If you are thoughtful about quality of your photographs and plan to shoot things like sporting events in a badly lit gym, you probably won't want the SD 780 as your only camera. Then again, you wouldn't want any point-and-shoot as your only camera. On the other hand, if you need something to take on vacation, or something to have in your back pocket when you are outside with your kids and don't want to miss anything, or are looking for an alternative to Flip, you can't go wrong with the SD780.
Already an owner of a large DSLR coupled with a heavy lens, I was looking for something that would 1) produce acceptable pictures under regular conditions, 2) replace a Flip cam for shooting video, 3) always stay in the pocket in that unassuming way a good cell phone does, and 4) cost under $300. I've looked at and tried pretty much the entire Digital Elph line-up, and also seriously considered a Lumix because of their awesome wide angle lenses, but ultimately decided SD 780 was pretty much what I needed.
I've owned the camera for a couple of weeks, and here are some first impressions.
1) The video is great -- much better than the old non-HD Flip. It seems that I shake the camera more than Flip because of its design, but, and that was a nice surprise since you can't see it in the product shots, the Elph has a tripod mount. The file sizes are an order of magnitude larger, however, so stock up on a decent and fast (class 6) memory card right here on Amazon for about $15 for 8 Gigs.
2) The image quality is what you would expect from a camera of this class. Pictures are great in a perfect light, and not so great in all other light conditions. I haven't seen a point-and-shoot that performs otherwise.
3) Given a choice between a couple of random extra features and smaller size, I would always go for the size. None of these extras make your pictures look significantly better, but a constantly bulging pocket is a major annoyance. This camera is very small. I have large hands (I'm 6'2"), and the small buttons haven't been a problem. The camera is also very pleasant to hold and look at.
4) Fast start-up time. Shutter lag is ok. There are other point-and-shoot cameras with much higher frame-per-second numbers. If you are considering one of those pocket-sized Lumix cameras, Lumix are slower.
5) The other non-Elph camera I looked at was a Canon Powershot SX10IS with the crazy 20x optical zoom (28-560mm equivalent). The SX10IS is bigger, more expensive, and doesn't have HD video, but if you are into stuff that requires powerful zoom, SD780 won't cut it.
On the downside, the lack of manual controls is a complete waste. Also, does anyone ever use that tiny optical viewfinder on this thing? And why can't they name their cameras in a way that doesn't remind an alphanumerical soup?
Overall, SD780 is great at what it's been designed to do. Manual controls and even a slightly wider lens would've earned it five stars in its class.
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Canon PowerShot SD780IS12.1 MP Digital Camera with 3x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom and 2.5-inch LCD (Black).
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