Nikon Coolpix 2100 or Canon Powershot A60?

[jebatzel]

went to Best buy and they didn't have the Canon Powershot A60 that I wanted to get, so my wife picked out the Nikon Coolpix 2100 camera, was $200 minus $20 rebate

that camera ate thru AA batteries really fast, glad I grabbed a 6 pack of them at the store. Canon battery takes 4 batteris to Nikon's 2.

I ordered a bunch of rechargable batteries off newegg.

man I feel ripped off, I see you can get that Nikon camera online for only $130.

Going to take the Nikon camera back and exchange for the Canon if they get them back in stock. I have 14 days to do so, 15% restocking fee if I don't exchange for something else in the store.

Review Link for Nikon

What should I do?

keep calling Best Buy and they say they should get more in today, but not getting my hopes up.

Anyone here try and return anything to Best Buy before?

JB

 

[Peter]

Pro Canon: Records video w/ audio, has firmware update for PictBridge standard (for direct connection to compliant printers). Pro Nikon: Comes with rechargeable batteries and charger unit, supports USB Mass Storage mode for easy use on non-Windows OS (and you can abuse it as a CompactFlash reader device as well).

I bought the Nikon. btw, there is a firmware update for it that fixes a problem: Premature "Low Battery" warnings with NiMH rechargeables (guess what kind of batteries come with it ...)

 

[suklee]

Have just bought the Coolpix 2100 recently and love it. Sooooo much lighter compared to the A60. If you're a photography n00b like myself and just need a solid , no-frills digicam, I'd pick the 2100 over the A60. The A60 has a lot more customizeable options but thats not to say the 2100 is a slouch. Check out www.dpreview.com for a comparison between the two.

Only CONS I've experienced so far are those dreadful batteries and no sound when recording videos (not to mention it only records 15 seconds). I'll have to dig around for that firmware update Peter is talking about.

EDIT: Doh, nevermind. My cam already has the latest firmware, v1.1

 

[Peter]

Also, NiMH batteries need a few charge/drain cycles before they're up to their full capacity. I've had a few rounds of annoyingly few shots taken before camera went dead, but now that I've used it a bit more the batteries have gotten good enough to survive an entire day of taking snapshots whilst out skiing.

 

[suklee]

Heya just an update here: picked up the Coolpix 2200 last night and jsut started playing around with it. More or less the same 'feel' as the 2100 but with some design improvements, most notably:

-better location of on/off switch... more than several times I've turned it thinking it was T/W
-an "enter" button in the centre of d-Pad
-function dial is next to viewfinder now
-and of course, it uses SD/MMC instead of CF

Overall I'm fairly impressed at the changes they made.

 

[Peter]

SD/MMC over CF isn't something I'd call an improvement, CF cards being the most versatile, the least fragile, and the cheapest of the lot.

Using CF cards was one of the must-have criteria I had when I was out to buy a camera.

 

[suklee]

I forgot to mention I had a spare MMC card that came with my Zire, so thats why I chose SD over CF in this instance.

Also I'd think at least some of the improvements I listed above (relocation of multifunction jog dial & T/W button) was moved due to the smaller footprint of the SD card. With the big footprint of the CF card this simply wasn't possible. The camera also feels thinner to me.. not sure if thats true, will have to look up the official specs. Will have both 2100/2200 tomorrow in front of me so I can do a more thorough examination.

That said, there's already one thing I miss on the 2100.. the ability to turn off the LCD screen with a button. They now made it so that you HAVE to go into "setup" mode and change it in there... rahter annoying.