S1 IS vs. A80

[ScottyBaby02]

In a serious serious jam here, I have no idea which camera to purchase. I really like the S1 IS but it seems the A80 is a better camera for less money. Can anybody help me out here? :?

[willy77nilly]

The only thing you would be gaining with the A80 is the 4.0 megapixels.

If you don't play on printing 8 x 10's stick with the S1.

You will get :

- Image Stabilizer (works in photo and movie mode)
- Enhanced movie mode (upto 1 hr or 1 GB CF capacity) with zoom avail.
- 10x Optical Zoom
- Same available shooting modes as the A80

- The only thing you won't get on the S1 is a dedicated Macro mode (still performs well with close-ups without it) or a RAW option (same as A80).

[Bodryn]

I have both the A70 and the S1 IS. I would not be without BOTH cameras. The A70 is perfect for all round convenience of use but doesn't have as many features as the S1. The A80 would be a slightly improved version of the A70. The S1 IS has a 10x optical zoom plus 3.2 digital zoom. I have gotten bird photos with this that would not be possible with the A70 and have done so without a tripod due to image stabilization. However, I feel that the S1 isn't as fast to use for a quick point-and-shoot because it is considerably larger than the A70 and it uses an LCD viewfinder which may be hard to see properly in bright sunlight - from experience I can say it slows me down somewhat. On the other hand the autofocus for the S1 is MUCH faster and I think more accurate as well. In addition, you can specify custom settings which stay in effect if you keep the top dial turned to C. You can even specify zoom and focus settings for this custom feature. Lots more; I'm still exploring the camera which I've had just over a month.