Rating: 
Summary: First Thoughts - Updated
Review: This is my second digital camera. For about 3 years I have been using a Canon A5 (0.8 Mpix, fixed lens) with Adobe PhotoDeluxe. So the S404 was a big step up for me.I just got the camera 3 days ago. Most of my playing has been test pictures to get used to the camera and see how it reacts under various conditions. (I've had it 7 months now and I find that it is an excellent camera). I am using Powerx 1800 batteries and they seem to work fine. With probably 30 min of "on" time the battery indicator bar is still solid. (Battery life is indeed excellent - I take about 30 - 70 pictures a week and recharge the batteries about every 3 weeks whether they need it or not) The camera recognized the 256 Mb Viking CompactFlash card as soon as I inserted it. It shows a capacity of 123 images at highest resolution. Uploads to Windows XP are very easy - Just plug the camera into a USB port, turn it on, wait about 5 sec for the computer to recognize it as an external drive, then drag and drop. Transfer rate is good. 14 hi res images took less than 2 min. The Image Viewer Utility to convert color space is an extra step, but it is pretty easy, can be done in the batch mode, and doesn't take very long. I haven't tried it yet, but I suspect that in a pinch you could probably get the same color results with any good image editor. (Indeed, you can) The camera is easy to use. My only two complaints are things I knew about up front. The camera is a little bulkier than I wanted (but still less than most of its competition). Second, I have had a couple of pictures where the autofocus missed the mark, but I think this just means I have to be a little more careful to get a good green light before shooting. (The auto focus works fine as long as you are sure you have a solid green light). All in all, this is a great camera, made even greater by the copy of Adobe Photoshop Elements which I bought at the same time. I doubt if you can truly appreciate the value of a hi res digital camera without a first class image editor to go with it. Photoshop Elements sure fits the bill. (I continue to be an enthuiastic fan of Photoshop Elements but I like version 1.1 better than the new version 2.0).
Rating: 
Summary: Disapointed with Minolta
Review: We bought this camera about a month and a half ago, and it has been nothing but trouble since the day that we bought it. We can only take a few pictures before it turns itself off, and says that the batteries are gone. Or it will not turn itself off, but will not take pictures. The pictures have been mediocre, and it takes forever to turn on and be ready to take a picture. We went into the store wanting a Canon S45, and let ourselves be talked into this piece of junk. What a big mistake.
Rating:
Summary: I hate this camera
Review: We bought this camera about a month and a half ago, and it has been nothing but trouble since the day that we bought it. We can only take a few pictures before it turns itself off, and says that the batteries are gone. Or it will not turn itself off, but will not take pictures. The pictures have been mediocre, and it takes forever to turn on and be ready to take a picture. We went into the store wanting a Canon S45, and let ourselves be talked into this piece of junk. What a big mistake.
Rating:
Summary: Super Camera!!
Review: We wanted to upgrade from our 1 MP camera and have been looking at the Minolta Dimage series for several months. We finally bought a Kodak DX3900 and it was an awful camera! We were able to get our money back and we immediately ordered the Minolta Dimage S404. We got it just in time for our Colorado vacation and the pictures are awesome! We now have beautiful mountain pictures that we can enlarge and print. I've already done some printing and the pictures look like 35mm photos. I have read that some people complain about having to process the pictures through special software. We tried this processing, but didn't see a difference. We have very vivid color just using our regular photo editor. It isn't time consuming to use the Minolta software though. I would highly recommend this camera to anyone. It's great for point and shoot and gives you more professional settings if you want to use them. We've had great luck with the auto settings so far.
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