilization and most of all fantastic picture quality. Pictures rival many much more larger and expensive cameras. It is basically a point and shoot with no shutter or aperture control (although there are some manual adjustments) but for travel or snapshots it is an excellent choice.
->Compare
I have purchase three. One for my Grandson, one for my son-in-law and one for myself. This is the best camera. Easy to use, compact and does special things no other camera can. Pictures are clear, sharp and beautiful. All for a very extremely good price.
->Deals
My dad has the sony equilvalent to this model and it definitely doesn't compare to the picture quality & easy of use of this canon. I love this camera and it takes great pictures. Definitely worth the money.
->Prices
Love the camera, thought I could never replace my Pentax, but this is a great camera... Feels like it is well made and takes good photos and good videos. Glad I picked this camera.
->Purchase
I was worried that I could have gone without buying the Image Stabilizer. I was not after I realized how well this camera took action shots. I have tried to mess around with the manual settings to get the best picture for action shots, but found that Auto mode worked best for that even though it forces a flash when I don't want to sometimes.
The viewfinder I can see would be useful if the battery life was short, but it proved to last a good 2 days of partying. I wish that there was a bigger screen like the SD630 with the Image Stabilization (The battery life might get worse but I would guess that it would be enough for a full day session which is sufficient for me) because after the 4 months I have owned this camera, I haven't used the viewfinder once.
Conclusion: I love this camera because of ease to take great action shots without having to mess with the settings too much (leaving it in Auto). It's not the smallest camera out there, but fits in my jeans pockets no problem. With the price it is going for now, I think it probably would be worth it to go with this model instead of the IS SD800. (That is unless you frequently blow up your pictures to a poster) Great camera!
->Buy
I love this camera. Easy to use controls. Crisp, clean pictues. The stabilization software virtually eliminates blurred pictures. I would definitely buy this again.
->Best Price
I'm not a photo fanatic, but I appreciate a well designed product. The canon takes great pictures. The IS is great. It works well in low light and in bright light.
The thing I love about the camera is how quickly it goes from off to ready to take a picture. This is great for social situations when you want to take that quick picture.
The sofware is straight forward and easy to use.
The battery lasts forever. I bought two just in case, but it can go with moderate use for about 12 hours.
->Purchase
I reviewed every camera I could find to make sure I was getting the best bang for my buck. I ordered this camera without ever touching it, based on the reviews and the name brand. I've had this camera for several months and I love it. The images are pristine and the features are great. If I had to complain about anything, I would say that I wish it were smaller and lighter but everything smaller I looked at had poor reviews. So I am very happy with this purchase. The Indoor preset has made all the difference in the color quality of our indoor shots. So much better than my last camera. That alone has made it worth the price for me.
->Prices
That person( Rae (Honolulu, HI United States) ) who put the picture of moving cars, forgot to mention about the truck next to it, it is so hazy and is worthless, cannon is making crapy camera's, i cannot get a clear shot of anything moving, everything is hazy. Image Stabilized is a joke by canon. And what the hell is 4x Image Stabilized Zoom and wats the differnece between just Image Stabilized.
->Buy
Did a lot of research on the various Canon models and I absolutely love this camera. Small, solid, great balance to it. The clarity of the photos is phenomenal. The LCD is crisp and large so you can really determine if you got the great shot you wanted. The speed is unreal (Continuous shooting is great, flash charges super quick), read and write time is lightning fast...highly recommended.
->Affordable
My wife had a Canon S400 for about 2 years and this one was worth upgrading to from that one. The LCD is AWESOME. The low light capability is AWESOME.
->Comparison
I agree with pauliesaurus' review. Santa brought this camera for Christmas. It has great point and shoot features for the price (~$320 at Amazon): small, long battery, nice LCD, good color pics, quick multiple photos, great video, IS, 6Mpix, etc.
But the pictures are not crisp. When you zoom in to 100% on people's faces, even in pictures taken in bright sunlight with no motion, there is just a bit of noise. Comparing to photos from my old 2Mpix Olympus and another cheap Sony point and shoot, the focus is poor. I took many pictures with and without the AiAF feature and am sure I am focusing on the subject.
Other not-so-great, less important items:
Big nosed guys will have a tough time using the little view finder. This is rarely used as the LCD is so great and rechargeable battery life so long.
Flash inside room highlights subjects in foreground and leaves background dark. Is this because it is too weak of flash? It takes out all the color of the room.
Still debating whether to keep this very fun and sleek camera.
->
Pros
- Excellent image quality
- Excellent build quality (except for mode dial which is a little flimsy), nice look and feel
- Excellent LCD, perfect size, good resolution, works well in bright light
- Pretty long zoom, image stabilization
- Excellent low light, high ISO performance
- Pocket size
- Fast focus, shot-to-shot times, etc.
- Nice user interface, including external ISO control
- Auto white balance works well, custom white balance is easy to use
Cons
- No direct control over shutter speed or aperture (except shutter speed control for 1 <= t <= 15 sec), but that's not what this camera is about
- Flash is a little weak
- No indication of remaining battery charge
- ISO value obscure in EXIF data
- Tends to overexpose in bright, high-contrast conditions (use -1/3 - -2/3 exposure compensation to correct)
- Lens is a little slow at long end of zoom
Recommendation: Get the accessory kit with the case and extra battery, it's worth it. And a big memory card.
->
I had this camera for less than 2 months, when it slipped out of my hand and fell about 2 feet to a carpeted floor. The lens became stuck out, and I couldn't turn it on anymore. I sent the camera back to Canon, and even though IT IS still covered by warranty, they want to charge me $138.19 to fix it!!! It's obviously a very fragile camera. It breaks INCREDIBLY easily, and they are not willing to fix it for less than 1/3 of what you would pay to buy it brand new. Very disappointing!!
->Prices
The LCD screen is very, very fragile. Mine broke after a couple of months of use. The repair will set you back about 135 bucks, so figure that into your purchase price.
->Deal
I had an SD550 that I was very happy with, but broke the LCD. I ordered the SD700 as a replacement and was very excited about the 4x zoom. I have to say that I was very disappointed in the picture quality in this camera. No matter what setting I used (auto, manual, scenes, flash/no flash, etc.), most pictures came out blurry. Even the ones that weren't blurry, we not crisp. The camera also produced much, much darker videos than my SD550, depsite using the same lighting scenarios. I use my camera mostly to take pictures of my toddler and outdoor nature scenes. My daughter's face in almost every picture was blurry, even though the camera was focusing on her face. I returned it and am going to try the SD900 - hopefully that will be better.
->Buy
I purchased this camera based on many factors, but the most important one is the almost non-existent shutter lag. It's great for taking pictures of my 16 month old. Our old digital camera wasn't quick enough to catch him in the act. I read that this camera was very quick (for a point-and-shoot) and it definitely delivers. I am very impressed. Now I don't have to worry about my son blinking or turning his head. On top of all that it takes beautiful pictures and outstanding videos. As I have read in other reviews there is no battery life indicator, but I have yet to read the manual or search for that option. Nevertheless, if you are in the market for THE perfect point-and-shoot digital camera this is it. Oh yeah, and it's nice and small too.
->Compare
I was in the market for an ultracompact camera that could still manage to deliver great image quality. I had been looking at numerous brands and models but eventually decided on this PowerShot SD700 IS.
The big deal with this camera is the IMAGE STABILIZATION. What this does is compensates for say, a shaky hand, and makes images sharper and clearer in the process. Now, other brands have things such as an "Anti-Shake DSP". These do serve the same basic purpose, but do so DIGITALLY, by (among other things) messing with your ISO and shutter speed! NOT COOL! Canon's method is OPTICAL, which actually adjusts the lens to achieve this, so the images are sharp and clear without any additional noise.
How well does this work in real life? I don't know about the rest of you but I'm a caffeine junkie, and my hands can be a little shaky at times. This camera helps me keep stable shots. It even improves your image quality when using a slower shutter speed. I was amazed at the images I was getting with a 1/8 shutter and no tripod!
Now, a word on megapixels: you might say that 6MP is a bit low when compared to the 10MP cameras that are out today. I'll tell you this: Any camera 5MP and up is going to be way more than enough for pretty much any type of photo printer. As the adage goes, "quality over quantity", and images will look better with a great 6MP camera than a mediocre 10MP camera.
Image quality aside, I LOVE the aesthetics of this camera. It's a *little* big for an ultracompact, but it has a solid and tactile feel, you can tell its put together well. Either way, it fits very easily into my jeans pockets (and I buy my jeans on the slim-fitting side) and I can use it one handed. The buttons are a little small, as is the dial, but such is the price to pay for a small camera. The menus are RAPID and very easy to navigate, powers on quickly, shutter lag is nearly nonexistent (though shot-to-shot times could be better).
My gripes?
- MANUAL FEATURES. I know, nobody buys an ultracompact point-and-shoot for manual features, but I would gladly pay an extra $100 just to be able to set my own aperture and shutter speed. However, none of their competitors are really doing this either.
- Thickness; no, 1.04 inch is not huge, but competitors' cameras are clocking in at 0.8 or 0.6 (Casio Exilim), and Canon should be keeping up with the likes of the ultra-ultra-compacts and giving us a truly slim camera-- even if it means trading in that nice 4x zoom for 3x.
- Buttons are small. Optical viewfinder is too small for anyone to use, they should have just done away with it and given us a larger screen.
- Shot-to-shot time could be improved.
Sure, the SD700 IS is not perfect, but it's the closest thing there is to "perfect" when it comes to a midrange ultra-compact. Highly recommended.
->Comparison
I've had this camera for a couple of months now; it has performed flawlessly under a variety of conditions. I've been able to get good shots at night, at dawn, under dense forrest canopies and in the bright sunlight of the altiplano. Also, the camera captured great shots from moving buses or cars.
I found SD700 to be an excellent pocket camera and with extra memory and a spare battery one can go on using it for a long time.
The only potential issue for me is the sensitivity of the LCD screen. I'd recommend using a screen protector for shots on-the-fly, and a carrying case is a must.
->Best Price
Great camera, easy to use, and great movie quality on video cam part. Bought a 4GB SD card for it, so photos are just about endless.
->Deals
This is my first camera and I'm very happy with the choice I made. This camera has allowed me to take amazing pictures I wouldnt' dream of. I love accentuating colors and taking sepia or black & white pictures of great backgrounds. It's certainly an aggregated value to the camera.
Before I bought this camera I used to borrow my brother's, and I can say that mine is SO much better than his. The colors are more vivid, the images look brighter and I can shoot faster with mine. The only feature I miss from his camera is that I was able to cut the picture right in the camera. With my Canon I have to wait to get home, download the picture and then cut it. You should take another picture if you dont' like the first one.
One other thing: the camera claims to have "Image Stabilized Zoom" but that didnt' work for me when I wanted to take the picture with no flash. I hope it was because of the lack of experience, and I'll try to improve my skills so I can come back and give you more details about that specific feature and about the camera itself.
Still, knowing all this, I would buy this camera again!
->Deal
Image quality is pathetic. It generates ludicrous amounts of noise even at the lowest ISO (80).
Rest assured, you will be disappointed. I returned mine within a day.
->Discount
I did a lot of research in picking out a camera and wish I had known about this camera before purchasing a Nikon P3 (with WiFi). I happened to receive a refurbished SD700 right before our honeymoon and took both to test them out. What better place than Kauai to take some great shots...
So, after about the first day of shooting I came to the conclusion that the Canon was a better camera hands down!!! As a matter of fact it is the best camera I've owned and I'll never get another brand again. There were several things that set this camera apart from others:
1. Picture quality on scene modes (beautiful beach and floral mode)
2. Picture quality on auto (true sign of a good camera)
3. 4X zoom (unbelievable - best feature...took pictures of a lighthouse from a mile away and looked like I was right in front taking it. I also used camera as binoculars to see a mountain goat in Wimea Canyon and picture was unbelievably clear)
4. Battery life
5. User controls and software
I really can't find anything bad to say about this camera. I didn't get a chance to even read the manual before our trip and figured out all the "bells and whistles" fairly easily. As a point and shoot camera, this Canon delivers a professional quality like no other! Definitely a great purchase.
->Buy
With 2 toddlers, I'm the type of person who likes to have a camera with me to capture those unexpected moments on film. The ELPH cameras are ideal for this because they're small and lightweight. I used a 3.2MP Canon ELPH before this one, and I thought the 3.2 was good until I started using this new one. The clarity and stability control on the SD700 is great! And downloading the photos to my computer takes only seconds. I highly recommend this camera.
->Buy
I am not much of a photographer. I found this camera easy to use and my pix are just great. Believe me, it's the camera. The stabilizer thing works to give clear focus almost every time. I can even put the pix up on the computer and send them easily. I'm thrilled. You do need to upgrade to a 1 mgb. memory card when you buy the camera.
->Deal
I gave this camera to my husband for his birthday. It is the first digital camera we have owned though my college age son is on his third one - all have been Canon digital Elphs. This is such a great little gadget - it is smaller than a pack of cigarettes, has a big screen on which to view your photo(s), is easy to learn to use, and great for taking on trips - as long as you remember to keep the wrist strap on your wrist while you are using it so it doesn't drop and break.
I also purchased a small Canon digital printer which is great for us to take to our aging parents, take photos, print them immediately and leave them with our parents to enjoy immediately. Every Canon product we own has not disappointed us and this little camera is no exception!
->Deal
I love this camera. It does everything you'd want a compact point and shoot camera to do. Perfect for taking pictures of my toddler. Fits in your pocket and starts up in a split second. Never miss another "Kodak moment".
->Best Price
Worth the money in every way. Sturdy, compact, great pictures, easy to use, easy to upload images.
->Price
It is a great compact camera with a good zoom. I can now leave a larger lens on my Nikon DX 70 and use this for closer shots. YOu do need to try different settings to make sure you get the color you want. I really like it for most general quick shots, carry it wth me most of the time.
->Comparison
No blurry pics!!!! it's wonderful. I love the different options, it's easy to use, and it's sleek and small. I do have a problem with red eye - even red eye reduction doesn't work... but it's a great little camera.
->Lowest Price
Design is very slick and looks professional. Very pocketable..
When you click photos and look at it through the high contrast LCD on the back the pictures it look wonderful. You will tend to fall in love with the camere because of that..
Great to have IS on a small camera,
However to me there 2 important photographic features that was a deal breaker:
1) Week Flash : Pictures look like standing in front of a cave..
2) Red Eye: While expected of small camera, the cannons and especially this one is very prone to red eye.. Anytime subject is not looking at the camera lens directly you will get red eye and not always easy to fix with software without spending a lot of time..
So if you are not into shooting indoor or people photos this is for you..
Otherwise I recommend to take a look at the fuji f30 or f31fd..
->Comparison
That's Image Stabilization. Nothing more to say.
->Deal
Canon SD700 is a cool camera which would suit anybody who wants to shoot whenever time allows. The compact size, viewinder+LCD, 4X IS are the three main selling points of sd700. Night photos are not that great but otherwise the picture quality is good.
->Lowest Price
The SD700 is by far the best camera I have ever purchased. First, the image stabilizer. I purchased this camera primarily for my trip to Japan, and I took about 500 shots there. Every single one of them came out perfect. The image stabilizer is a must-have for digital cameras. The low light photos came our crystal clear, even with the flash off. Second, I have heard some reviews complaining about the battery life, but I found that I rarely had to charge it. In fact, I TRIED to drain the battery just to see how long it could go. I left it on over night and when I woke up the next morning, the "low battery life" icon had just come on. On a normal vacation picture-taking basis, i can go for days, maybe a week- without charging it. Third, the screen appears to have some sort of hard coating, so the LCD will not make those "ripples" when you press it. And finally, the only thing that might be a problem for some people, is the size of the buttons. Large fingers may have some difficulty pushing the buttons. If you don't mind this, this is the perfect camera for simple day-to-day picture taking. I will always buy a Canon from now on. I'm sold!
->Cheap
Great value product, turned up on time & worked, can't as for more than that!
->Cheap
Canon has won my loyalty. I own an old Canon Elph, and now a Digital Elph, and I will never buy any other brand but Canon when it comes to cameras. The SD700 IS is sleek, stylish, and takes crystal clear pictures. I would recommend it to everyone I know!!
->Sale
Great camera, no blur pictures, I tried it out bowling, clear pictures, a little bit difficult to set up the manual mode at first, shoots great and shoots long video on a larger memory card, good for concerts, good microphone on it. Love the size, can't go wrong
->Deals
I have to go through lot of reviews before buying this camera. And I am not 100 percent confident about all the reviews, but after going for the camera, I am satisfied with the performance of the camera and also with all the reviews.
->Buy
We got this camera in Aug and I have not charged the battery yet(11-7)! the pictures look great and it is very easy to carry. I love it!
->Deal
I've had this camera for about a month, replacing a Canon S400. I debated long and hard after reading the reviews both here and in other review sites. I was comparing this camera to the Casio Exims' because of their battery life, etc., and I also waited until the SD800 came out. I ended up choosing the Canon SD 700, and I am very pleased with the results so far. I took pictures inside with low light, and I must say that the red eye technology has improved tremendously from the S400 model, and so far I have not taken a picture that I found problematic with this camera.
I can't judge the battery life just yet, but so far I am happy with my decision.
->For Sale
I am still learning how to use this camera. All the photos I have taken so far are absolutely beautiful. Very happy with this purchase. Love the small size, as I travel a lot.
->Comparison
We compared the Canon SD600, SD630 & SD700 and found the SD700 to be the way to go. The features and as we later found the performance of the SD700 were worth the extra dollars.
->Price
I am very happy with this cannon camera.I rcommend it to anybody who wants a reliable camera and easy to work with.
->Compare
I bought this camera because I broke my old camera and I decided to go for an upgrade. I use it mostly for taking family picture. I really like the red eye function and the speed at which I can download the pictures on my computer. With its light weight and compact format this camera is easy to carry around.
->Price
Have owned several canon cameras and this is my favorite so far. Because of its compact size, I carry it with me all the time. Ideal for quick snaps of grand kids and used on several social occasions. Haven't had a bad snapshot yet.
->Compare
I love this camera in many many aspects most of all I love the Wide screen shots it takes I get so much more in each picture. My only criticism is that 1 month after I bought this camera Canon comes along with an 8 and 10 mega pixel model witch I probably would have considered buying.
->Deal
I have been having a great time with this little camera. I carry it in my purse all the time. It's been helpful at work, fun when I'm out, and very accessable all the time. It's taken a bit to learn all the many functions, which might cause some people some problems, but I'm enjoying learning what all it does. The huge view screen was what originally drew me to this camera, and I've found it does everything I wanted it to. I already own a professional quality SLR digital camera, but it's cumbersome to carry. I wanted something small, but didn't want to give up file size... with this camera, you don't.
->Compare
The SD 700 is a great camera. I just returned from a trip to Italy where I took over 600 hundred pictures with this camera. The 4x zoom works well with the image stabilization. Virtually all of the pictures turned out great for a pocket sized camera.
->Deal
This is an amazing camera in its category. Used it intensely during vacation. Definitely worth buy. If you're looking for good point and shoot camera, Cannon SD700 is the best alternative with lots of features. Photos are just astounding!
->Comparison
i love this camera, so many cool features. compact and easy to use. highly suggest this camera, however, the memory card that comes with the camera is has low storage, so i suggest getting a bigger one with purchase of the camera.
->Discount
Pros: As far as the workings of this camera it's great in every respect.
Great pictures.
Great night performance.
Great videos.
Great sound with videos.
Awesome zoom.
Cons:
Design is good looking but bad quality. The camera is not the typical Canon quality. The AV/battery compartments open too easily but don't open all the way. The dial to the side is flimsy and impossible to use if you are not looking at it since it doesn't turn evenly. The power button is badly placed - you cannot start up this camera with one hand.
There is no reason why you shouldn't spend the extra 50 and buy the sd800. They fixed all the aforementioned problems in the new model.
->Compare
This feature packed camera with image stabilization, 4x zoom and past experience with Canon cameras didn't take long to convice me to bite the bullet and buy this small wonder. Took it home and made lots of "test shots" to see what this puppy could handle... To test the Image Stabilization, I would bounce the camera up and down and take a picture -- and most would come out crystal clear. The Macro Function -- MOST EXCELLENT... Accent Color feature -- Amazing... For all intents and purposes, it was just what I was looking for in a compact camera. That is, until I decided to take some "indoor" average to low light pictures without the flash... I have one word to describe it -- BLUUUUUURRRRRRRRRRY....
Having a cat as my "only child", I often take pictures of my furry friend. Unforutnately, she is none too happy when I use the flash... With that said, I often take photos of her with the flash disabled. Suffice it to say, I was HARD PRESSED to take a photo in average to low light that was not blurry... When using the flash, in many instances, the flash appeared to be too harsh for the photo. Suffice it to say, I ended up returning the SD700.
Having had positive experiences with other Canon digital cameras (I also have a Canon S30 from 6 yrs ago), I decided to try a different model -- the Canon SD600... While the photos were better and SLIGHTLY less blurry when taking indoor photos with no flash -- I still expected more... I expected something as good as, if not BETTER than, my old Canon S30. So yet again, I ended up returning this camera as well...
Loving the distinct features that the Canon line provides (excellent macro, accent color, Sepia and B&W photos) I didn't want to give up on Canon just yet... Fortunately, I had just read that Canon had released an SD800 and SD900... While the SD800 has image stabilization and a wide angle lens, and the SD900 merely has more pixels with no image stabilization, I decided to go with the better features found on the SD800. BOY was I glad I did!! For myself, the Canon SD800 is all that AND a bag of chips! :)
So if you don't take a lot of pictures without the flash - then this may the camera for you... If you take a lot of photos without the flash, you may want to consider a different camera... Like the Canon SD 800 IS.
->
I have always been a fan of Canon Digital Cameras after owning my very first Powershot back in year 2000. I had that Canon S10 (like 2 megapixels) from 2000 to early 2005 and it still works, with the exception that the rechargeable battery just does not last more than 24hrs. Shortly after, summer of 2005, I had purchased a Canon SD500 for about a little over a year before my sister accidentally dropped my camera onto the cement ground which had caused my LCD screen to break and leak. The camera was still functional without the LCD screen for about a month before it started acting up entirely (perhaps due to something loosening up within the camera body) - sometimes it will take photos and sometimes it wont. Having researched online to see how much repairs were going to cost me to fix my Canon SD500 LCD screen (~$100-$200 USD), I figured I will be better off getting a brand new camera - so now I own the Canon SD700 IS.
Few Key Items I love about the Canon SD700 IS:
1. Color Quality of the photos after being developed (Shutterly is the BEST!)
2. Image Stablity (altho there are times when I feel like there is still some bluriness to my pictures despite the IS capability)
3. Bigger LCD Screen (compared to Canon SD500)
4. Fast Response Time (for capturing the perfect moment and that is especially hard when ur camera takes forever to start up)
5. Stitch Assist Mode (for those beautific panoramic sceneries)
6. Compact
7. Digital Macro (absolutely the best for capturing the smallest details)
Overall, I do love this camera... however, if I had to compare Canon SD700 IS to Canon SD500, I think I still love my old Canon SD500... the pictures always came out just perfect... plus the SD500 was 7.1 megapixels whereas SD700 IS is 6.0 megapixels.
Overall - 4.0 out of 5.0 scale for Canon SD700 IS.
->Deal
I do not own this particular camera myself but If you are interested in digital point and shoot cameras, since Canon discontinued the Power Shot S-80, there are THREE or more digital point and shoot cameras on the market that I know of that have a "true" WIDE ANGLE lens of 28mm or even 23mm! 1) The Panasonic DMC-FX01
for $250---and 2) The Kodak EasyShare V570 with a 23mm lens for about $250 3) The Canon Power Shot SD 800 IM for about $400. and 4) My current favorite is the Kodak EasyShare V705 with 7.1M and a 23mm super wide angle lens plus a 2nd lens that goes up to about 180mm.
So, you ask, "who needs a 28mm or 23mm lens?" You do! Most people concern themselves with how LONG is their telephoto lens. But, most people who "know" know that it is the WIDE ANGLE lens that is most important---most of the "best shots" are made with a WIDE ANGLE lens. For example, you're in Europe and you are trying to "get a shot" of that Cathedral of Notre Dame over there. You NEED a WIDE ANGLE lens. You are in the California Poppy Fields and you want to get the expanse of the golden-yellow poppy flowers with the huge blue sky filled with white clouds above---you need a WIDE ANGLE lens. You are sitting at thanksgiving dinner and you want to take a photo from the foot of the table with everyone sitting on the left and right---you NEED a WIDE ANGLE lens. You are in the garden of the California Mission and you want to take a photo of the ENTIRE garden surrounded by the mission walls---you NEED a WIDE ANGLE lens. It's Christmas day and you want a photo of the ENTIRE GROUP of visitors in front of the Christmas Tree---you NEED a WIDE ANGLE lens. This is where the 28mm lens (or 23mm on this camera) comes in! So, you NEED THIS CAMERA! Otherwise you'll be cutting off heads and leaving Aunt Sylvia out of the "Christmas Group Photo" this year---and she'll disinherit you and you'll live a life of poverty and misery everafter! :o) If you agree or disagree or know of ANY other digital point and shoot camera that has a WIDE ANGLE lens please write, Email:boland7214@aol.
->Lowest Price
This is my third digital camera after I dropeed my first cannon S400 in water and lost my S50 in downtown. This camera is best among the three. This one is ultra-compact, so it fits into my pocket or wife's purse easily. Pictures are crisp and clear. Flash works great. All indoor pics and night shots come nice and need no editing what so ever. When we bought this camera, it's list price was $500 and we got it for 420. Price is dropped now. So it's really good value for the money.
And BTW, I have two kids (4 years and 5 months old) and the image stabilization works great while taking their special shots that might have been missed with other cameras.
->Deals
This is a very impressive Powershot, and the 3'rd that I've owned (SD-300, and SD-450). As much as I've enjoyed those, this camera has gone to the next level for me with the Canon Image Stabilization technology. Have been taking a lot of pix over the month that I've owned it, and am very impressed by the overall quality of the shots.
For small handhelds, camera shake is an issue in some lighting situations. Certainly the other Powershots attested to that. Not a big problem, but given that the camera is not going to give you much control over shutter speed and aperature, you may find that some lighting situations give you shots that are a little less than satisfactory. Not a lot of shots are affected, but enough that you may find yourself dorking around in Photoshop to try and "save/improve" the shot.
Now, with the Image Stabilization, two things appear to be happening. First, as Canon says, for most lighting situations, the camera will bias the shot at an average of 3 stops faster. Which to me tends to produce "better lit" shots. I know that's a bit subjective, but that's what I'm seeing.
Second though, which is probably of more interest, is that the pictures are much sharper in general. As in less blurry as one measure, and sharper as another.
Not really a scientific test, mind you, but in my month of shooting I've been very pleased with the pictures and doing the A/B with the SD-450, definitely favor the SD-700 picture quality.
Single downside is that this camera is a little bigger than the SD-300 and SD-450 size. When I travel around, I often keep this camera in my pocket. I can tell that the SD-700 is a small bit bigger and heavier. Not a big deal at all for me, just an FYI.
Although, should also mention that the camera is a bit bigger because the LCD screen is bigger. Since I tend to compose and shoot from the LCD with these types of cameras, the bigger screen is appreciated.
Very pleased with the purchase, highly recommend the camera.
->Lowest Price
The SD700 IS is a good camera, but not great! I read bizillions of reviews - all laudatory - of this camera before buying it. I've had it about a month and have been using it steadily. For the most part, images are crisp, clear and accurate in color. However, Arizona sunsets - beautiful oranges, reds, and magentas - come out yellow in the view finder and on the image. VERY DISAPPOINTING. I have tried different scenes, manual settings, and white balance settings (including custom). No luck. It may be a glitch in my particular camera or this model in general, but if you are planning to shoot sunsets, I would stay away from this camera.
->Deal
I have just upgraded from a Kodak DX6490 and am amazed at the performance of this very compact camera. Going from a 10X zoom camera with an excellent lens I expected that I would be making trade-offs in performance along the way while picking up some higher resolution and a much smaller footprint. I have been very pleasantly surprised with the quality of the images that I have taken under various and often poor background and lighting conditions. I took several photos with horrible lighting and what I thought would be very difficult scenes to establish any kind of decent focus. This camera is fantastic; I have not yet taken an image that isn't very good to excellent. I'm starting to become a Canon believer.
->Deal
Just got this camera and am enjoying the Canon product for the first time. After lots of research and discussion I decided on the SD700IS. So far it has not disappointed. Very easy to use and forces an amature like myself to start educating himself. The automatic settings are precise and very reliable; yet I can tell that once I start gaining understanding about when I should apply certain elements offered in the manuel setting they will be easy to employ. Love the speedy turnaround time between shots. I also really enjoy the fact that the image stabilizing tool is valuable to the outcome of almost every auto setting shot I have taken. If I am moving...no problem. If the subject is moving...no problem. This is an easy to carry, easy to travel with, and easy to function camera that should be in the hands of all parents who want to be able to capture those unexpected moments that should be immortalized.
->Compare
I'll write more later once I use it more...
I've been messing around with settings and have been very impressed with the image quality. The camera is very easy to use and while it is very small, it has some weight to it so I don't feel I'll break it.
I've taken several videos and I have absolutely no noise in the background. Crystal clear sound and the video quality is great.
I'm so glad I got rid of my Kodak DX7630 -- this Canon is so much better!
->Buy
Had this camera for little over a week and I started getting the memory card error. Seems as though this is typical for Canon Powershot S400 but hadn't heard of it with the S700. Wondering if it is only a matter of time before others complain about it with the S700 aswell or whether it is just a fluke with my camera. Sent it back for refund.
->Deals
SD700 is a great camera! A bit pricey but the best point and shoot photos I have seen. If you are looking for a great camera to throw in your pocket on vacation this is it. Super fast when you need a quick snapshot and the photos are great! I have taken 200 photos with flash over the past few days and still have not charged the battery. It seems like the screen has been turned on for hours while I am trying to learn the menus but the battery is still going strong. Very impressed with this battery! The screen is very clear and crisp. Redeye reduction light is annoying to the photo subjects but the photos have no redeye... Image stabilizer works perfectly. Photos are crisp even when moving the camera
Beware; this camera is larger than the rest of the ELPH family but still very small. It is also very heavy (but feels really solid in your hand). Like most cameras this small it is hard to take a picture with one hand (unless you're a kid, they have small hands and have no problems with one-handed snaps). Plan on setting down your coffee to use this camera if you're a big guy.
->Deal
I have owned 2 other Canon cameras that have been work horses so I was looking forward to owning the SD700 because of the image stabilization and 4X zoom. I bought the camera in anticipation of the annual visit of my British granddaughters and began happily recording their antics through the improved video and still shots. Unfortunately, the camera stopped working halfway through the visit (one month after purchase). I sent it by overnight mail to Canon Repair and then had to wait 5 days before they could even acknowledge receipt and another whole week before it was returned by two-day express after speaking to a supervisor who promised to expedite the repair and return. Along the way I had to make several calls to Canon to determine its status since the email notifications never came as promised despite my confirming my email address with them. My granddaughters had returned home by then so I lost lots of opportunities for more photos and videos and had to squeak by with my oldest Canon. Ironically, my Apple PowerBook also went in for repairs during the same time and they sent an overnight box for packing and returning it and returned it by overnight within 24 hrs of their receiving it without any cost to me. So I'm out $25 for a faulty product and missed out on some great opportunities for pictures because of the extra delay. In hindsight I'm sorry that I didn't buy another brand that had better service options than this one. It may have great features but it's useless if the both camera and the company let you down when you're counting on them.
->Deals
Camera delivered today after appx 25 photos lens failed to retract. Screen displays "lens Error restart camera". I read manual, used fully charged battery to no avail. Paid 399 for camera and bought 2gb memory card by sandisk for 45.00. Never got to see picture quality as camera lasted about one hour before failing. I am an experienced user of digital cameras.
->Deal
Pros: (1) starts up in a nano-second. (2) no picture is blurry thanks to the image stabilization feature. (3) picture quality is very good. (4) optical zoom is 4x -- better than your average 3x. (5) extremely fast from one picture to the next.
Cons: (1) can't focus in low light (a problem with a lot of canon cameras)
I have small kids and need my camera to be fast, fast, fast to catch those split second moments. This camera does the trick.
->Comparison
First off, the pictures are stellar. I am an amateur user with a critical eye. This camera shoots awesome pics. No question. I researched different cameras and read as much as I could. I did read about the video noise problem with this one...some people had it, some didn't. I went with the benefit of the doubt and got the camera. Lo and behold, damn it. It does have a serious noise problem during video. I know, people have separate dv cameras for shooting video. So do I, but I don't have it with me at all times. I love being able to shoot impromptu videos. Alas, I am returning this camera because of this noise problem. And no, it is NOT caused by a finger over the microphone. Guaranteed. I want to love this camera. I would love it to work. If anyone could give me advice as to how to fix this problem, I would forever be in their debt. But for now, I have to let it go. Anyone have a good alternative?
->Deals
I wanted a small camera that would be extremely easy to use for people that really have no idea how to properly use a camera and this particular camera fit the need perfectly. My wife and I don't know anything about professional photography but this camera takes very nice looking pictures despite that, and it's small enough that it's not cumbersome to bring with wherever we go when on vacation. It's about the size of my flip phone, actually.
I had initially considered getting a larger camera, but decided that compact would better suit our needs. Since the pictures this camera takes are plenty good enough for what we want I'm not disappointed at all by that decision. From what I am told by a friend who knows quite a bit more about photography than myself, this camera is also a great upgrade to previous Digital Elph cameras (which, as I understand it, had some speed and occasional quality issues).
->Deals
I have been waiting for this camera. It was difficult to get sharp pictures especially the macro shots with my previous camera being small, but this camera takes sharp pictures much more easily. I do not have to rest my arms on any solid objects to get jitter free pictures. Great camera to carry around for any snap shots.
->Buy
Since the day i purchased this camera, i havnt been able to put it down.
- Ability to take great low noise shots in darker situations (indoors, night ect..) with the flash turned off.
- ISO settings are right at your fingertips.
- Pictures come out exactly the way you see them on the LCD, they are perfect everytime.
- Solid construction.
- Good macro mode for its size.
- Menu is very easy.
- Changing settings is a breeze.
- Image Stabilization makes a noticable difference when taking shots indoors.
- Perfect size,.
- This is the first digital camera i have actually used the video mode on. The videos are as clear as my video camera.The videos have to be seen.
I would highly reccomend this camera, It's the best I've owned and this is my 6th digital.This one will be with me for some time to come.
->Buy Today
This camera beats the Casio Exilim EX-Z850 in optical zoom, and as I quickly found out, that was more than enough to make up for its inferiority in virtually every other category. I know the Casio is supposed to be the better camera, but the bottom line is that the 4x optical zoom is more valuable than the white balance settings or the best shot settings. The ISO seemed to work better than the Casio's anti-shake feature as well (I got less blurry photos with the Canon than the Casio), and the Canon was definitely faster. I used the same memory card in both (Lexar Platinum II 60x), which I know doesn't mean a whole lot, but thought I'd add that all the same. I tested these cameras on my cats outdoors, flash off, underneath a tree in the middle of a sunny day. The Casio's white balance settings did shine through, but when it came time to decide, I went with the Canon because of the optical zoom, despite all the Casio's perks ($100 cheaper pricetag included). The SD700's 4x optical zoom gives me quality photos at a greater range, and that's really all there is to it. Megapixels are not even an issue (wow, they really aren't an issue, unbelievable!). I took 5 shots on this camera and realized I could get better quality photos than an 8 or 10 megapixel camera that only has a 3x optical zoom. Once Casio comes out with a 4x optical zoom, I'll be tempted to sell this camera, but until then, the steep price tag is worth it (and the only reason this camera gets a 4 out of 5).
->Lowest Price
Great product for the price. It's super easy to use, takes beautiful pictures and uploads to a computer without any difficulty.
->Sale
We bought the SD700 because of Compact Size, 4 x zoom, and its a Canon. I did a lot of online research before buying, and this camera consistently gets great review. I'd thoroughly recommend it to anyone looking for a compact digital camera.
The price is a little high, and they insist you need the high speed memory which adds to the price. I bought a 2Gig Scandisk card and it can store over 600 shots at the higest resolution.
The battery life seems excellent, so far we haven't discovered its limits, and have gotten well over 100 shots without flattening the battery, and the figure in the manual is around 250.
In the video mode you do get 'click' noises that I think come from releasing the zoom button, but otherwise the video mode works well.
On the whole we are very pleased with this Camera, it is so small compared with our 5 year old S20. I'd recommend it to anyone looking for a compact camera with good resolution and a full set of features.
Pros
Compact size
A real viewfinder (try using the LCD on the beach)
4x zoom
Cons
Pricey
Noise pickup in video
->Deal
Best digital camera we've purchased. Compact, easy to use and takes outstanding pictures!
->Affordable
This small camera fits inside a 3.25" x 4.5" leather case purchased separately. Canon's SD700 comes with a Li-ion battery that lasts longer than most other batteries and a has a compact charger. A 2GB SD memory card (purchased separately) stores more than 360 still pictures at the highest resolution! You can even take sharp movies with this gem up to 1GB in size which is something like 40 minutes. 4X zoom lens allows for close-up detail shots from far away. This is all the camera you will need for about 6 years.
->Compare
I got this camera after researching a bunch of cameras online. I decided to get this one with the image stabilization as opposed to the SD600 and I am so happy with the camera. I just got back from a trip from San Francisco and I purchased the 1 GB memory card for it and I was able to save 600+ pictures on the camera in the highest quality with ease. The pictures are beautiful and the color is amazing. There are a lot of features on the camera and if you are not a person that likes electronics or are scared of changing settings this camera is not for you. It does have a point and shoot automatic mode but for this camera, it defeates the purpose. The manual mode has a digital macro that is awesome and I have had amazing results. The DOF is not the best but considering that this is a Canon Elph - its pretty darn good. The color accent is pretty cool - when you have a shot that works with that. All around its a great camera. I think the battery lasts for me well over the 245 estimated pictures. I purchased a no-name battery on ebay (aftermarket) and I have had really good results with that battery as well. The screen on the camera is huge and has great detail when you review your pictures. The size of the camera is great and one of the main reasons that I got this camera. It is palm sized - easy to put in your purse or bag and I actually had it in my pocket for most of my trip to SanFran and I was able to hook it around my hand. Next time I will probably get the neck strap - it doesnt weigh much and I think that it wouldnt be too heavy. Like I said, this is a great camera - well worth the price - I am 100% satisfied with it and I have recommended it to my own family and friends (2 have purchased it as well and are happy with it too).
->Purchase
All of the features of the Elph with stabilization and 4x zoom! It produces fantastic pictures.
->Prices
I was recently given this camera as a gift. Quite a nice gift for sure! But... of course the person who gave it to me didnt know I had just bought myself another compact cam recently. Anyways, it was nice having two so I could compare and either give the one I didnt want as a gift myself or sell it. In short, much has been discussed about this camera, well since its a Canon, and as long as you put the Canon name on it, everyone will let you to believe its the best cam out there. Unfortunately, I tend to agree a little more with the more critical reviews, given that this is a $500 list price cam, thankfully I didnt pay for it :-) Also since I previously owned an Elph that gave me the famous E18 error - I was already very skeptical. Do a search in Google and you will see what it is. I had lost faith in the Canon compacts since this issue and I wasnt the only person in my neighborhood that this error happened to out of nowhere. So I made a promise to myself to never buy a compact Canon camera again - DSLR's are the only Canon's I will consider from now on. Also, my best friend recently bought this camera too and guess what - the whole left side of the image always came out blurry - again another clear defect a la Canon. Heres a summary of my thoughts: the good points are there - fast operations, good continous shooting, nice video mode, good zoom range (though I would have much preffered wide angle to telephoto) and decent OIS and several other well deserved points. But, the problem is the camera offers little flexibilty when it comes to manual shooting and the camera suffers from several issues for the top-end Elph its supposed to be. Firstly, the images are a little soft. 2. I see major corner softness so if you print big be prepared to see it in the larger sizes. Also, theres some mild vignetting, though this isnt terrible. 3. Major red eye, and its just not oh theres some red eye, its full-on demon eyes that are glowing fire hot red. Thus, if you post-process and want to clean it theres no detail. Not a good cam for flash shots and portraits for sure. Speaking of flash, its weak and doesnt have a very long effective range. The points about Noise are all true, its terrible at ISO800 even in the smallest print sizes and ISO400 is OK for the smallest print sizes but not for large prints. ISO200 is pretty good though and you can happily make a larger print from it. Also, the Image Stabilization system is definetely much better in the Panasonic range of cameras. More effective, but more importantly more consistent. I come back to the manual settings now, well there are none, save for Manual White Balance. It would be nice to be able to control aperture and shutter speed for a cam costing this much if you ask me. Overall, its still a nice cam and good for regular printing and holiday shooting in the bright sun and so on, but its definetely not an enthusiasts compact cam of choice unlike say a Fuji F30 - which another friend bought online and Im very impressed with, it offers more in line of flexiblity. I do not find it a coincendence that many Canon DSLR owners I know - do not use Canon Elph series cams as their second compact cam but prefer a more capable and flexible cam such as the F30 or antther camera. Especially if you are shooting low-light - this camera will dissapoint. There are several good competitors to this cam if you ask me that are worth a look - one being the Fuji F30, the others are the Panasonic compact cams that offer Image Stabilization but also lack manual control. They are a more competitive price and justify what they cost much more than this camera in my honest opinion. Still, its a nice/decent camera, if youre the type that likes to feel good about how the camera looks in your hand and only shoot in vacations, etc. and dont care so much about flexibility and control. But in this case, I would personally recommend a camera like the Panasonic FX01 or the new one that is coming out, which have almost identical features to this but at a better price and a wide-angle Leica lens! Or the F30, if youre more than a holiday shooter and want a good capable ultra-compact cam that is maybe the only camera less a DSLR that is usable in low-light.
->Deal
I used to own the Canon SD410, which I thought took great pictures, but had a long shot-to-shot lag. I was also looking for a camera with more megapixels because I do a lot of cropping for scrapbooking. I did some research and decided to buy the Sony DSP-200. Big mistake. 90% of the pictures were blurry. I went back to read the reviews and sure enough a lot of people had the same complaint. The ones who loved it claimed that the ones taking the bad pictures must have been doing something wrong. I'm not a professional photographer by any means, but I expect a decent point-and-shoot camera to have a pretty good automatic setting. I took great pictures with the SD410, why couldn't I do the same with the Sony? Needless to say, I decided to do some more research and buy another camera. I was leaning towards a Canon and after reading (more carefully this time) the reviews for the SD700 I decided that it was worth the high price tag. I've been taking great pictures again and the shot-to-shot lag is very minimal, even using the flash. The only little problem I've had so far was with the internal auto orientation. It seems to work fine when I upload the pictures, meaning that it does encode the orientation properly in the picture file, but sometimes it doesn't display it properly on the LCD. A portrait picture doesn't get rotated, but a landscape one does. It doesn't happen all the time though. I need to check if Canon has released any firmware upgrades because this looks like a bug.
->Purchase
I've happily used Canon Elph digital cameras for years; my SD700 is the fifth model I've owned in the series.
Other people have reviewed this camera in general, so I'll only compare it to the Canon SD600 which I also own (see my glowing review of that model w/comparisons to previous models).
The newest Powershot Elph camera, the SD700 adds several welcome enhancements to the Elph family, notably the optical image stabilization and the 4x zoom. Otherwise, this camera is functionally very similar to the SD600, although with rearranged physical controls. The control and menu changes take a few uses to become familiar, but make sense.
The SD700 has a tasteful two-tone casing with a new ergonomic curve for the right-hand grip like the SD630. Unlike the SD630, it does have an optical viewfinder. While it's physically almost the exact same size as the SD600/630, it weighs notably more.
There's something about the photos the SD700 takes that I don't like. I find hard to quantify what makes them not as good as the ones taken by the SD600, but they seem almost over-processed, a little less crisp, a little less sharp, kind of like images smoothed out in Photoshop. Since the Digic engine is the same as the SD600, I can only theorize I'm seeing the results of the image stabilization and/or the new lens. I didn't like the effect and switched back to the SD600. The SD700 does take slightly better indoor photos that are cleared and less prone to shake, but the difference isn't that great vs the SD600. The SD700 also has a new CCD (the device that actually captures the image) which may be the culprit.
The increase from 3x to 4x zoom didn't seem to make much of a difference in my mixed usage (I took the camera on 3 very different trips to try it out), and may be a contributing factor to the problem I describe above. Generally speaking, the "longer" a zoom lens is in a small package, the less sharp/clear it tends to be.
The SD700 still ships with the same measly 16MB SD card as the SD600 -- it's way too small for any real usage and Canon should upgrade the entry level card up to at least 64MB since SD cards are so cheap these days.
This is the first Elph model I've ever had any qualms about, and I've since reverted to using my SD600 instead of this new model. While it's still an excellent camera, and hence the four star rating, at its higher price, I can't recommend it over the SD600/SD630. Buy one of those instead, unless you really need the extra bit of zoom and plan to primarily take indoor/flash photos. I'll wait to try the new technologies again when the next generation of Elph cameras comes out...
->Purchase
I'm extremely happy with this camera! It does all the job that it's supposed to, and the (semi) manual control also does its job very well. I won't go into details of how the pictures look, etc, since other reviewers have done so extensively well. In all, I have no complaints. I'm on a Mac, and the pictures on my Mac display seemed a little bit darker than what appears on the camera display at first, but it's easy to fix (just dim the camera display a little to match the computer display or the other way around).
Also, the battery life is amazing! I admit I don't take photos every single day, but when I do take photos, I take lots and lots of photos (I've lost count how many hundreds of photos I've taken, 2/3 of them with flash on), and the battery is still running from the first charge since I got the camera (exactly 30 days ago!).
Overall, I recommend this camera to whomever in need of a point-and-shoot camera! Its small-size and lightweight is also a delight (no puns intended) to carry around anywhere. When I travel, I travel light; and if possible, I'd rather not carry anything in my hand, which is why I also purchased a neckstrap for it. I could go on forever about this little camera, but it would all come down to this: What are you waiting for, get it now! :-)
P.S. Always format new memory cards before first use!
->Deals
After owning an SD600 for 3 months, I decided to sell that cam and purchase the new SD700. I didn't think another multiplier of optical zoom and image stabilization would be such a big deal, but after taking photos WITH IS on and reviewing them on my computer, I was shocked. I never knew that a little image stabilization (no matter how steady my shot was) would improve the image quality in normal and low light conditions. I do have to admit though, the 'noise' levels are almost identical to the SD600. Pics taken in low light conditions under ISO 400 and 800 are still a tad noisy. After taking about 3 days worth of pics and reviewing them, I have to admit, this camera is a perfect compliment to go with my Nikon D50. Basically, it's great as a secondary camera if I don't feel like lugging my D-SLR and not sacrifice image quality while doing it.
->Compare
I read all the reviews of the Canon SD-700IS and decided I better write my own. This is an ultracompact camera and it does have a ton of excellent special features packed in it including IS (image stabilization) that really work! Canon's version of vibration reduction as it is called on Nikon cameras and differt things on other cameras, is IS and it works very well. The IS works especially well on a camera this small. You can mess up the picture if you try (have you ever gotton blurred digital pictures as in low light situations?) but in most cases the Canon image stabilization works great.
It always amazes me that a few people expect a point and shoot compact camera to do things that only top end (i.e. very expensive) SLR Digital Cameras are made to do like shoot in RAW or automatically adjust the ISO rating (actually it's the sensitivity of the sensor that replaces film in a digital) up to ISO 800 mode but most people who choose a point and shoot and especially an ultra compact point and shoot digital will never even try the plethora of features available on this camera. However, if you are one of those people like me who will USE the manual mode and special modes; you won't be disappointed unless you are expecting the the same results you would get from the Canon EOS SLR professional Digital cameras. Even then you have the same computer that is used on those cameras controlling the image intepreted (DIGICII) and the pictures I took under varying circunstances were excellent except where I goofed up.
The 700IS will do everything 99% of everything the people who buy a compact digital for better than most cameras in it's price range. Its 4X optical zoom, excellentlens quality, great image stabilization, the DIGIC II image processor, it's 2.5" LCD, excellent and easy to use menu system, and one thing many people forget until they need it--- it still has a basic (if tiny) viewfinder to compose pictures in very low light which I really miss on my Sony W7 compact digital!
It is a great buy, has very good battery life in it's proprietary rechargeable battery, a very decent flash built for an ultra compact, AUTO mode, manual mode, a nice macro mode, and if you want them special modes: Portrait, Foliage, Snow, Beach, Fireworks, Underwater, Indoor, Kids & Pets, Night Snapshot, Color Accent, and Color Swap. I own several Sonys, virtually all the Nikons up to the D200, but this is the first ultra compact Canon that impressed me above all the other ultra compacts and compact cameras.
->Lowest Price
I, like a lot of people, have been anxiously waiting to get my hands on the Canon SD700 IS. Well, I've owned it for about two weeks and my conclusion is that I am pretty disappointed with the SD700. It was more hype than anything concerning the IS and the higher ISO settings. Whilst most of the outdoor pictures came out okay, it still failed to produce sharp and detailed pictures. The SD700 just lacks the "crispness" I was expecting; my old SD500 (SD550 is the same camera, btw) blows it away. Biggest drawback of the SD700: weak flash. This is very important because without a strong flash, your outdoor pictures will come out on the dull side with evidence of graininess (e.g. skies, buildings, people, trees, leaves). When there is ample lighting, however, such as at the beach, pictures are decent but still inferior to the SD500; again, due to weak flash. Another drawback of the SD700 is its smaller sensor size. Why did Canon opt to go with a smaller size? IMO, they should've stuck with the same sensor size found on the SD500. The smaller senosr size, in essence, gives you dark corners (very true when the sky is present in the background - you'll definitely notice slight vignetting on the upper left and right hand corners; it is very annoying to say the least). Then there is the issue of blurriness (you'll tend to see this on either the left or right corner of your pictures). I can't believe people who gave this camera a very high mark didn't mention the aforementioned problems, as they are common complaints addressed by SD700 owners at various online camera forums. Again, when comparing to my SD500, the SD500 produces superior images - pictures are sharper and more "alive" out of the box, has more details, better contrast of colors. Indoor pictures is a mixed bag. In certain situations, pictures do come out nice (e.g. inside a department store); in darker conditions such as your room, museum or restaurant, you find yourself raising the ISO level, up to 400 (ISO 800 is worthless; it's nothing more than a marketing ploy). I had to use a noise remover program to get rid of the noises, which I must say, did a very decent job. If you are doing a lot of indoor shooting, I highly recommend the Fuji F30. I love Canon cameras but I have to concede the F30 is a superior camera in the low-light department. Reason I didn't purchase this camera was because it uses the XDcard. But main reason for not purchasing the F30 was because outdoors pictures come out inconsistent (strong purple fringing, blown out shots, lacks details when compared to Canon pictures). The SD700, respectively, wins in the outdoor department.
Biggest pluses of the camera are obviously the IS feature and macro shot capability. But these two positive atrributes of the camera don't justify the hefty price tag of the camera; even when the camera is on sale, the SD700 is overpriced.
Bottom line: If you can deal with having to post-process a lot of your pictures, not to mention the issues I addressed, then the SD700 might be the camera for you.
I'm going to be sending the camera back and wait for the release of the next generation model of the SD700 that will hopefully make drastic improvements on the said issues.
->Comparison
I travel a lot and my previous camera, while very good, was bulky and had to be carried around my neck on a strap. I wanted one that I could slip in my pocket and this one is so very good for that. It gives an excellent picture, and with the image stabilization, it makes it simple to grab the camera out of my pocket and take that quick shot while on the go. I bought a backup battery, but I don't think I need it -- the battery seems to last forever and quickly recharges with the included charger that works on 220V as well as 110. I bought a 1 gig chip for it, and that is definitly needed. The one that comes with it is not good for going on trips, but with that size chip I can put all the large size high res photos on I need for a 2 week trip. You might consider the 2 gig chip.
->Deal
Although I am no expert, I have to say this is the best camera I have ever owned. It is easy to use and takes excellent photos. Its not much bigger than a pack of smokes, so its easy to take with you almost anywhere. I am happy I bought this camera.
->Prices
This is the latest addition to Canon's Elph series. While it offers something no other Elph has ever offered with Image Stabilization it lacks in many areas. As an S400 owner I recommended my family to purchase the SD700 as a good P&S compact as it got very good reviews. While it may work for my mom and dad with its easy controls and good enough picture quality for them (they know nothing about phtography and wanted an easy camera), I find it quite dissapointing actually. The nice things are: Good continous shooting, OK battery life, 4x zoom and the presence of an optical viewfinder. The bad points however all have to do with image quality unfortunately. Firstly, this camera suffers too much from corner softness. The images are just not as consistent as my camera or some of the other Elphs and the softness is quite noticeable at larger print sizes (not at the small sizes however). The blurry effect I do not like at all. Also, the images are a little too soft for a P&S. If it was a DSLR it would be OK as with post-processing sharpness can be gained but for a pure P&S I dont like soft images out of the box at all. The ISO range has gone up now to 800. But this is actually a trick. What Canon used to do was understate their ISO's by almost 2/3rd of a stop. Thus ISO400 on the older Cam's was almost as senstive as ISO800 on other companies Cam's. Now Canon have fixed that issue and state their ratings more correctly so ISO800 is just correctly labeled now. And well, the ISO800 image is very very grainy and looks terrible even as a 4 x 6 print, ISO400 is also very grainy but definetely better. ISO200 is fine and is pretty decent. So the camera is quite bad for low-light shooting and if you do any of that be prepared to be dissapointed. Also the AiAf system may well be the worst metering system ever produced. It was the same with my S400. Etiher way it really does not meter accurately and fails too often to expose an image correctly. Also, the images are a little oversatured too with the reds being the worst (too bright and neon like) and the greens having a yellowish tint. On a side note I found out about the Fuji F30 too late unfortunately, I actually had a chance to use it recently as a friend bought one and it got excellent reviews online and it is indeed a very nice instrument. Of course, that camera is not perfect either (no P&S is for that matter) and has some of its issues as-well but if I had known, I would have made my parents get the F30 over this anyday. In fact, I am heavily considering getting one for myself as its time to update for me and I am very put-off by Canon's latest Elph efforts. Like I said the F30 has my very serious consideration and I will probably get that camera if I decide to stick with compact cam's - though I havent decided fully yet - as I may move the DSLR route instead (probably a Canon or Nikon) - but If I dont go that way, I know Canon aren't getting the rather hefty price they ask of me for this cam - that's for sure. Overall the SD700 is a decent-to-OK camera but let down big-time by the issues I mentioned above - especially considering it is also overpriced for what it is - which made it an even greater let-down.
->Compare
I love my sd700is. The image stabilization is a plus. And the large screen is beautiful. No more squinting. I also like the fact that Canon has lightened up their product line. The best feature of Canon cameras is hte panorama feature and the Photostitch software. We went to Alaska and Hawaii and came back with amazing 12 image panoramas. The camera is easy to use... and so it the photostitch software.
->Sale
The other 2 reviewers on this page are accurate in their reviews. Read them for their detail. They missed one fatal flaw to this camera. It's the auto focus, aka AiAf. I've used the Canon SD 500 and SD 550 without Image stabilization (IS) and loved the cameras. (Never had a bluring problem with these non-IS cameras) Canon can do no wrong (so I thought) in photography. I bought the SD700, blind without testing. The AiAf auto focus, auto multiple sensing zones, are lazy/not as active as the SD 550 or SD 500. Auto focus will tend to offer only one zone instead offering 2 zones. The 2 zones are important. They average the focus areas yielding an intuitive dept of field. Frequently, even in bright day-light when depth of field should be quiet wide, a critical area of the picture will be out of focus with the SD 700. I have turned off the AiAF and now manually focus using the fixed center box. That cures the problem, but makes you work a bit harder for the shot. Ease of point and shoot is lost. Shutterbug Sept 2006, just rated pocket cameras. The Nikon P3 was the top choice. I would look at this camera if buying again or buy ths SD 550.
->Discount
I just got this camera, and it's truly great, but I am biased towards the Canons (it was replacing an SD450, which replaced an S400...). However, the really big thing for me about the SD700 was not the Image Stabilization, as cool as that is, or the extended battery life--it's the LCD. It's so big and clear (way more pixels than I'm used to) that I can actually take a bunch of photos of something and then GO THROUGH THEM RIGHT ON THE CAMERA. This is huge for me: I used to shoot number of photos, upload them to the computer, go through them, put it off, never get to it, and basically, get a year or more behind as far as going through pictures and weeding out the 75% I didn't need. Not any more! I shoot pictures, and since I keep the camera on my belt, I can go through them anytime I have an opportunity. It keeps me busy when I'm waiting, and it means that I'm only really uploading mostly good photos to my computer. If I want to be really nitpicky with a photo, I can zoom in and check it out magnified, but even so, the display on this camera is so good that I usually don't even need to do that.
I love this camera.
->Compare
Canon SD700-IS Compact PowerShot Digital Elph Serial No. 2628105xxx: One of the reasons that Canon as an enterprise excels in this new world of Digital Compact Cameras, is that they have the ability to move the technology that has been refined in their flagship professional equipment, to the semi-pro or consumer gear, and on down to their "pocket cameras." This camera is an excellent example of Canon bringing over several very important Pro features. The most obvious is the large, clear, high resolution LCD display; a similar display used in Canon's $4000 pro equipment. The other important feature is the use of their effective Image Stabilization, IS. Many of the reviews I have read recently do not give full credit or understanding of this very important "candid" photographic tool. When using this camera with IS switched on, one has the ability of taking good shots at 1/15 sec or even lower, assuming that your subject is not moving. Many shots can be taken with out the Flash. Read the manual packed with the camera and experiment with this feature; you will be surprised at how powerful and easy to use this feature is.
For those wanting to know detailed features go to Phil Askey's site:
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/specs/Canon/canon_sd700is.asp.
For those wanting a quick & dirty review plus see some unedited images:
http://www.416-1100.com/gallery/1619772.
This camera has a WOW factor for any class of user. I have used and/or own the best Canon digitals and this camera adds to a great line-up of cameras. As a teaching Pro, I for one like the strong flash, and the IS feature. Another feature I like is the Auto ISO feature. This is like committing heresy for a supposed Pro, wanting any AUTO features. Well too bad; sometimes, yes infrequently, I want to spend ALL my attention on the subject, and do not want any distractions with all these settings. I am a technology person, and read all the documentation two or three times. No matter, many sometimes I look for the Green Dot, telling me the camera is ready to AUTO expose and the Focus is spot-on ready... and I'll go full auto... It works well too. Some other notable features is the ability to turn on a GRID, superimposed on the LDC screen; this is very helpful if you are taking shots and desire to have the camera in synch with the horizon or an edge of a building. Another surprise feature, is when you are viewing shots, if you took a variety of portrait and landscape modes, when viewing shots, if you rotate the camera the image rotates automatically. What this means if you take a portrait shot, instead of seeing a much smaller thumbnail, just rotate the camera body and the portrait shot auto rotates to fill the LCD screen; very cool feature. The images shown are not fancy hand picked ones. They are straight from the camera with no editing whatsoever.
In comparing the Canon SD700-IS (N) Compact PowerShot Digital Elph with SONY's DSC-T30, which are similarly sized, priced and featured, both cameras take great videos and snap-shots in a variety of circumstances. I would rate this as a tie-vote overall. Feature wise, the T30 does have their bright 3" screen, and 7.2 million pixels, however, the SD700 (90 x 57 x 26 mm / 3.5 x 2.2 x 1 in) is 5mm shorter in overall size than the T30 at (95 x 57 x 23 mm /3.7 x 2.2 x 0.9 in); however, Canon's SD700 has a 4x zoom lens giving the equivalent of 35-140mm focal range. In shooting modes; the T30 is a bit more sensitive for low light images, having an ISO capability of Auto, 80, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1000 with the Canon having ISO capabilities of Auto, 80 ,100, 200, 400, 800. If you are into Macro modes, the T30 is a clear winner here in that it has two macro ranges letting you shoot to as close as 1cm. Also the focusing is superior at these close ranges, I had difficulty getting the Canon camera to focus at the point where I wanted it to focus, when taking the "bug shots." As I have stated before, picking a point-and-shoot camera is like buying sandals, a very personal choice. If you stick to the most popular brands (Canon, Sony, Nikon, Pentax, Panasonic, Casio) and buy a current new model, US$400/500; they all will take great shots once you are familiar with the controls, etc. Do not buy prior years' sale models. Too much is happening with digital, and 24 months (ago) is a whole generation in dog-years for cameras.
->Purchase
With all those digital camera models that are out on the market today, how does one choose? I've currently been a fan of Nikon in the past, previously with my Coolpix 7900 and I'm happy to say that I'm glad I switched to the SD700. I've been reading tons of reviews on it and I finally took the plunge and got it. At first I was skeptical, but after a few days of shooting, I was glad to have purchased it! The look and feel of the camera is solid. The battery charger is compact, no cords, it just plugs right into the wall. Battery life is pretty decent. The camera starts right up instantaneously. I highly recommend purchasing a high speed SD Memory Card such as a SanDisk 1GB Extreme. When taking a picture with this card with the camera, it automatically writes the image to the card without any delay. Picture quality is excellent! The images are sharp (very important to me). The image stabilization is a nice feature too when shooting indoors with flash but be aware that the pictures may come out "grainy" because the camera is shooting at a higher ISO to compensate for low light conditions. This is to be expected with any camera and should be a given. The flash recharges quickly. The LCD screen is great; 2.5" LCD. Be careful, screen is easy to scratch. Perhaps purchasing a screen protector might be useful if you are concerned about the upkeep of the screen. Also be aware that there is no shutter or aperture priority modes although there are lots of "preset" scene modes that will compensate for this as well. This camera is meant to be a compact camera and with that, you paying more money for a great point and shoot camera with little or no manual control. You can manually adjust some of the exposure settings and white balance. You can also adjust saturation, sharpness, and choose to shoot in black and white and sepia. Another neat feature is that when viewing pictures in playback mode on the camera, the picture tilts depending on how you hold the camera! For example, if I shoot a portrait rather than a landscape and view it back, the picture rotates according to how you hold the camera! No more rotating the camera based on the image, the image rotates on how you hold the camera!
User interface with the camera is excellent. I was pleasantly surprised how easy it was to navigate through the camera settings via the menus. There is an optical viewfinder but you'll probably won't use it. In fact, it really doesn't serve any purpose. Definintely use the LCD screen when shooting. Taking pictures in macro mode was amazing. I was surprised at the results given how close up you can focus on small objects.
As for video mode, when I buy a digital camera, I buy it for taking pictures, not taking videos! Although it's nice to have, it's something that you may or may not get use out of. There has been some feedback that playback and recording of video mode for the SD700 has been somewhat questionable. However to be honest, please ignore it. If you're serious about taking videos, please buy a nice digicam for the best results.
Drawbacks? The only one I have is I wish Canon would have put in the time and effort to make the dial on the camera something other than plastic. It's going to get a lot of use when switching to different modes of the camera and I wish they would have made it more "solid". It's like sewing on a cheap button on an armani suit. They should have made the dial better quality, perhaps metal?
Overall, definitely keep this camera on your list for when reviewing and comparing. It's probably one of the best point and shoots ultracompacts with image stabilization out there on the market. Canon has been in the business for many years and its a brand you can trust. The price has come down somewhat but its worth the money. I highly recommend purchasing the Canon accessory kit that contains the case and extra battery.
->Lowest Price
After much research, and deligation, I decided to buy the canon SD700 IS. It is one purchase that I will not regret. The big up from the SD630 and this camera is the IS (image stabilization). The extra hundred so is completely worth it. The manual controls are very intuitive, and you can have complete control over this camera with very little work. The viewfinder is a little worthless, but with a 2.5" LCD, I don't mind the optical not being great.
One thing that everyone has been complaining about is the poor audio quality in the video mode. I don't know about the rest of you, but I thought this was a digital CAMERA. You buy a camera to take great pictures, dur. A digital camera is not going to take great video, that's why you buy a digital CAMCORDER. Buy something for the primary function. This camera takes great pictures in the dark, light, rain, shine, indoors and out. That is all I want out of a digital camera, and the Canon SD700 does it wonderfully. With ISO 800 and IS, this camera will out perform any ultracompact and even compact in its price range. You are paying more, but you are getting every pennie's worth.
->Best Price
hi to all the readers,
ive to say that the sd700 is a nice improvment over the previous models and its one of the best compact digital cameras in the market (there are around 5 cameras that are better), it has very good picture quality, you get low noise (grain) also in iso 200 and a bit higher, large and sharp lcd screen, it looks stylish it even has an optical view finder thats not so common nowdays in digital cameras, and ofcourse the picture stableiser is a special and good feature that many cameras dont offer.
on the other hand there are some issues that bug me and the biggest is the price, its to expensive for what it gives you especially when i can see in the market 5-6 or even more cameras that give you much more for less money, this model is not a brand new one but an improvement of its previous models, it wasnt made tottaly new out of scratch but it takes many parts of the previous SD models so i really dont understand why its much more expensive then other brands, especially when you think of it and realise that there are some 5-6 and even more models from diffrent brands that give you more camera for less money, some of these cameras have really cool features and many more manual posibilities, and technical stuff taken from SLR cameras and fitted into them.
as a camera i would rate it at 4.25 stars and its because of its price i would rate it 3.75 stars, in average its around a 4 star camera.
->Deal
It took me a ton of research & several camera test-drives/returns before I finally got to this diamond in the rough. I was looking for a replacement to my previous compact camera & was debating between a Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ7, Canon PowerShot S3 IS & the Casio Exilim EX-Z850. I know what you're thinking... The Lumix & the S3 are NOT compact... It was extremely difficult to find a compact camera that had features of the aforementioned products & I didn't want to go DSLR (though the entry level Canon Digital Rebel XT had me drooling). The S3 IS blows the SD700 IS out of the water, but was too big to fit in my pocket or my wife's purse. The Panasonic Lumix took decent pictures but felt as if it weighed less than a bag of chips. Construction felt cheap, it looked cheap, the IS didn't work as well as advertised, so back to the store it went. The Canon blew away the Casio in every way imaginable. Side by side photo comparisons between the two proved the inferiority of the Casio's image quality. (Purple fringing, objects out of focus, etc... - Check out dpreview & dcresource for sample images) Video quality is awesome though the microphone is in a very illogical location. (Regardless, you're not paying for a camcorder) I needed something that can take amazing, on the spot pictures (mainly indoors ) w/ little or no user interaction (due to my wife's fear of bleeding edge technology) for our newborn. I've been in situations where the perfect, once in a lifetime picture opportunity arises & the slightest of movement causes the camera to blur images beyond recognition. Breaks your heart... Not with this guy though... The IS works so well, I've purposely tried to take bad pictures by shaking the camera up & down, side to side, in circles, etc... 9 times out of 10, the picture comes out perfect. Blown up in Photoshop & focusing on background objects, they still look great. I could go on & on with this review but I'd rather stick to something short & sweet...
All in all, if you want SOME of the functionality of an entry level DSLR, more optical zoom than a typical compact & spectacular Image Stabilization, then this camera is for you... This is the closest I've seen to a compact point & shoot that can effortlessly take amazing pictures that can hang w/ the big boys. The price is a bit steeper than most but so well worth it... I bought mine from Dell during a 15% off sale + paid .99 for a stackable $35 off coupon from EBay & paid $389 out the door w/ FREE shipping... Zero regrets...
->Compare
The quality of the photos this camera takes are incredible. Its interface is easy to use and the image stabilization is really a substantial leap forward in no-flash photography - the difference is pretty amazing. Canon did a nice job with this camera.
Do not spend the $17 on the AC adaptor it will not charge your battery in the camera, only allow you to run the camera with a battery shaped plug in the battery slot of the camera - totally worthless.
Mac Owners: I own a Mac and this camera is an absolute nightmare with i-photo- which routinely notes that the .jpg files on the camera are an "incompatible file type". Even using the Canon software which interfaces relatively smoothly with i-photo I have had many trying times getting my photos uploaded to my Mac. Definitely not the plug-and-play transfer I was accustomed to with my older Nikon. I have managed to get all my photos off the camera and onto my Mac, but it requires a lot of patience, manual selection and downloading (which if you take lots of photos is a drag), and general fussing with both camera and the Canon software. Hopefully some type of software upgrade for either i-photo, Canon software or both will be forthcoming.
->Purchase
There have been several complaints of a noise when shooting videos. I had the same problem, but it was on some of my videos and not on others. I finally figured out that the noise was created when you are shooting and you accidently cover the small microphone in the front with your finger. this problem has since gone away with this discovery. Everything else about this camera fantastic. Easy to use and takes incredible pictures, fast, durable and is a must buy if you are looking for a great point and shoot. I have had several point and shoots cameras in the last 6 years, and this one is the best by far. If you are looking for a better camera, than you must spend more money on a Expensive SLR. Otherwise this is the best point and shoot out there today!!!!!!
->Buy Now
I have studied and read every review about all the compact cameras and felt that the SD700 would be the best choice by far. High quality pics with optical image stabilization is great. The only thing that concerned me was that some people complain about the noise when taking videos. I plan on doing a lot of videos with this camera and this was a big concern of mine. Strangely enough, the other websites with reviews never mention this. Only Amazon reviews.
Well, the camera arrived today and I was very excited by the size and feel. The first thing I did was take a video to see if the complaints were valid or not. I played the video on my laptop and I was shocked at how bad the sound was. It sounds like constant static. It's not real loud, but its very obvious that there is noise throughout the entire video. I turned IS off thinking that this might get rid of the buzzing noise. But no luck.
On a side note, some people have complained that the video files are not compressed and take up a lot of space. I agree with this as well. The videos are AVI files and they require 2MB per second of video.
I hate to say this (REALLY hate to say this), but I have to go back to studying more cameras and find another choice. The pics are wonderful and IS really works magic. But the noise is a deal breaker. If you plan on doing any videos at all, the sound quality on this camera is unacceptable.
------ UPDATE --------
I went back to the camera store to research the noise issue some more. I thought that maybe they would have a SD700 without the noise problem. So I took in a memory card to the store and literally did "silent movies" of different SD700s as well as different styles of cameras altogether. When I got home I analyzed the video and they ALL have the background noise that I'm complaining about. It's not just a SD700 problem. So my theory is that since the microphones on these cameras are just microscopic dots, then you really can't get a decent quality audio out of them. You need a much larger microphone with wind protection to get quality audio. So this isn't a SD700 issue, it's with all compact cameras.
->Lowest Price
Stepping up from my Canon S40 to the Canon SD700 was the perfect choice for me. Since deciding that my old S40 wasn't up to pair with the versatility and compact size that I needed, I looked on Canon's website to see what new cameras were on the market. I compared three basically similarly built cameras: Canon's SD600, SD630 and SD700. Wow! I thought. List price of $499 for a camera? With the only difference being an added viewfinder, the color variations on the body and image stabilization?
Is this camera really worth it?
Being a VERY touchy / feeling / must test something out in person kind of gal, I went to Costco and Ritz Camera before finding a floor model at Best Buy. There, I was able to compare the SD 700 with Sony's 8.1 megapixel contenders and Nikon's family of digital cameras. I poked. I prodded. I made movies. I rationalized. I bought it.
I haven't looked back in regret since.
This camera is a powerhouse: It's small, quick to start, and you can use digital zoom while recording in video mode. The internal color filters while in SCN mode are a big plus: the less time I have to spend in Adobe Photoshop, the better.
Plus, the SD700 can even fit into my smallest bag WITH my keys and my wallet. This feature alone makes me want to take it everywhere with me. You never know when opportunities to take photographs may arise. And yes, I actually DO like the fact that like the SD600, this camera has a viewfinder. Personally, I thought the size of the LCD screen in the SD630 was too large. The black contrast matting surrounding the preview LCD screen in the SD 700 is perfect and just right.
Like Cameron below me, my zoom is quiet and I do not have a noisy video problem. You can change the exposure settings and shutter settings in limited variables. So far, this has not been a problem for me.
This camera works great while synching with my iMac and iPhoto.
If I had to do it all over again (including my week of internet research and in store questions) I'd choose this camera in a second. It has everything I wanted in my upgrade and I'm very satisfied with it. If you buy this camera, I'm sure you'll feel the same way.
->Sale
This camera is near perfect. I love the ability to have a compact camera that does great image-stabilized video (and pictures).
The big negative, as others have mentioned, is the noise issue. It is coming from the lens image stabilizer, which inherently makes noise. That normally wouldn't be a problem, but the microphone is too close and picks it up. All my videos have poor, crackly audio, which is a shame, since that's the main reason I bought the camera... great videos.
Also, two controls are very awkward to use - the On/Off switch and the mode selector (they are better on the SD 630).
All in all, very good camera, but still needs some of the initial bugs worked out.
->Compare
Camera is great but no camera is perfect.
I have been waiting for 2 months for this camera, and for the most part it was worth the wait.
A few things that irritated me the most compared to my previous Sony camera were :
a) resolution of the screen (not of actual photo, those were great)
b) the battery/memory compartment squeeks a lot
c) noise of the zoom
d) cheap plastic dial.
Overall I give it 4 out of 5 but I am not sure it is worth the high price....
I will keep mine though
->Sale
I love this camera --that is everything except the high pitch whine that starts when it is turned on and won't stop until the lens is zoomed. Canon is not aware of prob. but 3 diff cameras at Best Buy did the same thing. I hope they can correct this as this camera is very good otherwise. Fast and solid construction and good looks. After zooming lens you can still hear a low level static if you put it up to your ear. Sounds like motor is still running.