How Do I Know if a c|Camera is Good?

[jrpilot]

Hello, I have been looking at digital cameras lately and was wondering how I should figure out what the zoom means..I no what is does but how good it is for distance. so if soemthig is 20x30 zoom what does this mean in comparison to something that has a 300mm zoom?

thanks

[Mr. Bones]

hmmm, i think the human eye sees at around 50mm. a 300mm will give you a 6X zoom...but i'm not sure about this.

just test them out and see what results you get. also look on sites such a dpreview.com. there they sometimes give some samples in camera reviews with a similar object taken at different mm.  ;)

[chomp_rock]

300mm is only a 6x zoom in 35mm photography, in digital the (X)x junk is not really that important as the actual magnification varies because of the CCD size and resulting differences in focal lengths. The only real way to compare it is to look for a "35mm equivilient" number or to try it for yourself. BTW if you are looking at digital cameras and do not want a digital SLR I recomend you consider the Minolta Dimage Z3 and Canon Powershot A95, I have used them both and was quite satisfied by their performance.

[Scottler]

Also, pay no attention to any reference to "digital zoom".  The number you want to look at is the optical zoom.

Digital zoom does nothing but magnify the image, which will almost always result in a "pixelated" image.