So, the story starts a couple weeks back when I knocked my
Canon A630 over and while it was connected to my computer and (I guess) fell on the cord sticking out of it. The guy took pictures just fine, but a few days later I found out that it did a wee bit of damage. The fall must have pushed in the cord so it bent the plug just enough so it couldn't actually make a solid connection anymore and I couldn't download images directly from the camera anymore. I figured I had the thing in warranty still, so I took it in for repairs. Best Buy took it in and it wasn't going to cost me anything to fix it (beyond what I paid for initially).
Fast forward to yesterday. Best Buy called me and said I was elgible to just get a new camera and I went over after work. Unfortunately, their system was screwed up and they couldn't pull up any records. To make the situation worse, when asked about getting a new camera they told me they no longer carried my model so I could get something "equivalent." Problem was, I looked at all the comparible cameras when I bought the A630 in Feb/March and didn't want any of them. I knew all the other cameras in the range and didn't want to touch them. The other side of the problem is that Canon's models below and above it were not what I wanted because they generally focused on being more compact with less photo-taking omph from what I understood. They didn't even carry the thing online anymore, so I couldn't order it. I couldn't finish the transaction because of the computer problems, so I left pissed. At that point I figured I would have just bought a card reader and dealt with the problem because I knew they would just trash my camera and tried to give me something I didn't want.
When I got home I spent the night catching up on all cameras in the $300-$400 range again. I picked the A630 because I wanted something beefer than a compact, but it wasn't a full dSRL that would be wasted on me. I looked over pretty much everything Canon was offering because I really did love what the A630 did for me and took a long hard look at the
Canon S3is. I sorta thought about it when I was researching stuff a couple months ago, but decided against it because it was more expensive than the A630 and possibly more advanced than I could handle. Well, it seemed the price had dropped a little bit more and Best Buy was selling it for $50 more than I was getting back for my old camera. Best of all, they actually carried the damned thing which seems rare for cameras in this range. I was willing to pay the difference, so things were looking to have worked out.
Before work this morning I went back, looked over the camera for a few minutes to confirm that I was okay with the size, and made the exchange. There was a little problem in that they didn't want to carry over the warranty because the cameras were in different price ranges, but after a little discussion with the manager they would transfer it over so long as I paid the difference on the warranty as well, which was totally acceptable to me.
So yeah, after about a half day of worrying I think I came out alright. I feel like S3is a little powerhouse compared to any camera I've owned before, including the A630. I'll have to learn even more to start making the most of it, but I'm excited. What's really cool, is that even though the camera was basically designed around the 12x zoom, it's supposed to take really great macro shots which is really why I wanted something beefer to begin with.
Yay. Now I have to start playing around with it and see what I it can do.
