Digi Cam for the Mrs...?

[jus_tin]

Hi, unfortunately my camera upgrade has been put on hold as the wife now wants abit of the action. Shes a complete beginner and isnt looking to do serious photography just a simple point and shoot compact camera for a budget of £200. The only requirement i suppose would be a good zoom lens of 8x or over. It will be mainly used for taking pictures of animals, scenery and family parties etc and doesnt need all the manual functions that some compacts come with. A good image stabilization is important though. Any tried and tested cameras people can recommend??? Thanks!

 

[woodbutcher]

I think the usual recommendation goes to panasonic and their LUMIX DMC-TZ cameras. I'm pretty sure that I'm probably getting confused with the LX series by the same maker but they are beyond your budget, besides having a much shorter zoom. Canon's mega zoom cameras would be the SX series.

A good place to start would be here where you can compare prices and take advantage of any discount codes various shops are currently running.

Personally I have a rather long in the tooth canon IXUS as my compact P&S but that series doesn't have the zoom you have asked for.

I'm sure others will be along shortly with their experience of the above cameras and maybe a recommendation as to which will be suitable for your wife.

 

[ecniv]

Second vote for a panasonic tz series.. We have the tz3 and its been brilliant. For a small camera. Battery life was a bit sucky and image quality wasn't the best out there, but compact and yet zoomable... yup has it.

Used to be a store on ebay that sold the japanese models around 100 ukp cheaper than the street.

Also for comparisons try dpreview.com as they have reviews and a side by side comparison.