Canon IXUS 55

01 May 2006 by martin

Don't get me wrong, I love my Canon Powershot G2 but often it's just too big and bulky to carry around. I've had my eye on the little IXUS range of Canon cameras for a while and during a recent trip abroad spotted this new IXUS 55. Being stuck in an airport waiting for a delayed plane is a great opportunity to check out a new gadget. One thing I really like about the G2 is that it's digital camera shutter lag is much better than many other digital cameras, i.e. when you press the button it takes the picture very quickly and you don't miss  too much of the action. However I was amazed that the lag on the 55 is almost non existent. In fact it was the speed of this little thing that made me decide to buy it there and then.

Despite it's small size, the IXUS 55 has a surprisingly sturdy feel. It has a 5 mega pixel resolution which is good for prints up to A4, or blowing up areas of a picture and still getting a decent 10x5 out of it. Remember high mega pixels doesn't necesarily mean good pics, a good lens is just (or may be more) important and for a compact, the lens on the 55 delivers some pretty good pictures. Canon make some higher mega pixel IXUS' but they start to get bigger and it's size that matters here.

What struck me imdeiately about the 55 is ,despite its tiny size, is its back screen is huge (2.5" to be precise). It also has this cool trick of knowing if you've taken a picture in landscape or porttrait (i.e. which way round you held the camera) so that when you view the photo on the back screen it always rotates the picture the right way up.
Like the camera, the battery is tiny too. It's a proprietary Canon Li-ion battery but with normal use can go a few days between charges (a lot longer than my iPod). To charge it you have to remove the battery from the camera and place it in the supplied external battery charger. Whilst I suspect this helps keep the size of the camera small, it is a pain to carry around the charger and another power cable. Luckily the power cable has the same connector as my Toshiba laptop so that's half the problem solved.

Overall I am very pleased with this great little camera. I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a good quality, simple to use and very easy to carry around digital camera.