Took the plunge, hope I don't end up all wet!

[Boxlock]

I've agonized over wich digital camera to get for about a year and a half now. Posted here for advice as recently as mid-October. I didn't ask for much, just wanted a new digital SLR, like a D-1 at a disposable film camera price. After some great discussion and imput from you guys, I decided on a budget of $300-$500. I narrowed my selction down to a couple of out of production models, with high end features like a large optical zoom, and a good following on the used market. The OLY-C2100, and the Canon Powershot Pro-90 where the ones I settled on. Ya'll warned me I'd be taking a chance on a used camera, but these models where generally worth the risk. So I went galumping off to E-bay and have been watching both models come up, and sell. Got a good idea of the going prices of each. I watched and bidded low on numerous examples of each, generally favoring the Canon a bit because of it's bigger pixel count. Well, tonight an auction for a Canon Pro-90 described as having a couple small scratches on the body, but fully functional and otherwise in pristine condition, complete with all original accessories, original boxes, and software. There where no bidders so I bid $300 but didn't meet the reserve, so I increased my bid by $5-$10 incriments till I met the reserve at $350. No one else bid before it closed, and I won it. If it arrives as described, then I think I did good. I've seen similar examples of the same model sell for $409, $455, and $500, over the previous few weeks. I'm really starting to get my hopes up, so everyone wish me luck!

BTW! I've got questions about accessories now. Most stuff, can wait, but I want to make sure I have the batteries and memory I will need without going overboard. It comes with a 16mb CF Card, and I think it uses the Canon 7.2v BP 511/512 Lithium-Ion batteries that I see for sale on ebay for $8- $10. I'm sure I'll want a bigger CF Card and posibly another battery, but am confused about how much to get, not to mention card readers and battery chargers etc... any guidance that will help me get along with my new camera when it arrives is appreciated. Thanks JDBraddy

[gibsonpd3620]

A 256 mb CF card and two extra batteries. The 256 card will provide you with about 300+ shots before downloading.

[Boxlock]

Originally Posted by gibsonpd3620

A 256 mb CF card and two extra batteries. The 256 card will provide you with about 300+ shots before downloading.

300......WOW! Didn't realize it would be that many. Please edjucate me a little bit here. I read Steve's review and know this camera is CF-I, CF-II, and fully microdrive compatable. I'm not real confident I know the diffrence. I think the CF-II is thicker, but works the same as the CF-I, and the microdrive is essentually a mini-computer hard-drive? I didn't know if it was worth it to get say a 1-2GB microdrive, or better to have several of the smaller 128-256mb CF cards? The Microdrive is almost as expensive as the camera, and I read they use up the battery faster too? What other diffrences do I need to know about? If the 256mb will take 300 pictures, then that might be all I need. A 1GB microdrive would then store 1,200 pictures? WOW! Sounds increadable, but I could never use up that much. I'm mainly interested in which would be the best over-all value, but would also like to understand why somthing was the best value. Thanks.

[voxmagna]

On this camera you might want to shoot at the best JPEG modes. A 256 card will give you 82 shots, or 146 the next quality level down. You can reckon just under 2Mb per shot for a 3Mpix cam (download the manual off the Canon site).

When you use a digital camera you will be taking many more shots than with film - you become selective in editing. On my first practice shoot at a friends wedding, I took 130 shots in 3 hours! A day out at the zoo with kids could be 200 shots. Of those I'd probably save 70% and queue 5-10% for large hardcopy printing later - hard disk space is cheap. A special foreign holiday? I don't know, but 2 X 1Gb MD's, an image tank, laptop and Instamatic probably!

You will find the smaller size cards - say 256Mb are around at better and better prices as more move towards the bigger cards for higher Mpix cams. However you have the hassle of swapping cards more often and possibility of pin damage - it's really your call!. As far as Md's are concerned - because they are fast and don't have the erase cycles of CF, in save burst situations their power is only in peaks. It's when you keep the disc spinning, say with a lot of streaming preview or long TIFF/RAW writes and hardly any camera cache memory that you have to watch power. VOX

[lg]

It sounds like you got a really nice deal! Congratulations on your purchase and selection. Here's my two cents' worth:

A nice camera bag to protect your new investment is a great idea; check out the Samsonite Worldproof bags-- I have two different sizes, and love both of them. There are many other good bags out there, but I don't have a lot of experience with them.

I'm not familiar with the transfer via USB for the Canon, but I prefer using a card reader to transfer pics from my camera. If you're using XP, you'll really like this option. For that reason, consider whether you want to get a card reader (more knowledgeable Pro90IS folks can offer better advice here).

Phil is right about getting additional memory - I'd pick up a second 256MB CF card if you can afford it; there may be times you run over 300 pics (can't really imagine that right now, can you?).

Three sets of batteries total should be sufficient. Depending on how much money you have, you may want to consider a nice telephoto or wide angle adapter; if so, I'd recommend the TCON 1.7 and WCON 08E lenses.

Have fun, and enjoy your new digicam!

[Boxlock]

My new Canon arrived day before yesterday. The seller couldn't find a UV filter in the description so he included a 128mb CF card in it's place. I also won an auction for a 1GB 4X CF card on E-bay for $152.50 shipped. I hope that was a good deal. If the 4x speed isn't a problem, and it works ok in my camera, then I should be all set as far as memory is concerned. I set the camera up and snapped a few pictures here in the office, downloaded them, played with the settings a little, and emailed them to myself. everything seems to be working ok. I can tell I have a bit of a learning curve ahead of me. Need to learn what all the settings do, and how to manipulate them. make pictures bigger, smaller, crop, shoot in low light, indoor, outdoor, and macro. etc.... anybody know any good online resources for this kind of info? Thanks. JDBraddy