In the world of digital cameras, it’s all about megapixels and storage. Today I got my hands on the Cannon PowerShot A540, this is how it stacks up.

In the Box

The box contents were your average digital camera junk: a USB cable, an A/V-out cable, a 2 pack of batteries with no brand on them, a 16 MB memory card, and the camera. I’d say you got a nice average product. As for documentation, Canon has gone far beyond the normal bulk of instruction manuals. You will find an English manual, an English quick-start guide, a Spanish instruction manual, and a Spanish quick-start guide among the papers. Also you get two (English and Spanish) fold-out diagrams on how to connect your new camera.

Software

The camera comes with a software CD. I’ve used this software before when I got my old PowerShot A300. Most of the programs on the disk are plainly trivial in use, and serve no real purpose. One program, however, allows stitching of pictures to create a panoramic picture. This utility takes your pictures and finds the similar edges, just like in Adobe Photoshop‘s photomerge script. The only issue with this program is that your images will vary in brightness when using a flash. This means fewer lines in darker pictures, so your going to get bad results from this.  Other than that utility, the other software ranges from a photo browser and USB drivers (in-case you’re still using Windows 95). The photo browser that is included attempts to copy the best program out there, iPhoto. However, it falls extremely short. After using the program for only two minutes, it crashed on me. I reopened it and tried again, and got another crash. After about twenty minutes of this I reinstalled and tried again. After the re-install it continued to crash. Apparenty this software was written by a monkey with a keyboard.

The Camera Itself

The Canon PowerShot A540 is a normal-sized camera. Compared to the Sony Cybershot DSC-P52, the PowerShot is slightly taller and not as long. The PowerShot’s LCD viewfinder screen is 2.5 inches, compared to the Sony’s 1.5-inch screen. The Canon features 6.0 megapixels, 4X optical zoom, and 21 capture modes. A small issue is the fact that The PowerShot A540 comes with a very tiny memory card, and non-rechargeable batteries. The camera only comes with a 16 MB memory card out of the box, enough to hold very few high-quality pictures (around 15-20). I feel like I should be getting rechargeable batteries with a $200 USD camera. Cannon is skimping out on us for our bucks, and if you really want to get you money’s worth you should go with a nicer package. Another afterthought is that the cover over the I/O jacks does not go back into place. I can push and shove, but it will never fit back into the spot. Finally, the camera’s control scheme is just plain whack. The impossibility of the twenty-one shooting modes is enough to confuse even a savant. Most of the modes serve no purpose to the target market, novice consumers, and are really just a bother. Some modes like “portrait” are not even marked on the “wheel of modes”, not to even mention the location of the zoom controls, which are located in a ring around the shoot button. This causes issues, because when you press the shoot button, it zooms. Whoever designed this camera greatly compromised aesthetics for function. However the camera still delivers on picture quality. As you can see below, the pictures are crystal clear as compared to the Powershot A300 and the Cyber-shot DSC-P52.

Sony DSC-P52, Canon Powershot A300, Canon PowerShot A540

Today I’m going to introduce a new part of my reviews. I like to call this part:

Warnings of Absurdity

Seeing as how this is the first Warnings of Absurdity let me explain how this part works. Basically I’m going to look at the warnings that are included with whatever it is that I’m reviewing, and type out (and make fun of) the ones that are most absurd. So without further ado we shall begin.

Today’s first warning is found in the “Camera user guide” part of the docuimentation. Here is how it reads.

Store this equipment out of the reach of children and infants. Accidental damage by a child could result in serious injury.

Now, first of all, how in the world would a child get hurt with a digital camera. My second thought about this is, what child hurt himself to make this warning a reality. In America, no one thinks ahead on warnings.

Here is the second absurd warning I found in the documentations. This one is regarding the software CD.

Do not play the supplied CD-ROM in any CD player that does not support data CD-ROMs. Playing the CD-ROM in an audio CD player with headphones could cause hearing loss and speaker damage.

This is something my grandmother would do, right after she finished using her CD tray for a cupholder.

Final thoughts

All-in-all, the Canon Powershot A540 is a good consumer digital camera. It’s something you would use to record memories of your family vacation, or just mess around with. It’s something that can be broken without much loss. However if you are a serious photographer, I would advise getting a better camera that is more high-end like the digital version of the Canon Rebel.