Canon PowerShot SD300 Digital Elph

The Canon PowerShot SD300 Digital Elph is only a 4MP camera with a 2 inch LCD in an ultracompact space increasingly dominated by 5MP contenders with 2.5 inch LCDs—but that's okay, because this tough, tiny camera punches well above its weight. Superb picture quality more than make up for its sluggish flash recycle times, making this our new Editors' Choice ultracompact camera.

Available in the same range of colors as its fixed focal-length cousin the SD20, the SD300 has a bigger LCD, at 2 inches, and adds a retractable f/2.8-f/4.9 5.8mm to 17.4mm (35mm to 105mm, 35mm equivalent) 3X optical zoom lens that retracts into the body of the camera when not in use. It also adds an optical viewfinder, though we wish this were placed to the side; placing it further in toward the center of the camera means that people with small noses will put them right on the LCD and people with big noses will have trouble using the viewfinder at all. Still, most people frame shots with the LCD, and while this camera's display isn't the biggest, it's crisp and bright. The SD300 has the same menus as the SD20, which, while not quite up to the standards we observed in the Casio ultracompacts, are still very good. We also like the fact that it shoots 640x480 video at 30 FPS, something recently reviewed higher-end Canons, such as the PowerShot S70 and G6, do not.

Where the SD300 really excels, however, is in testing. It got a very respectable 1225 average lines of resolution (compare to the previous Editors' Choice, the 5MP Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T1, which only scored 1150 lines), which, while not as good as the 5MP Casio Exilim EX-Z55, is still impressive, and the best of the 4MP ultracompacts. Pixel transition was a fairly good 2.5%. It boots up quickly enough, at 1.8 seconds, second only to the Sony T1 among ultracompacts, but while it's fairly fast shot-to-shot without flash, it takes a full 5.5 sec-onds between flash exposures, which is quite slow.

Still, the images it takes that long to process are well worth any wait. The daylight shots show excellent colors and dynamic range, with good contrast and rich detail, from the shadows to the highlights. The flash shots aren't quite as outstanding, but still very appealing, with good exposure if somewhat uneven illumination. The contrast was excellent and the color hues were very good, though there were no true whites in the shot. The picture was very sharp, with good details.

The SD300 is a keeper; aside from a slow flash, there's not much to complain about. If you need a faster camera, try the Casio EX-Z55, but otherwise, this is our ultracompact of choice.

Benchmark Test
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