Electronics : Canon Digital IXUS 750 Silver Digital Camera [7MP, 3 x Optical Zoom]

Rating: - Best camera for sale, excluding IXUS 800 IS
First Impressions:
Small, light, well made. The silver finish adds to the style of this camera. The lack of a case is very annoying, as is a screen cleaning cloth. Software mediocre, I'd use picasa - available free from Google. Start up time phenomenal. Very initiative controls.

Ergonomics and aesthetics:
Matte silver finish, VERY small, excellent attention to detail, even the sticker with the serial number on it looks classy.
Nice, sturdy feel to it, no creeks or bending.

Taking photos:
I find the pictures taken come out a little blurry unless the camera is resting on your knee or something. This is something which is very hard to get used to with smaller cameras, but don't assume its just the 750, as smaller things are harder to balance. The viewfinder is a nice touch, but in my opinion useless, as you have to press you face against the screen, creating smudges on the screen. As said before, start up time unreal, less than a second for sure; I'd say around 0.5 seconds.

Modes:
Well, the fully automatic mode is excellent, but I would like to be able to have a fully automatic mode with a few more options unlocked.
The my colours feature is so much fun. You can create really artistic pictures with this, choosing only certain colours to show through, or replacing all the white colours with black and visa versa. As far as fun goes, this camera is unrivaled.
The different scene modes seem to me as more of a gimmick, but I am sure someone has benefited from them.
The flash is effective, but over zealous. I hate flashes personally, they ruin a good picture. I'd have preferred it if canon had ditched the flash altogether and added an image stabilizer, which is essential for a camera this small.
Macro mode is good, have some nice pics of petals etc. Resolution is all one could ever need. Remember, your screen resolution or your printers limit you so resolutions above 3000 are insane for everyday.

Niggles or Unexpected cool features:
-- Battery indicator only shows if the cameras about to die. Can be very frustrating.
-- Flimsy plastic covers for lead access
-- Battery has to be charged separately
+ If you take a portrait photo, then view it on 'play' mode later the image flips the right way for you
+ Cool animations on menu items
+ Sounds and images can be custom recorded with the camera (e.g. shutter sound)
+ Battery takes only an hour to recharge (approx.)
+ Comes with 100MB free web space to host your photos.

In conclusion, this review comes across more negative then this camera deserves, but I believe the other reviews list the positives of this camera anyway, I noticed a lack of criticism, which unsurprisingly this camera has. I would give it five or even six stars, but there is one major letdown:
The screen resolution is lower than I expected. I previously had a camera with a much smaller screen, but the resolution and brightness was a lot higher. (EDIT: after about 6 months of using the camera, the brightness and resolution is not an issue at all)

Final Line...
If you have the money, or a willing to wait, buy the ixus 800 IS. It has a longer battery, is the same size, has a higher resolution screen, has an image stabilizer, and basically fixes this camera's flaws. However, it costs more like 300 quid, whereas this beauty is a mere 207. (Prices have now changed enough for the 800 IS to be the more sensible buy).

Needed Accessories:
*The included memory card can hold less then 10 pictures on high quality, so a 1-gig card is needed. There's one on Amazon for £13 plus £4 P&P so I'm going for that. (EDIT: worth noting that when the quality is reduced to a minimum 640x480, 1GB gives you almost 10 thousand pictures!)
* A case. The canon branded ixus 700/750/800 IS case looks like the one to get.

I'm happy with my purchase, and if you go ahead and buy this camera, I guarantee you will be too!

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Rating: - IXUS750 great camera, just needs a little care with use
Ive seen a few reports here that this is a daylight only camera. Having just bought one I can see why, if you just try to snap indoors without flash you can get blurred images. I used to own an IXUS 500 and I think that was slightly better at low light. However this is a compact camera, and therefore it has a small CCD (the device that picks up the picture), and a small lens, so the low light performance will never be as good as a larger camera. Also, by moving to 7Mpixels from 5Mpixels each pixel is smaller (the overall size of the sensor is the same), so there is less light for each one.

Having said that you can get good pictures by some simple tips that will work with any small camera.
1) Use the flash! If your indoors, take advantage of the powerful flash on the 750
2) Use the self timer. The camera in lower light will open the shutter for longer and that will cause blurring of the image if the camera is shaken. The biggest cause of camera shake is when you push that stiff shutter button! So no matter how still you try to hold it, it will shake. So put the self timer onto 2 secs (in the menus), and whenever you need to shoot inside without flash use the bottom of the navigation button (on the back of the camera) to enable the timer. Line your shot up, push the shutter, then hold it steady while it takes a picture.
3) Manually set the colour balance. The camera cannot know whether your indoors or outdoors, it just makes a guess on what is white from the scene. A lot of the time that means indoor tungsten lighting makes yellow pictures. So go into the menus and manually change the white balance setting to tungsten, then take your picture. Remember it will remain set while in Manual mode, so you have to change it back to automatic for shots in future (auto mode makes its own mid up anyway).
4) If all else fails, in manual mode, change the ISO setting to 100 or 200. This makes the camera more sensitive, and you can set it to 400, though pictures start getting grainy.

I'm really pleased with my IXUS750, especially with its digital macro mode which takes much better macro shots than the IXUS500.

Hope this is of help
Andy

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Rating: - Oh how I love it!
This is the first time I've has a digital camera and it's absolutely brilliant! It's very small - fits into my handbag easily. Batteries last a good while but only take 90 mins to charge up anyway. There is virtually no delay at all in taking photos so you get what you take, not what happened 8 seconds later! I just point and click and have got good results evey time.
On holiday in the USA recently I experimented with the settings more and got even more brilliant results. I got so carried away I took 904 photos with the 1.GB card I bought!
Although I am not particularly computer literate, even I can sort out how to download and edit photos without too much of a hassle and I haven't even read the instruction booklet properly!
I would recommend it without a moments hesitation to anyone.FAB!

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Rating: - Excellent image quality for a compact point-and-shoot camera
I was looking for a compact, point-and-shoot camera which was small and durable enough to carry in my pocket, and which gave good picture quality in all lighting conditions. After reading several glowing reviews of the Ixus 750 I couldn't wait to get my hands on one, and I have absolutely no regrets.

I have two main uses for a compact camera: holiday photos, and shots in low lighting conditions. I hate using the flash when indoors, as it tends to lead to unflattering pictures of pasty-white people against dark backgrounds, but even in cameras of above-average quality the alternative is usually noisy, blurred pictures. Not so with the Ixus 750; I was very impressed when I uploaded my first indoor pictures to my computer and studied them in detail to find almost zero noise or graininess, even in dark areas.

Being able to take pictures quickly and easily is very important to me in a compact camera. So I was delighted with the fast startup time and low shutter lag of the Ixus 750.

Build quality and durability are also essential to me, as I tend not to carry my compact camera in a case. The Ixus 750 looks and feels luxurious, but is also more than adequately sturdy. The matte surface of the metal body is resistant to scratches, the "feel" of the buttons is just right, and the cover for the AV and USB ports does not look as if it will drop off at any moment. The large screen has a durable coating so fingerprints can be wiped away without too much fear of scratching it. The size of the camera is such that I can slip it into my jeans pocket and carry it all day without even noticing it is there.

But the most important thing to me, at the end of the day when I upload the images onto my computer, is always going to be the image quality. I was actually dumbstruck when, after trying some macro photography in a well-lit room, I viewed the images at 100% zoom on my screen to find that they were completely pin-sharp.

Is there anything bad about this camera? Well, the tiny optical viewfinder is useless and badly positioned, but you're a moron anyway if you are going to use it instead of the huge, bright screen. If you want a camera which will take your cautious expectations of a point-and-shoot compact at the £200 mark, laugh at them, piss all over them and return them to you in sodden shreds this is the camera for you.

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Rating: - Good and bad
The Good.
The IXUS 750 has great resolution and can take very good close ups. It is very useful to be able to change the metering and also the AiAF to AF (centre spot). For portrait shots, wide angle (x1 zoom), the only thing you could possibly complain about is redeye, however this can easily be removed post-processing. The 750 has a fast continues shot mode when using a fast SD card. Shots taken in low light situations without flash were amazingly good. Down loading shots to a PC was fast and easy.
The Bad.
It is extremely difficult to hold the 750 still enough to get crisp shots. On many occasions I would have to take 5 shots to get one that was not blurred (AiAF or AF) and this was resting my hand on something. If you use the optical zoom things get worse. For example at x3 zoom placed on a table using the timer to take the shot, the hand shake icon would still be flashing. However shot taken when place on a table or tripod would not actually be blurred. The 750's ability to focus on landscapes, whether in landscape mode (infinity) or not, were never crisp. In fact a shot of anything 20m away or more was not crisp, nor was it very blurred though. In short it is not easy to hold the 750 still enough, even using the self timer to operate the shutter, to get a non blurred shot. If you are willing to take several shots and inspect each one by zooming in, then the 750 is a very good less than 20m camera and a fair landscape snapper.

And yes it would be great if canon would allow more manual control in manual mode, but they don't and you know that when you buy the camera.

7.1 Mega pixels is only useful if you can easily take sharp focused shots. If you can't take sharp shots 6 Mega pixels with an image stabilizing system is better, so go for the IXUS 800.