Canon PowerShot A30 Digital Camera [1.2MP 3xOptical]
Average Customer Rating
(4.5 out of 5)
Amazon Customer Reviews
Most Helpful First | Newest First
(5 out of 5)A great first buy!
Having read rave reviews about the A40, I set about looking at it's little brother the A30. The difference between the two cameras is small, the A40's resolution weights in at 2.3 megapixels, and records movies with sound, whereas the A30's resolution is just 1.3 megapixels and records movies without sound...
When I got the camera home, I found that the build quality was excellent for a 'plastic' bodied camera. The software was top notch and I had no problems connecting the camera to my Dell PC running Win 2k. Included with the camera is a USB cable and a video out cable with which you can display your pictures straight to a TV screen.
Setting up the camera was easy and within 5 minutes I was shooting top notch indoor and outdoor photos using the Automatic mode. For the more serious photographers, you can set Whitelight levels, ISO settings and much more. Every picture was in focus, and the colours were both vivid and life like.
The LCD screen whilst small is adequate, although when you view the scene prior to taking the shot, the picture can look a little noisy. Even with this criticism, when reviewing the photos on the camera the picture sharpness is considerable better.
When I printed out some photos taken in high resolution, whilst not 'still photo' perfect, they are sharp and crisp with good colour representation. These photos were printed in both in 7x5 and 6x4 sizes on 'glossy photo' paper, and whilst I would be happy to place these in a family album, the true test will be when I take them down to Boots to get them developed!
(3 out of 5)Good camera but battery life problems
Whilst this is an excellent camera to use, very easy to shoot with, nice zoom, good crisp quality and a simple software package; it has a major flaw when using with normal batteries. I have found that a set of expensive duracell batteries will last for only about 20 shots, this is frustrating and expensive. REchargeable batteries have fared no better.
(5 out of 5)Digital Camera
As a "first time user" of these new fangled things, I am very impressed with how easy it is to use! It took at while to read the manual, but it was worth it. As for downloading it to my PC, well that was even easier. Once the software is loaded, plug it in and voila! Then you can delete the photos from the CF card on the camera and you have a new "film" if you like. I was slightly apprehensive but not any longer - it's very very simple and the picture quality is fantastic. I would throughly recommend this to anyone who is looking for a digital camera