Heir to the elph throne.
Written: Jun 21 '03 (Updated Jun 21 '03)
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Pros: Small size, very attractive, durable construction, 4 megapixels, 3x zoom.
Cons: Price, flash, is just a point a shoot.
The Bottom Line: My opinion the best digital point and shoot camera on the market. Sexy design, proven reliability, made by a good company. Will even improve your "coolness" ratio.
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| zlmajors's Full Review: Canon PowerShot S400 / IXUS 400 Digital Camera |
Why is it that whenever I pick a product, do extensive research on that product, and then when I really do love the product the company always releases another better product shortly thereafter.
Such is the case with the Canon s400. Just 4 months ago I bought the s230 and I have been VERY happy with it. In fact I really don't have any complaints about, so why oh why did I go and try out the s400 from a friend? Because I am one of those people who are always thinking "well the grass MUST be greener on the other side".
Well I borrowed the s400 from a friend when I wanted to try it out, I am very impressed with it in most areas, but also am more impressed by one or two things on the s230. So read on and find out why.
So with that background, off to my review of the newest of the elph line of canon cameras.
Which to choose, the s230 or s400?
This is of course the question I have had to ask myself as a owner of the s230. Do I sell my s230 on ebay for 300-350$ and get a new s400 or stick with the s230?
Well the major changes to the s400 is the overall speed of it. I sat both cameras down and turned them both on at the same time, I'd say the s400 starts up a good 1-3 seconds faster than the s230. So your looking at a 2 second startup rather than the 3-5 seconds of the s230.
Of course the megapixels are bigger on the s400 but not groundbreakingly bigger. The s230 has 3.2 million pixels and the s400 has 4 megapixels. If you print out 4x6 or 5x7 without any digital zoom, you most likely will not notice any difference. The 4 megapixels will let you zoom in digitally a little more before you get pixelation though.
The optical zoom (remember optical is the important zoom, digital zoom you can do on your computer)on the s400 is a full 3x while the s230 is 2x. Not a huge difference but definently enough to notice.
Another difference I saw was the FUNC button, this I saw on the s40 and s50 models, and although I recognize that this can be a helpful addition, I am very used to the configuration of the s230.
Finally of course the last major difference is the price! Currently the list price of the s400 is $499. A far cry from the $350-399 price of the s230. The real question here is is the extra features worth the extra $100-150? Or for me is it worth putting that much more into a camera when I'm happy with my current one? Read on and decide for yourself.
This concludes my direct comparison of the s400 to the s230, the rest is a straight forward review on the s400 on its own merits.
The photo quality: A+
Any product has one thing it was designed to do, and should do well to get any kind of good score. The s400 was intended as a camera first and a chick magnet 2nd. (lol)The s400 does a remarkable job at this. The way the camera pulls in for focusing so many areas of the visible picture (9 visible points) makes sure almost every picture is pristine. I really found that I had a hard time taking a blurry picture, I had to try hard. All the images this camera takes will easily print out to 8x10 without any pixelation. What more can I say? I loved the photo quality of the s400.
Battery: A-
The elph line has been a little bit plagued by less than perfect battery usage. The s400 I believe is a bit better than the previous models but it still will only get about 130-150 shots per battery charge. Now I know that this is plenty enough for me, especially since The charger that is included is plenty small enough to transport on any trip you take. My personal opinion is this, how many rolls of film would you take on a day trip? 3? 4? 5? I'd take no more than 3 extra rolls plus a roll in the camera, at 36 exposures your looking at 144 shots, which the s400 will do without too much strain. PLUS this is with the lcd screen on, with it off (and thus draining less battery) the camera will give you closer to 200 shots. For me this isn't a big issue but for some of you, you might find it useful to buy an extra battery.
Flash: B+
Ah if there was one thing I'd change about the elph line, it would have to be the weak flashes. The problem is that the camera's are just too small to put a powerful flash. This coupled with the fact that you can't add on a external flash makes it sometimes a bit frustrating but only if you are taking pictures in the dark and of far away shots. With the s400 as with the previous models of the elph series, you won't be able to light up enough space to take dark photos longer than about 6-8 feet from the camera. I'd give the flash a good rating but is definently not a very good or excellent. This is I believe the weakest part of the camera.
Construction: A+
Oh my god one of my biggest pet peeves are products that are made out of inferior materials. The s400 is made out of brushed aluminum. Currently it it the most sturdy camera out there for the price range. The biggest problem I had with many of the other cameras I have tested is that a lot of them are made out of hard plastic. I just don't like how plastic gives a little with you push on it, makes it feel cheap. The s400 feels very strong to the touch, and the aluminum makes it look cool too. After about 6 months of owning a earlier elph I am still very happy with its construction AND it has been dropped once with no damage. Which leads me to....
Durability: A
Now because the s400 is basically an upgraded version of the s230 with most of the same technology and almost the same construction, I can safely say that the s400 is a very durable camera. I have dropped my s230 multiple times and it came away with a little scratch on the metal but because the lense retracts fully into the frame, the camera itself had no damage at all. I have been very impressed with this camera, and I can safely say the same will be true with the s400.
Another nice feature that I believe mostly falls into durability is the fact that the lense when turned off retracts FULLY into the frame of the camera, this means you aren't going to bump it or knock the camera lense cover off or anything else.
LCD screen: A-
The lcd screen is the same as the previous model, which is a 1 and 1/2 inch color screen that has good resolution. The reason for the a- is because in low light conditions the lcd screen will not show some parts of the picture, but the when you download the photo it will show up. Also the LCD screen is hard to see at certain angles. Other than those very small issues I enjoy the lcd screen on my s230 (which is the same as the s400).
Optical lense: A-
The lense on the s400 is a 3x zoom lense which is the standard 35mm equivalent lense. The canon website says that the lense is a 35-108mm lense.
Movie Mode: B+
Ah the movie mode, something I don't use much on the s230 but when I do, I can do it in 640x480 resolution. This lets you take good enough movies to supplement your camcorder, but unfortunently the s400 has eliminated the 640x480 setting instead reducing it to 320x240. This makes it hard to use it for anything but straight to web streaming movies. I am not impressed by this change. Even though they did add a mini-speaker so that when you playback the movie you can actually hear it without having to download it to your computer.
Ease of use: A+
The s400 just like the previous elph models are designed to be a point and shoot camera at heart. Yes the s400 has new features that let you change brightness and add certain effects but 99% of the people that use the s400 will just use the zoom and the shutter button and that is it. With these functions the s400 is better than 99% of similar designed cameras and is equal to the last 1% of the other cameras.
One nice thing that contributes to the ease of use is the FUNC button, after you push this button you have a pull down type menu on the lcd screen that shows all the most common functions (uh thus the FUNC designation if you were still wondering lol). These FUNCtions include white balance, iso sensitivity, flash, image size (which also means the overall quality) and exposure size.
Ease of use includes how easy the camera takes photos that are excellent, because of the software that the camera uses to take pictures, this is a snap (yes pun intended). The s400 uses a processor called a digic processor, you might have seen this on the g3 and i believe the g4, but not sure on the g4. I personally don't understand it but its all about the way the camera sees the picture and analyses it, then "takes" the picture.
To help this whole process the s400 uses a unique 9 point isaps technology. Basically this means the camera will look at evenly spaces 9 points on visible picture, then will use those points together to focus on the picture, most of the time you will just see small green boxes flash on the lcd screen as it is taking a picture, BUT (and this is a big but) if you want to take a fast picture, you can PREFOCUS a shot by holding down the shutter button halfway, this will show the green boxes and will prefocus the shot, so if you are wanting to take a photo of your kid doing a flip off the diving board you only need to prefocus the shot and press just a bit more down on the button and it will instantly take the shot. This is a really nice feature that I use a lot when I'm trying to capture those quick smiles that my baby girl shows.
The 2nd to last ease of use category is speed. The s400 is a faster camera than previous elph cameras and pretty soon they will be at the instantaneous power button pushed to ready to take photo. The s400 is ready about 3 seconds after you push the power button. The biggest thing holding it up is moving the lense out of its holding area inside the camera frame to the shoot picture position.
And of course the final ease of use category is size. While there are some smaller cameras out there, the s400 gives more for its size than I believe any camera out there. Plus it is definently small enough with its aluminum frame that is rounded on the edges to give you a certain "cool" factor upgrade.
Price: A- ($499)
Ah what the bottom line is, money. At $499 I don't think I'd buy it vs the s40 or s50, but currently you can get the s230 for about $350 which is just as good as the s400 in a lot of categories, but admitedly worse in megapixels and zoom. If you want the newest elph than the price isn't a concern but if price is in your top three, maybe look at the s230, quite a bit less money for almost as good a camera.
And the rest!
The tripod rest for the s400 is a bit uncentered, I did not find it too hard to use but it does mean you will have to fiddle with any tripod a little bit to get that perfect shot. I honestly don't know why they didn't fix this feature because a lot of people had said they wanted the next one to have a more centered tripod screw.
The s400 comes with a 32 meg flash card, a upgrade from the 16meg card that came with the s230. I find that even at 32meg it is just an emergency card in case you fill up the card you buy for it, which at 4 megs per picture (at the highest setting) you will need to buy at least a 128 meg card, but honestly that size is only good for a s230, for the s400 look at the 256meg card.
The s400 does not come with a camera case and even though it is a metal camera I somehow doubt you will want to test this by dropping or bumping it a lot, look to buy a $15 canvas case for it to protect it a little. I have a tiny one that fits onto my belt.
Conclusion
If you look on a scale where 1 is purely point and shoot and 10 is professional camera, then the s400 will probably fall in around a 4, the s50 about a 7 or 8 and of course the g3 at about a 9.8. So the s400 will definently fulfill all of your point and shoot needs, and has enough options to fulfill some of your more serious needs but because it doesn't have the ability to swap lenses, manually focus or add on external pieces (without some very creative frames for it that is) it will never be considered more on the professional side of things.
If you want an absolutely great point and shoot camera then this is a great camera for you, if you want a camera that is great at point and shoot but also lets you do some professional grade functions than maybe you should look at the s50, and of course if you are a big time photographer that knows your stuff about cameras (iso settings, manual focus etc etc) than perhaps the g3 or g4 is your camera.
For me, I'm sticking with my s230 and admiring the s400 as the young sibling to my s230 that papa canon is raising a little better but not by much :)
To read my review on the s230, which is related to to this review, go to:
http://www.epinions.com/content_78630129284
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 499
This Camera is a Good Choice if You Want Something... Easy Enough for Anyone to Use
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Epinions.com ID:
zlmajors
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 - Top 1000 |
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Member: Zach Majors
Location: Portland, OR
Reviews written: 62
Trusted by: 16 members
About Me:
Husband and father, picky when it comes to products for my family or myself.
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