When I was looking at which camera to buy I found an extreme shortage of reviews on the Canon Powershot S80. So I hope that my addition to the growing number of reviews helps.

The following format for my review will start with the Pros, then the Cons, and finally a small summary blurb about the camera...

PROS:

Appearance
~The Powershot S80 is surprisingly small for the power it packs, which helps make it a suitable pick for anyone who travels.
~Style... I wouldn't be surprised if famous personalities started wearing this camera on their neck chains as "Bling". It is very sharp looking, though one can determine what they think of it by looking at pictures I suppose.

Operation
~You can find out most of the information regarding this camera's operation and statistics on various websites, but I have a few things to mention that I was not able to find online, or didn't think of looking for.
~After using this camera it is easy to see that a significant amount of effort went into gearing it for point and shoot photographers. Have no fear though, it does offer advanced settings that I have not actually been able to play with yet on my S80.
~8.0 effective mega pixels (8,000,000 pixels) worth of resolution means for example, if you turn on the Macro setting (at least 4 CM or 1.6 inches from the subject) and take a picture of your index finger, then, upload it to your computer and zoom in on your fingerprint you will actually be able to see the tiny particles or dirt stuck between the many crevices that make up your fingerprint. It is really amazing. The resolution has been incredible for every photograph and video that I have taken thus far.
~The video recording capability of the S80 is unmatched for any other camera in its size or price range for that matter. One of the important factors that I was looking for when shopping for my camera was that the video format was basically anything but ".mov". The S80 uses .avi which means that you can use windows media player to watch the video that you record and more video editing tools to manipulate footage that you record. The video resolution of the S80 goes up to 1024 x 768 at 15 until you consume up to 1 Gigabyte of memory. I recorded a video last night and watched it (with the cables provided in the box) on my 32'' television. I am still amazed at how clear the image was. I will even go so far as to say that this camera will second as a camcorder for certain purposes, which would then imply that I think that it is a good 2 for 1 buy. Which it is ; ). You can also record in lower video resolution up to 1 Gigabyte too. If you are planning on using the highest quality picture and video settings, buy a SD memory card with lots of memory, I bought a 2 Gigabyte card myself. Ah, and I took a 48 second video on the highest resolution and the file was 87.8 Megabytes, which will give you some rough idea of how much footage you will be able to shoot on the memory card of your choosing.
~The battery and charger that come with the camera are great, the prongs on the charger can fold inwards when it's not plugged in (obviously). Which is good for travel. I have had my camera for 2 days now and I have not needed to recharge the battery yet, which is nice that I have been using it constantly to play with the settings and have taken almost 100 pictures or videos. Another reason that you might want a camera like the S80 is that it does not use AA batteries, or any disposable batteries for that matter. My old camera was A Kodak Easyshare 3.1 Mega pixel camera. I got about 8,000 pictures out of it before it died in a very irritating manner. It gradually got less and less use time out of new batteries until it would literally take 2 pictures and then turn itself off. Now it totally refuses to function. Also, my friend had his camera die due to a simple mistake in battery purchase, he put Lithium AA batteries in his camera (I forget the make and model, it was a 3.2 MP though) instead of the Alkaline batteries he was supposed to be using and it totally broke. I was amazed that such a simple mix up could kill a 200$ purchase. When I helped him bury his camera (in the trash) I swore to myself that I would only go with rechargeable in the future.
~For its size the S80 offers just a little more than the norm with a 3.6x optical zoom. Which is really cool. Don't even turn on the digital zoom. It's worthless and probably one of the worst ideas ever conceived. You might as well take a magnifying glass and hold it up to the picture, the quality suffers when you zoom in with the digital.
~The LCD screen is massive (2.5 inches) which is good for video playback and reviewing your photos before downloading them to your computer. It also appears to be very strong, which is a definite plus.

Price

~Let me just put it this way, for what you are getting this camera is a bargain buy compared to most of the other cameras in its price range on the market right now.

Accessories

~I bought the waterproof case for the Powershot S80, though I have yet to actually take it underwater I can say that It offers almost 100% use over the cameras controls. There is a way to rotate the dial (which is one of the controls on the back of the camera) by pressing the "share" button apparently, but I have yet to figure that out. The only thing that you cant do, well as far as I know, is turn off the camera wile underwater, though you can turn off the LCD screen which will save your battery life for ages. Oh, and something that I was concerned about because I couldn't find information about it online was whether or not I would be able to use the optical zoom and flash easily underwater. Well, you can, the case leaves room for the lens to extend as far as it can and the waterproof case comes with a flash diffuser that snaps onto the case in front of the camera for good underwater lighting. The case also comes with a... Well, I don't know what to call it but I guess I could say that its an "open ended chamber" (there is a real word for it but I guess that its just not in my vocabulary today) that snaps onto the exterior of the case for easy viewing of the LCD screen underwater, though it doesn't really seem necessary. There is also a nice underwater neck strap and wrist strap included in the package. The waterproof case comes totally assembled, and it's pretty easy to open and close. There are no good pictures of the case online that I could find at the moment unfortunately (well, ones that show the back where all of the controls are). But its very well put together and looks far more high tech than I thought it would. As they say, engineers are the underappreciated (except monetarily) inventors of today's society. To summarize about the case; It supposedly goes up to 40 meters or 130 Feet underwater and remains watertight. Take care though, not all people are rated for that depth ; ). Oh and be sure to use the silicone lubricant for the rubber seal that is provided before you use the camera underwater. Just to be same make sure that you test your case underwater as a reasonable depth FIRST without the camera in it. Juuuuuust incase. I'm not sure if the Waterproof case is made for use in salt water, but I'm assuming that it is, I mean, who dives for and takes pictures of Trout that isn't either making a television documentary, or documenting their ventures in illegal freshwater harpoon fishing, hehe.
~The accessory kit for the Powershot S80 is a good buy if you are looking for a spare battery (which I recommend for trips without wall sockets (which of course, are the best kind of trips). It also includes a large, rugged, steel chain neck strap (which is much more convenient than the wrist strap that comes in the box with the S80. The steel neck strap is coated in plastic to prevent possible scratching on parts of the camera. You get a nice little carrying case that the camera will barely fit in, the carrying case has a strong belt loop on the back if you want to wear your camera on your hip with a belt.

CONS:
(The cons will need less explaining)

I would have liked the Macro setting to be a little closer than 4 CM.

The camera offers digital zoom (which virtually all digital cameras offer unfortunately).

The lens is surprisingly noisy on camera startup and when you change the zoom. This isn't really as much as a problem as it's just that I take lots of wildlife photos and it might someday ruin a great photo opportunity if I have a close encounter with a frantic creature.



That's about it, I took a good long amount of time to try and think of more negatives but couldn't. I could probably add more pros but I think that this review is long enough. I have only seen 2 negative reviews for this camera and they were on different websites, one was because the person who bought the camera disliked the fact that the Powershot S80 changed to SD memory cards. That was the only reason in that review that I could find. And the other negative review was because the S80 does not give you the ability to shoot in the "RAW" format. Which could be a drawback for some of the more advanced photographers, but it didn't bother me that much. Anyways, that was my lengthy review. I tried to keep it from being dry which is tough when you're writing a review on something so technical, hah.

Oh, and if you were thinking about buying this camera, the only reason that you shouldn't is if you absolutely need the RAW format or higher optical zoom.

***RANDOM TIP: Remember to always BACK UP YOUR DIGITAL PHOTOS and other information. I was vacationing in New Zealand about 9 months ago and had my laptop... Read moreʉۼ