Released in 2001, the Canon Powershot S40 is my second oldest (still working) digital camera. The A50 is my only pre-2000 digital camera (released in 1999) that I own as my collection mostly starts at the mid 2000s.
In 2001 having a 4mp sensor in a compact camera was insane. Most cameras at this time were using 1-2 mp (or less think "VGA" resolution sensor). Even the bigger sensor Professional DSLRs at the time were around 3-4 MP (like the Canon D30), so a small sensor that packed in 4mp was really cutting edge stuff.
This camera was a thrift store find. It was untested so I took a gamble but it works. The physical controls are a little worn out which is to be expected for a 22 year old camera.
Interestingly enough uses the same battery as the Canon Rebel XTi (which is the reason I chose it for this review- I still had the Rebel charger and batteries charged from last week's review) even if it is 5 years older. So lets get onto the product photos and the review:
As mentioned before the Canon Powershot has a 4mp 1/1.8" CCD sensor which at the time was the cream of the crop for a point and shoot camera (1/1.7/-1/1.8 sensors would remain as the "Big Pocket Camera sensors till the advent of the 1" sensor in the Sony RX100). This sensor is what makes this camera.
In addition the S40 can shoot RAW (but like most pre 2005 cameras writes RAW files very slowly to card so I stuck to JPEG), has manual/priority modes and even has some features that I wasn't expecting for a camera from 2001 including 3 shot AEB (Auto Exposure Bracketing) which I discovered on accident. While there was a significant pause between the 3 shots the camera automatically fired the fact that it existed on a pocket camera from 2001 really surprised me.
It's also worth noting that while I don't review the Video capabilities of a camera the fact that this had Video recording (and it was one of the first pocket cameras to do so) was pretty big for 2001. It was terrible resolution at 15fps but the fact that you could capture video on anything but a camcorder would have been pretty slick in its day.
It has a 3-5 second startup delay before it's ready to take a photo. It has about a half second shutter delay from when you press the shutter and it takes a photo. Burst mode is pretty much non-existent and it takes 2-3 seconds between shots before you can take another photo. Overall the camera is pretty slugish to respond but not any worse then digi cams I own from 2004/2005 which were a few years newer.
Lens covers were common in the early days of pocket cameras especially before the advent of the retracting leaf-shutter style internal lens cover that we are used to seeing on more modern pocket cameras. Some cameras like the Sony TX and T series (which I reviewed a few weeks ago) would carry this lens cover concept forward to more modern pocket cameras but by this time the covers were better built.
The S40 has some unique design flaws as well, and back in the "wild west" days of digital photography prior to 2010 quirks and gimicks on digital cameras were pretty common. When the S40 came out every digital camera had a different design with a different control and menu button layout or gimmicks and some worked better then others. (As we will see with the Sony f828 when I get to that review)
The first major flaw was the lens cover. My first photo showed it open without a battery (so the lens didn't extend) but here is what it looks like when it is closed:
The lens cover on the S40 and similar SXX series powershots up to the S80 was flimsy and prone to breaking such as getting de-railed or stuck due to dirt/sand/debris getting in the track. Mine still works but you can defiantly tell it is loose and likely will fail at some point in the nearish future- a reason I don't shoot it that often.
Like some other other early point and shoot cameras (such as the Olympus D-490) the cover is also how you typically turn the camera on and off. As I mentioned the Powershot S40 has a startup as well as a shorter (About 2 second) shutdown delay so if you are not used to being patient with digicams it is really easy to jam the cover against the lens while it is still out which could damage both the lens and the lens cover itself.
The second major design flaw is the navigation buttons. Just like the Fujifilm A345 that I reviewed earlier it lacks the 4 way button with an ok button in the middle set that most modern cameras today. Instead the S40 has a rocker switch which you push in to confirm menu choices and man did it really suck to use.
My finger would often slide the rocker up or down when confirming an option, which meant the option I was trying to change got changed right as I was confirming it. Want your white balance to be on Cloudy? Nah man you really want Tungsten instead. The rocker on mine has been worn out from age which made accidental toggles with it all the more common.
But at the end of the day with a lot of patience I actually managed to get a few really solid photos with the Canon Powershot S40 including one that really surprised me and I couldn't re-produce if I tried. One of those "Happy Accident" sort of shots. So it by far is not the worst Digicam I've reviewed so far in spite of the awkward controls and lag which is pretty typical of older digital cameras.
It's a camera that's over 20 years old that you can still take out and get some pretty neat photos of which in itself is quite the feat.
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