Canon PowerShot SD850 IS ELPH Digital Camera

lens will not retract

Posted Apr 18, 2008 - Got the camera for Christmas. It's April and the lens will not retract. Website FAQ is not working properly -- can't get any answers. I guess we'll try to send it in for repair. Very disappointed.

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Powershot SD850

Posted Sep 4, 2007 - I bought the camera because I wanted to have a small compact camera that would allow me to not carry my large digital DSL when walking around town. But the camera had to have enough mp to allow 8 x 10 photos. I did my research & this camera was highly recommended. I must say that the camera perfectly satisfied my needs. I went on vacation in July and snapped about 2500 pic with this camera. It work flawlessly. By having the camera with me at all time in my pants pocket, I was able to capture pics on buses, subways, museums, etc. The photos are sharp and almost as good as my Nikon D70. I also purchased the underwater housing and, it too works great. Notwithstanding the window of the housing, the photos were sharp & clear. There are almost too many features in such a small camera and it took some time getting used to how to get to the functions. For example, I needed to turn off the flash and/or adjust the exposure compensation in some of my shots and had a difficult finding the menu for the exposure compensation dials. (Should have read the manual) Anyway, I was able to find the shut off dial for the flash quite easy and believe that this cut-off and on feature is very accessable. I had to go to the manual for the exposure control. And admittedly, most persons using a compact would not need this feature. But it works great. The price $350-$370 is reasonable given the features and number of mps. It's more of a high-end type compact for individuals who are knowledgeable re photography. Given its size, there is no reason not to have a camera at one's disposal 24/7.

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Great little camera

Posted Jul 8, 2007 - I have been using this camera for a few days now and am in love with it. It is replacing a Canon Powershot A75 which had the CCD unexplainably die recently. The camera is nice and small and easily fits in my pants pocket. Normally these little point and shoot cameras don't have all the feature of the larger point and shoots, but this one matches them and more. Canon has pumped this thing with a plethora of shooting modes, a movie mode, manual mode, 4X optical zoom w/ optical image stabilization and more. I am very pleased with the shots it takes in all lighting conditions and zoom factors I have thrown at it so far. Of course, I would still recommend a tripod for night shots despite the IS. The only major cons I have found are the battery life (much less than my old A75 which ran on 4 AA batteries) and the lack of a digital viewfinder (although there is an optical one available which is acceptable). I don't think I could expect much more in such a small package.

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Great Images, Great Image Stabalization, Very Tiny and Fragile

Posted Sep 11, 2007 - This camera is a great camera and well worth the money. I would definitely recommend this purchase. The only problem I have had with it is when I dropped it, the end is now not flush with the body of the camera (but still functional). It is very compact and even for my small hands easy to lose grip of. However, compared to other Canons I can appreciate its size. Great Canon image quality and the image stabilization is great as I have shakey hands.

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the TRUE successor of the award-winning SD700

Posted Jul 10, 2007 - Canon's model number can be confusing. there are SD700, SD800 SD900 SD1000 and now this SD850. SD700 was one of the DPreview top picks for its rich features and great pic quality. All SD800/900/1000 are not really the true successor of SD700. Now the SD850 is out and it has all the features of SD700 with improved hardware, including 4x zoom and 8M pixel, optical stablizing and DGIII processor. No wonder this is one of the best compact digital cameras you should checkout. It does not have wide angle like SD800, which I guess is difficult to have along with great pic quality on such a compact camera. In addition, I read somewhere the frame is no longer real metal. It still looks/feels very nice though. I hope in the future, they could have some video processing built in. Currently the raw avi format can only record 20min video on my 2GB SD card.

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Nice camera, but not perfect

Posted Jul 29, 2007 - I have the Japanese version (IXY 810 IS), but it is identical to the US & Europe versions (PowerShot SD850 IS & IXUS 950 IS) AFAIK. I bought this to replace a 2 year old Casio EX Z750 whose autofocus problems caused me to lose many good photos. I chose the Canon after narrowing down my choices from comparable offerings from Fuji (F40fd) and Panasonic (Lumix DMC-FX33). From the moment I popped in the battery after charging it - I was fairly impressed. Some points to ponder: I had thought the controls were a bit awkward - but after a bit I found I was incorrect. Basic controls can be accessed by slighly flexing a ring in the direction of the icon you want, and these expand a bit on the LCD screen. Nice touch! You change shooting modes (play, auto, manual, scene, & movie) by using a partly exposed knurled dial. This seems a bit flimsy, compared to other models I saw. There also doesn't seem to be an audio recording mode (though I never used this on my Casio). The 810 IS also has an optical viewfinder, which I thought was important on the Casio - but I never used it. Taking photos is easy and quick (get a fast SD card), and the camera makes a satisfying clunk sound when you take the shot. This audio feedback is really useful, for those of us who used film cameras in the past. Probably other cameras have this, but I don't recall it on my two previous digital cameras. The face recognition is fantastic. I was aiming my camera at my daughter today, and she kept moving around bouncing her head up and down. The white face square followed her head across the screen. Image stabilization works well too, though without a flash it has a tough time in low light levels. I played with the manual setting and cranked up the ISO to the max - 1600. It took photos in very limited light, but the image was quite grainy. I think this is to be expected, though. I'll have to play with manual mode more to see its limits. Movie mode is nice (640x480) and allows me to zoom while shooting. (Many cameras don't let you zoom movies...). Also, images stayed relatively in focus upon zooming. This wasn't true for my Casio. However, I'm not sure I prefer the .avi format over the .mp4 format in my Casio. The IXY 810 IS uses a rechargeable battery, but it doesn't seem to be chargeable in the camera itself. You have to pull it out and pop it into the included battery charger. This means that when your camera runs out of battery, you can't plug it in to keep power in it. Another issue I had was with the 2Gb Panasonic Class 6 SD card I used for storage. This SD card won't mount on my Macs via a card reader after formatting on teh IXY 810 IS. In fact, you can't even reformat it via Disk Utility. So, the only way I can move content to my computers is via the USB connector and the Canon Camera Transfer software. This means you have to have a working battery to transfer photos. This is annoying, but I wonder if it is truly an issue for the Canon or for the card. I don't recall having these issues with the same card on my Casio - but my memory's a bit hazy. The third problem I have is with the macro and flash. If you use macro mode, the lens barrel actually blocks part of the flash! So you get this shadow over one corner of the image. Maybe I shouldn't be using flash anyway with macro mode. However, I imagine flash will be useful for underwater macro shots. Lets hope the flash diffuser helps with this. I would highly recommend this camera to others without hesitation. In order to get 5 stars, this camera would have to have a better charging system, as well as not occlude the flash when shooting close up. If you can live with those issues - then this is a 5 star camera.

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WOW!!!

Posted Jul 20, 2007 - I owned the 800is and i was desperately in love with that camera... One thing that i love about the 900 is it takes a mighty fine picture at night time... I love taking pictures at night and it seems to do a much better job at night then the 800. The newtime lapse feature is really cool if you have a lot of time to spend to do slow motion recording... The only downfalls to the camera is the way they changed the looks... I found it more difficult to change my different modes on the camera because the dialwas smaller. I wasnt to impressed with the touch sensitive button so i turned that off as soon as i got it.. The new iso shift is pretty cool but hard to use. when your holding down the shutter halfway and it looks like your not gonna have enough light toget a good picture, you hit the print button on the camera when it flashes and it will raise your iso... This is a great camera for someone who is looking for a more advanced point and shoot thats not quite ready for an SLR.

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Canon SD 850 IS Digital Elph Camera

Posted Sep 11, 2007 - I bought this camera a couple of weeks ago for our family trip to Cancun. The camera took great pictures outside in bright light, indoors, and during the beautiful sunsets. I didn't have a hard time with the basics...it was easy to use right out of the box. The menu took a little while to get used to. I still haven't used all the manual functions, but with the Auto settings, it takes such great pictures that I am not sure I will even bother with the manual stuff for awhile. The Image stabilizer worked wonders for my unsteady hands! The battery lasted without recharge (over 200 pics). The display is bright and clear. I don't yet know if you can time/date stamp the pics. I will say you have to be VERY CAREFUL not to drop the camera...it's so smooth and light it easily falls out of your hands...make sure to use the wrist strap. I highly recommend this camera to anyone from novice to experienced users.

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Canon did it again!

Posted Aug 21, 2007 - This camera does everything well. It produces excellent quality pictures. The image stabilizer does actually work and you get perfect pictures everytime even though you have shaky hands and don't use a tripod. The price is just right for all the features you get. My only complaint is that it is not as thin as the famous SD600 model.

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PoweShot SD850IS Elph

Posted Aug 8, 2007 - Love the camera. It is small, sleek and light. Because of the tiny size, the camera would not be good for someone with little dexterity in his or her fingers. There are many auto focus settings which are great for photographers of all ages. Only complaint – there is no auto focus setting for shooting action shots. Canon suggests the use of the kids and pets setting but it does not take clear pictures of sports activities.

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Beware the Canon warranty

Posted Mar 4, 2008 - I purchased the Canon SD850 IS 6 months ago and have used it regularly. It suddenly stopped working - the lens would not retract. I sent it to Canon for service under their one year warranty. They decided that it would not be "economically feasible" to repair the camera and have sent it back to me still broken. Canon "customer care" says that the technicians found "water damage" even though the camera was never around water and worked fine up until the moment it stopped. Clearly, if they don't want to repair something a customer sends back, they can just say "water damage" and they are off the hook. No recourse for me, no appeal process, nothing for me to do but warn others. It was a nice little camera, but if it is only going to last 6 months, forget about it.

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Great pocket camera

Posted Jul 27, 2007 - I tried the SD800 IS before buying this and I think this is a better camera based on the image quality of photos that are shot inside the house. Most of the cameras of this size do have bleeding near the edges and that is very common. I have compared this to Sony T50 and this beats it hands down.

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Canon PowerShot SD850 IS ELPH Digital Camera

Posted Sep 6, 2007 - This camera works well! It is small, light and easy to use. The IS function is the most important feature, it can capture great quality pictures even with moving objects. Great!

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Canon PowerShot SD850 8.0 MP Digital Camera

Posted 1 year ago - I bought this camera for my daughter's birthday and she said it was the best present I could have given her. Her last digital camera broke and she loves the SD850. We recently came back from vacation and the pictures came out beautiful. The camera is very user friendly. She likes that it doesn't take up much room in her bag and the small size. Another plus is that it has a battery pack instead of rechargable batteries. It's very easy to recharge. All in all, would highly recommend this camera.

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Buydigs very impressive

Posted Feb 28, 2008 - I was surprised when the camera arrived 3 days after ordering it. All was in tact. I tried it and the pictures look very very good. I was disappointed in the case. Too big. I thought it would be the Canon case, It was generic. The 'film'packet I purchased extra to protect the LCD is a bit hokey. Can't get the bubbles out even after the 2nd sheet used and scraper scratched the film.

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