I own the Canon Powershot A80, the Olympus D-540 and just purchased 2 units of this new Canon Powershot A400 camera for my two friends 3 days ago for our upcoming journey to middle-earth (New Zealand) after reviewing its features on the internet.
The manual states that it is capable of 100 shots using 2 AA alkaline batteries with the LCD on, but rechargeables especially NiMH 2300 mAH and above, are really the way to go.
It has a 2.2x optical zoom instead of the standard 3x zoom, but I've found that photos taken with the digital zoom (max 7x) are also quite acceptable and not too bad as one might imagine. The wideangle end at 45mm equiv. may not be wide enough for scenic shots, so the friendly Stitch Assist feature in the camera will definitely come in handy to capture panoramic scenes.
The camera has so many features similar to the A80 such as ability to customise start-up image and sounds, (similar to changing Microsoft Windows theme) until it becomes a really 'fun' camera to use. Fancy a howling wolf as your self-timer sound, or perhaps a loud 'woof' as your camera shutter sound? The included cd has even more selections for you to upload to the camera, and you can even upload sounds/images of your own, once you configured them to meet the required specifications.
It is an easy to use camera in the Auto mode, and the 8 new Special Scene Modes should be able to handle most situations. A Manual mode is also available, and Canon has included so many other features and options, such as 2 autofocus modes, 3 light metering modes, histogram, custom white balance, sound memos, movies with sound, AF-assist beam etc. which makes it really feature-rich. The 1.5 inch LCD screen with 115k pixels also delivers a noticeably sharper and finer image quality than the 65k pixels on the Canon A80 and the 85k pixels on the Olympus.
Over the past 3 days I have taken numerous photos with this camera to test its picture quality, and the 'Vivid' mode reminded me of photographic slide films, since the pictures taken under this mode are really sharp and colorful.
There are 4 resolution settings (3.2Mp, 2.0Mp, 1.0Mp & VGA) at 3 compression levels ('Superfine','Fine','Normal') plus a special 'PostCard' setting (which allows date/time imprinting on photos). The 3.2Mp setting at 'Superfine' obviously yields the best picture quality, but finishes off your SD memory card mighty quick too (76 shots on a 128Mb SD card). Since I know my friends will be mostly printing 6 x 4 in. postcard-sized prints, I have performed some tests at the appropriate 2.0Mp settings. In comparing photos of same subjects taken under the 'Fine', 'PostCard' and 'Normal' compression settings, I have noted that the difference in picture quality is hardly noticeable, and therefore the 'Normal' setting is virtually as good as the 'PostCard' or 'Fine' setting. I will certainly be recommending this 'Normal' setting to my two friends, as they will then be able to take 403 shots of middle-earth on their 128Mb SD card, instead of 212 shots at the 'PostCard' or 'Fine' setting.
Overall, this camera takes great pictures, and very colorful ones too under the 'Vivid' mode. Discounting the slightly shorter 2.2x optical zoom, the rest of its features are really out of proportion to its budget price, and it is certainly one of the better buys coming from an established camera brand.
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