Noise problem with S40

[dusterbuster]

Hi everyone,

I have a Canon S40 that I purchased around November of last year. I've noticed an increasingly common problem. An increasing number of my pictures come out with these little red, green, blue dots (noise) making the image a bit fuzzy. It happens I think primarily with indoor pictures (or less than bright light pictures). Is this normal or do you think something may be wrong with the camera? I think it has been occurring more often which makes we wonder whether it's the camera.

I read an older post talking about CCD noise that's created when the camera gets warm. I guess that could be it, but talking with my friends who own Canon S110's, they say they've never seen that problem.

Sigh, I'd hate to have to get the camera serviced, but maybe that's what I need to do. Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks!

Andy

[jim9tan]

Hi andy,

Got the same problem. Noticed only once though. It was a sunset location and several photos had the red and blue specks (tiny) in the dark areas.

It showed up on my 4x6 prints. I used a Remove Moire function on the specks and it looks okay now.

Don't have any idea of why it happened and when.

Any ideas, guys?

[dusterbuster]

i think i figured out the problem. all the pictures in which the noise shows up occurred when i had the ISO set to 400 when shooting in the various manual modes. i was looking around and saw this review of the s40 where they discuss the noticeable noise at ISO 400.

http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/S40/S40PICS.HTM

i just turned the ISO back to Auto and it seems to work fine now (except of course if the Auto setting selects ISO 400 in a less than ideal light setting).

[Woodchuck]

Wonder if this is why there is no 800 ISO setting on the S40? Apparently the S30 has not a terrible amount of noise at 800 ISO:

http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/S30/S30PICS.HTM

[Inactive member 38]

dusterbuster wrote:
i think i figured out the problem. all the pictures in which the noise shows up occurred when i had the ISO set to 400 when shooting in the various manual modes. i was looking around and saw this review of the s40 where they discuss the noticeable noise at ISO 400.

http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/S40/S40PICS.HTM

i just turned the ISO back to Auto and it seems to work fine now (except of course if the Auto setting selects ISO 400 in a less than ideal light setting).

The Auto ISO only goes between ISO 50 and 100, so you won't have to worry about it going to ISO 400. However, I've tried using auto ISO mode and then manually selecting 50 and 100, and based on the shutterspeed selected (program AE mode), the camera always chose ISO 50 regardless of the light conditions or flash usage.