It's my sister's birthday tomorrow and I'd like to get her a camera to replace the canon ixus that recently drowned in the bath. I've got about £250 ($400) to spend and I'm looking for a P&S that's easy-to-use, (manual controls not really required), has good IQ, good video, and importantly, is very rugged. (her young children are skilled in technology demolition)
I'm certainly no expert, and don't even know if they still make them, but I have an olympus utough camera - 10m water proof, 100kg crush proof and 2m drop proof. I have had friends kids playing with it, got chocolate on it, dropped it in the pool etc and it's running strong. I haven't taken much video on it, it's prob not the best, but it takes a really good photo and is great if she is particularly after an underwater camera.
Anyway thats just my 2 cents purely because I own one and can vouch for it haha
And to add to the confusion, if the Canon was otherwise well thought of (the drowning was accidental, in other words, LOL) then check out the Canon D10. It gets very good user reviews. I don't have personal experience, but if I were in the market for a rugged P&S, I would certainly consider it.
And to add to the confusion, if the Canon was otherwise well thought of (the drowning was accidental, in other words, LOL) then check out the Canon D10. It gets very good user reviews. I don't have personal experience, but if I were in the market for a rugged P&S, I would certainly consider it.
I love my Canon D10. I take it backpacking, snowshoeing hiking, camping... I can hand it to my kids at the beach with no worries. It's been out overnight in -10F (hard on the battery life, but otherwise fine). It's been dropped, frozen dunked, strapped to a 4-wheeler and otherwise abused in ways that would kill lesser cams. My son took it in Lake Michigan and somehow opened the door covering the USB port. Water got in and fogged the lens, but the camera itself still worked. After carrying it in my pack for another week, I dried it out and it's been fine since.
It's a bit bulkier than most of the competitor cameras though. Canon is releasing the next version, the D20 which looks to be a good bit slimmer.
thanks so much everybody for the tips. I liked the idea of sticking with Canon but couldn't find the D20 - I guess it's not released yet. I'm thinking Olympus Tough now. I'll let you know how it goes, and maybe get my sister to enter some challenges...
