As we all know, Canon's S90 S100 models have pretty much set the bar in The Advanced Point And Shoot market for the last 4 1/2 yrs... Until recently ( With the advent of The Sony RX100). Canon sales more cameras than almost all other brands combined, this does not indicate, however; that they are the best in all categories, but that they are either the best over all, or at least in the top 5 for most classes of cameras.
I have owned many Canon Cameras and printers over the years, and I have been very happy with most of them, but I also place a lot of stock in fellow Amazon customer's reviews. For many months, I noticed that every other review, or updated one, for The Powershot S100 indicated a nasty lens error. That said, this time around researching advanced P&S's, I decided to see what other Brands such as: Nikon, Fuji, Panny and Sony were offering... What I found was this, Other brands have really took notice of The Canon S and SX line's success and or offering very stiff competition!
Sony has, IMHO, set the New Standard with the almost perfect Advanced P&S, The RX100. My coworker owns one, and it stomps all others in this now crowded class! Only problem is that it cost over $650.00, but the image quality, and low light rendering are truely amazing! Needless to say, Sony discounts its products about as often as Apple discounts its products... NEVER! The Panny Lumix LX5 and LX7, Nikon P300 and P310 and Fuji X10, are all now offering very good to excellent image quality in this class. You saw correct! I did include The Nikon Coolpix P310! Nikon has really stepped their game up with The Coolpix Line, in fact; this was the only model that came close to The Canon S100 and S110's Bang-For-Your-Buck. Price, it is $200 less than Canon S110, $450 less than The Sony RX100, while offering excellent I.Q., pocketabillity, low light performance and manual controls... Sans Raw mode. Came so close to getting The Nikon P310, before you judge me, just take a gander at the online sample shots of this camera!
In the end, I came back to The Canon S110. Chose The newer S110 over The S100 in the hopes of avoiding The Lens Error (Fingers Crossed). So happy with this camera! The S110 looks identical to The S100, but let me tell you, Canon has made some huge improvements with The 110. Canon has improved upon the sensor and auto focus speed of this model, added usable ISO, WiFi and touchscreen functionallity. Low light performance is a lot like that of The S95 and S100 combined. Allow me to explain. Sometimes The S100's colors would be a little off in low light, casting an orangish hue... as if shot in sepia. The Powershot S95 rendered sharp, detailed and very accurate colors in lowlight, but the lens was a bit slow under these conditions. I don't know what Canon did, but there is almost zero lag in AF, despite others claim that this is a slower lens or sensor than its predecessors. Color, contrast and sharpness are spot on! I predict that the next S model will have a larger sensor to be competitive with The Sony RX100's lowlight performance, but until then, I have to say that the S110 is very close in low light image quallity and will surpass the Sony, although at the cost of a higher price point and perhaps a larger form factor because of the larger sensor.
Battery life has never been an issue with me, because I rarely took over 100 pictures in a day and never used GPS tagging or logging. I also rarely shoot video clips longer than 10 min. in a day,also buy cheap aftermarket Batt.s as back-up. Canon's addition of WiFi to The S-Line is really cool and useful; I use it way more than I thought I would! It is implemented very well with this camera, much smoother and faster than using Eye-Fi's top of the line card... That's an $80 dollar value right there! Lol Also, I already own a Canon SX-230HS and many extra batteries. The S110 uses the same battery ( NBL-5) as The SX-230. Yes! Winning! WiFi connection with your smartphone or iPhone is almost instantaneous, once the App. is opened on the device, or printer turned on. GPS functions are combined with these WiFi transmissions between your phone and camera, and they are thus also instantanious.
The WiFi operates very efficently, and a cool, bright, blue LED lights up on the top of the camera when it is connected. It flashes when busy. The Camera asks if you would like to geotag or log your location while connected to your phone or computer. It is a 2 second affair, so GPS no longer drains your battery. Built-in GPS and Eye-Fi cards do not work nearly as seemless as this! I had issues when first setting this connection up, because I thought I could bypass the step where you connect the Camera to a computer via USB cable and run software CD... You have to do this step! I think you may have to also Register your S110 for it to properly set up initial WiFi.
Touchscreen: Very Responsive, and can be adjusted.... Nuff said on that.
CONS: The things I don't like about The Canon Powershot S110 are pretty much all ergonomically based. These things are true of the entire S series, and perhaps the indicative of the entire Class of these type cameras. They are not easily handled or operated... even on Auto! EXAMPLE: A friend, family memb., or pedestrian says, "Hey, YOUR NAME HERE, I noticed you are taking everyone else's picture, would you like me to take yours with the group?" You have to explain that this really tiny, hard to press button turns the camera ON. When it turns on be careful, because the flash is going to come up over here. If you want to zoom in it's the tiny switch here next to the shutter button. Now, you only want to press the shutter button halfway to compose the shot... it'll beep when ready, then you push it all the way down to take the shot. See? Some ergonomic issues have gotten better with this version of The "S".... others the same or worse. 1. Front grip is gone. 2. As on all The S Models, power button is way too small and recessed. 3.Mode wheel blocks index finger from shutter button. 4.Flash makes camera hard to handle with left hand. 5. if touchscreen shutter is on, camera will take picture if finger contacts screen before you are ready. I guess some things have to be sacrificed for a small form factor, but I feel comfortable giving anyone my Canon Elph 300HS and it is the smallest P&S ever produced!
There is no loud knocking noise when zooming in video, but there is a slight wherling sound when I zoom in video. Hard to notice and can only be heard when passage is very quiet during playback, but it's there... none the less. Wish Canon would get that worked out. All and all EXCELLENT IMAGE QUALITY and cool added features, deffinately recommended! The White is very cool looking and although glossy does not show prints as much as I had anticipated. The Black/Mat is sleek and modern looking like a stealth plane.... was a hard decision to make! UPDATE: Have now taken close to 400 shots. Still going strong! There are a few points that I should add to my review. Some I forgot, and some are new discoveries.
1. Wifi connection.: I own a Huawi Glory/Mercury Android smartphone which is still running Gingerbread. The S110 connects flawlessly with this phone, but what I found out is, you must be near an open WiFi network or hot spot for it to work. The Camera's Wifi will not work over 3G or tethered to your phones mobile hotspot. Also, The S110's WiFi will not connect wirelessly to Windows7 Basic,Starter or any OS older, such as XP or Vista. It won't work on Macs older than OSX 10 or whatever Apple's answer for Windows 7 was. I was told by a Canon Rep. that it works well with full versions of Windows 7, and extremely well with Windows 8. We will see. Waiting for Black Fri. to snag a Windows8 computer.
2. Touchscreen Shutter: Amazingly, the touchscreen functionallity of The S110
has really impressed my friends and family. It really comes in handy when I
give The S-110 to someone, in order to get in the picture myself or for
some one to swipe through the pictures, using their finger to preview.
3. Price Point: I purchased The Powershot S110 for $390 used, and it came
new, in box with all contents still sealed in plastic. Nice! The main reason
I purchased the S110 over the S100 was it was only $38 dollars more at that
time, and I felt that was a small Diff. to pay to hopefully avoid The Lens
Error. I really am happy with this little camera. The functions and menues
are very easy and quick to access with the lens ring and touchscreen. Before
I was using Auto way too much... Now, I am truely learning, in a fun easy way
about F-stops, apperature, ISO, white balance, shutter speed, etc. Things
that I already kinda knew about with my Eos T3 and even my S95, but seemed
to much trouble or laborious, are now fun and easily implemented to play
around with. I am having, "A Ha moments," where I think aaah, that's why
that turned
out good or bad with my DSLR... The S-110 is the perfect learning tool to
whip out of your pocket, purse, or Camera Case and start learning and capt-
uring. I also played around with The Canon G15 and G1X. Salesman at camera
store told me that G15 used pretty much the same sensor,lens and processor
as The Canon S100 and S110. The Powershot G1X really impressed me with its
image quality though; seemingly better than even the more expensive, Sony RX
100! I understood why when he told me it had an SLR sized sensor. The G1X is
a beast, though! Holding it, it felt the size and weight of my T3 without the
lens! Way too large, but may be Canon's answer to The New Sony, Panny, Fuji
and Olympias in this class. He offered it to me at the same price as the G15
$550 plus Uncle Sam's cut (Tax), but it still was more than I could afford.
So here I am. A happy S110 owner. Lol
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