With a holiday coming up, I decided I couldn't put up with marks on my pictures taken with my old Sony DSC-P200 digital camera. That's why today it got replaced.

This marks the end of a little over 3 years of photography with my older camera which can claim the title of my first film replacement digital camera. I like to think that I've learnt a lot about picture taking during that time, and having clocked up over 5000 images that's a lot of trial and error.

Never-the-less, when things start showing the signs of wear and tear (there are two main faults with the camera - it has dust in the lens, and the zoom buttons are failing), they must be replaced. So the Sony will be confined to a drawer to be taken out for times when the risk of damage, loss or theft is at it's highest, or should I need a backup camera.

So after looking over a few websites for fairly cheap cameras, I couldn't find any I liked the look of. So a trip to one of my favourite review sites (trustedreviews) was in order. After searching for compact cameras priced up to £150, I came across the Casio Exilim EX-Z1080 with a glowing review and a score of 9/10. Other reviews confirmed it's place of praise so I went on the hunt for one which Comet provided at a mere £79 (on offer, down from £149 - bargain!)

It's a fair bit different from my Sony. It's black for a start (I've gone off silver), takes SD and SDHC cards instead of memory sticks (cheaper memory - yay!), has 10.1 megapixels compared to the Sony's 7.2MP, features a higher range of ISO ratings (up to 3200 where the Sony went to 400) and features widescreen video recording. I'm still limited to only 3x optical zoom but that's not too bad considering the likely camera shake experienced from anything more.

It does lack a few features of my older camera, but hopefully I won't miss them too much. The Sony does have manual control over exposure times up to 30" where the Casio is automatic with a maximum of 0.5" although it does allow +/- 2EV and the Sony featured limited aperture control where the Casio does not. My aim is to one day complement my compact camera with a digital SLR, so for the situations where I would like more manual control that larger camera would fulfill those needs.

It does appear that digital camera technology has moved on in these last 3 years. When I bought my Sony, it was pretty much top of the range at least as far a megapixel count goes. 7 megapixels was rare for an everyday point and shoot, with a limited number of models appearing at the end of the range in the Argos catalogue. Now I see compact cameras offering 12MP, with features such as face detection (the Casio has that too), anti-shake technology reasonable quality video footage. I've even heard of a WiFi enabled camera.

Assuming this Casio lasts as long as the Sony, my next compact camera will be in 2011/2012. By that time, will 15MP sensors be the norm, with top-of-the-range cameras boasting 17MP? Will they pack any more technology (automatic scene optimisation perhaps) to allow people who don't want to know anything about photography take the perfect picture?

On a final note, I looked back at my early blog entry in April 2005 where I logged my purchase of the Sony DSC-P200. I noted that I must find lots of things to take pictures of. I think after approximately 1797 pictures per year, I fulfilled that ambition which now continues with what I will classify as my third generation of compact camera (1st = film, 2nd = Sony, 3rd = Casio).

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