Rating: 
Summary: great camera for all that it offers
Review: This canon A80 is a great digital - producing great pictures and the swivel LCD viewfinder is handy. The manual contols also give this camera more flexibility than just a point and shoot camera. The camera is small though on the heavier side with the batteries but I like the design and that later I can add a zoom lens. Its a great little camera for its price and it beats all the previous power A's in its class with its new design and 4 megapixels!! Cool camera and alot of potential for learning digital photography!!
Rating: 
Summary: Quality counts - cheapest doesn't mean best
Review: I did a lot of research prior to purchasing the Canon A80 digital camera. I read a lot of reviews, many right here at Amazon. I also looked into lens quality and the quality of electronics. I read consumer report's test results. The bottom line - as with most things in life "you get what you pay for". You can find cameras with more than 4MPs, however, my research indicated that the picture quality may not be as good as Canon's 3MP A70. Digital picture quality is a mixed bag of tricks. MPs are one part of the "picture" when determining what quality a digital camera is going to deliver. I will give you my advice in each of four major purchasing catagories below.Retailer: If you take nothing more from this review, please listen to what I have to say here. The cheapest price is not always the best deal!!!! In fact I would go so far as to say that the cheapest price may be the worst deal. While searching for the best price on an A80 I called four of the cheapest retailers listed at sites like Pricegrabber. EVERY store I called was either out of cameras (surprise, surprise) or the price quoted was only good if the camera was purchased in a overpriced package. The "cheap" store would then proceed to try and sell you what "they had" - not what you wanted. After four attempts at the cheapest price, I went back to Amazon and found a price of $359.00. This price was $50.00 or more than the cheapest price, but they told me if the camera was in stock and gave me a delivery date. I actually purchased through an Amazon affiliate. I received the product on time and in good condition. Camera brand: I touched on this above. Again, the cheapest product is not always the best buy. Don't be fooled into believing that MPs alone or a fancy zoom equate to good picture quality. If you don't plan on spending in the $300 dollar range, plan on mediocre results. Now...many people will argue that a $100 camera will deliver good results - it depends on why you are buying digital. If you are buying digital to replace conventional cameras, why would you want anything but great quality. You cannot go back in time and take another picture of your child at age 2. I went digital to begin replacing my conventional cameras. Canon is not the only good brand, but it certainly rises to the top of the heap in the quality for dollars catagory. I would stick to companies that make photography their business - Canon, Nikon, Olympus, Minolta, ect.
Camera model: Do your research and have a clear picture in your mind of what you need a digital camera for. A digital camera is like a computer - it's great when it works, but a nightmare when it doesn't. Again, don't always look to the selling price as the determining factor in selecting a model. If you stick with a major manufacturer you are less likely to get junk or poor service, regardless of the model you pick.
Many people stress out over the choice of an A70 or A80. I don't think you make a bad purchase with either product. I decided that, for an increase of $80, it was worth the upgrade to the A80. Your own budget may make this decision for you. Price: I discussed this many times over. Don't let anyone convince you that a $100 dollar camera takes the same quality pictures as a $300 camera. Buy smart and buy for the long run. Buy quality and service. Do your research - read Amazon reviews and search the web for independent reviews. Pick up a Consumer Reports magazine. My opinion of the A80 - Well...after about a week of playing with it and reading the manual(I'm not finished yet) I believe I purchased a quality product with features typically found on high-end cameras. A word of caution - don't fool yourself into believing that you can move from "point-and-shoot" to this camera without first educating yourself. I think many people foolishly believe that perfect pictures can be taken by simply pushing a shutter release button - not so in the real world. If you educate yourself about the functions of camera parts and read Canon's manual carefully, I believe you will find the A80 to be an excellent product. I hope this helped.
Rating: 
Summary: Nice pictures mostly, but flash is bad
Review: I was always told that the flash is the most important part of the camera, and this flash is good, but sometimes too good. I've had several experiences in the few months that I've owned this camera when I've taken pictures of friends, only to look at the playback and see that they are totally bleached out. Then I'll retake it without a flash and it will be too dark. I've tried several settings and haven't found a solution. It's disappointing because there have been times when after having everyone stand there for several pictures, I still don't end up with a good one and have to give up.
Rating:
Summary: Great Choice
Review: Took the Powershot A80 on vacation and took over 200 pictures on the first set of batteries. There have been absolutely no dissappointments with this camera, outdoor, indoor, portrait, every picture is great. I could not recommend it more.
Rating:
Summary: A80 vs. A70
Review: Disclaimer: Before I begin let me say that I love taking pictures but am a total amateur and will not be able to explain the fine technical diffrences. I have had an A80 for 4 months now. I got it for a cheaper price than Amazon through bizrate.com at a NJ camera store. I made sure it wasn't one of the bait and switch stores through user rating and reviews. They did ask me to buy accessories but when I declined they just sent me the camera the next day. I had an A70 for about 8 months before I got caught in heavy rain and the camera CCD was damaged due to the water after giving me about 3000+ good pictures. So I went to buy another camera and thought of buying another brand and model. However after some heavy research I came back to Canon as I love the Photostitch and the other manual and photo modes. So I bought the A80 and here is the difference between A80 and A70 through the eyes of an amateur. A80 is heavier than the A70 and the corners are less well rounded. Its squarer and is surprisingly heavier than A70. But you get adjusted soon and I like the weight as I don't carry it in my pocket anyway. The plastic parts of A 70 have been replaced by metal in A 80 which explains the weight and it has a more solid feel to it and is more resistant to scratches. The flip out screen is a good addition and I have twisted it in another angle about 25% of the times. For example when you want to capture a group of people from the outside. Then you can hold it above your head to get the center of the group and still compose your shot as you can see the screen. Or when you are taking pictures of kids and don't want to neel on the ground. You can just lower the camera in your hand and twist up the screen. The same goes for landscapes. It does allow for more creativity in composing shots. The rubber flap which covered the outlets for your cable has been reduced to about 1/5th the size. And there is a better navigator button which allows you to scroll through pictures/menu etc. In the A70 the 4 buttons at the back also serve as the navigator buttons. Now they need not. And the on/off button which was very flush with the top in A70 is more raised in the A80 and more easily found in dim light. The picture modes have not changed much over the A70 except there are now 2 more modes C1 and C2 which can be customized to your liking. The biggest difference however is in the 9 point AiAf autofocus. I see that the indoor pictures taken by A80 on Autofocus are 'harsher' than the A70. Outdoors I do not see a big difference and the pictures taken in daylight are as clear as the A70 but the indoor pictures are quite different. The white is whiter than it was in pics taken with A70 in autofocus, if you know what I mean. Overall, I like the A80, especially as I got it for only a few bucks more than what I bought the A70 for (from Amazon). But I haven't quite figured out how to use it to its full advantage especially indoors. And I do prefer Canon A80 over what was available in the same price range.
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful little beast
Review: For a camera in this price range it offers quite a number of features, including those found on the more powerful G series. While it's probably too big to fit comfortably in a shirt pocket, it is nonetheless a lot lighter to carry around than the G series. I've taken a large number of shots with this camera, and I have been pleased with the results. The quality is very good, the only problem is that jpeg compression tends to obscure minute details, and it is missing the RAW/uncompressed images options. That is not much of a problem until you start to do a lot of editing of the photos, and each successive save as a jpeg results in further image degradation. This is exacerbated by the fact that the unit has a weak flash which means you'll use the higher ISO settings, leading to the use of noise reduction software. The pros of the camera:
Relatively small
many G series/EOS series features
excellent picture quality
conservative ISO levels
relatively "smart" camera in auto mode
flip-out LCD
Lens add-ons The cons:
no flash hotsync, so can't use a good external flash (granted some good flash units would probably approach the cost of the camera itself)
smallish LCD, though not a problem for me
Tight viewfinder, I actually find it hard to use the viewfinder to compose shots, since it is not TTL
manual focus is a hassle
movies limited to 320x240; the A70 can do 640x480
optical zoom limited to 3x
limited to f4.9 at full telephoto
poor auto-white balancing except in daylight, but it does have a custom function for those who absolutely need white to be.. well white.
bundled photo editing software is very limited. I think even Jasc Paintshop Pro would've been a better choice, if not some Photoshop variant. minor quibble:
no raw image capture mode There are reports that Canon cameras tend to blow out the highlights, but the fix is to use center-weighter metering instead of full metering. Grab this camera, a camera bag, 8 AA NiMH batteris and a charger, a >=128 MB CF card, some lens addons, a tripod, and a digital photography book, and you've got yourself a relatively complete digital photography setup. If you desire more SLR features without the hassle of interchanging lens, there are the Powershot G3 and G5 from Canon; C-5060 and E-10/E-20N from Olympus; F717 from Sony; and the Coolpix 5700 and 5400 from Nikon. The current crop of 8 MP cameras suffer from increased noise and image distortion, according to recent reviews.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent picture quality, top of the line camera
Review: I am a mom of a toddler and also a scrapbooker so I wanted a camera that would take excellent pictures. The Canon A80 is a bit more than I needed~ I am a point-and-shoot person and didn't care to get involved in manual modes. The Canon is fairly small and easily fits in my diaper bag~ it is a bit heavier than some other cameras but this is due to the fact it takes 4 batteries, which are well worth their weight in battery life. Even in auto mode I can take excellent pictures~ I've taken close up shots of my pets that just blow me away with how detailed they are. The colors are gorgeous and true to life. This is my third digital camera (had Kodaks before) and I can honestly say the quality of the pictures far surpasses the other two cameras I have owned (the CX6330 and the DX4900). I do have a few complaints, though~ first, the flash is a bit TOO powerful. When I take pictures of my toddler (my main photo subject) I have often gotten shots where her eyes are half-way closed, resulting in a kind of 'drugged out' look. It was suggested to me to turn off the red-eye reduction (a preflash which could be making the subject blink) and this has helped somewhat, but I still get an occasional 'drunk' look. I have compensated by staying farther away from my subject and using zoom. The flash output can be adjusted but ONLY in manual mode, which I find irritating (I think this should be something you can adjust in auto mode as well). The only other option is to turn off the flash, which is not always possible indoors. My other complaint is the shutter lag~ there is a LONG delay between the time you press the shutter button and when the shot is taken. This can be avoided if you press the shutter button half-way and do a 'focus lock' first and keep holding it half-way until you are ready to take a picture. The problem with this is when you have a toddler that is on the move you don't want to be chasing after her and worrying about doing a focus lock; also often you have just an instant to take a picture before a toddler moves her head/walks away/etc and pictures have been lost due to this shutter lag. While all digital cameras have some shutter lag, the Kodaks I owned were MUCH, MUCH faster than the Canon, with almost no lag whatsoever. I wish Canon would improve upon this! If Kodak can do it, I'm sure Canon can. There are a few ways to try to speed up the shutter~ by turning off AIAF autofocus system, turning off red eye reduction, turning off the flash, or going into manual mode (I learned on a camera site how to go into manual mode and program 'snap mode' which has a faster response time)~ however these all can compromise the picture, especially in low-light conditions. It can result in blurry pictures. Aside from those 2 complaints, I am very happy with my Canon A80. I've resigned myself to learning the manual stuff so I can have control over the camera~ I know once I am comfortable with the different settings I will probably be able to overcome the issues I've had, however I really would have preferred to stay in Auto mode. It doesn't make sense to me why in Auto mode you cannot even adjust the color settings (vivid, neutral, etc.), however you can adjust these in the P mode or in manual mode. I seriously considered returning my Canon to get another Kodak b/c of the two issues above, but I honestly find the quality of the A80 far superior to the Kodak line. I did a ton of research on camera review sites, as well as looked at many picture samples from Pbase Photo, and the Canon just takes breathtaking pictures. As I'm growing in my knowledge I'm finding I'm taking much better pictures and working through the few problems I've encountered with shutter lag and flash output. Oh, one more thing~ the battery life is outstanding. I use my camera a lot (!) and I am just in awe at how long it lasts before I have to recharge the batteries. It is simply amazing! All in all, I think this is an excellent camera for both beginners and pros alike.
Rating:
Summary: Good price. Good camera.
Review: I know nothing about photography, but wanted a camera that had some 'advanced features' but was also very simple to use. This is that camera. The picture quality is wonderful at the highest resolution - you won't be disappointed. Friends that see my pictures over the net (I've never tried to PRINT or DEVELOP any yet, so I can't attest to that - however, I imagine the prints should look exactly the same provided you choose a decent development shop?) usually say first - "WOW, that picture quality is amazing." When they know the picture is one that I took with a digital camera, I suppose they are trained to think this is going to be a 'so-so image.' In fact, many of the pictures that I take seem to turn out better than the original scene. I don't know how to describe this, and it may just be b/c I'm not a camera or photo buff, but the camera sometimes seems to add a 'gloss' to the pictures that makes them seem more professional. Point being, I love the images! As another reviewer said = "Grab this camera, a camera bag, 8 AA NiMH batteris and a charger, a >=128 MB CF card, some lens addons, a tripod, and a digital photography book, and you've got yourself a relatively complete digital photography setup." I purchased all these things for an additional $100 after I got the camera and I do feel now that I have a complete package and ready for any shot. Be warned though - this is not 35 mm and digital cameras won't be for a long time. You can still tell quite easily the difference in picture type. That isn't to say, however, that the picture quality is worse, but it is simply *different*. I wish I could elaborate better. Personally, I will always prefer being able to take 100's of pictures without worrying about film costs, development costs, etc to knowing that I'm shooting with 35 mm.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent photo quality
Review: I got this camera from OD. It has got nice features. It takes good pictures in low light. I love the macro mode in the camera.
It eats battery power. You need plenty of backup when you go on vacation.
Rating:
Summary: Stop Here!!!!!
Review: I looked for two months comparing many cameras and this rose above all the others in it's market. This is very user friendly and worth every penny. I bought this for my wife on Mothers day and she loves it. Thank you for reading and please help others by keeping all of our write ups short sweet and to the point, most importanly is honesty. Thank you
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