Canon Powershot A530

[msemma]

Has anyone bought a Powershot A530? It's a relatively new camera by Canon. It's a 5mp camera, so what size memory card should I be looking at getting to go with it?

[vehelpfulguy]

Well the maximum picture resoultion for this camera is 2593 bytes by 1944 bytes, which multiplied together give you about 5 million bytes, hence 5Mb. See here

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0602/06022107canona420.asp

So set at the highest quality, each picture will take 5Mb of memory card space, so a 256Mb card will hold about 52 pictures.

Simply divide the memory card size in Mb by 5 to find out how many pictures it will hold (256 divided by 5 gives about 52).

Of course you can set the picture quality lower, and at the lowest camera setting, 640x480 (300,000 bytes per picture) you would get over 700 pictures on a 256Mb card.

So it all depends on what quality setting you set the camera at.

Here is a useful table

http://www.card-media.co.uk/memory+info.htm?page=mmc

At the highest resolution I would say you will need at least 2 x 256Mb cards (100 pictures), maybe 2 x 512Mb cards if you are going on holiday (200 pictures).

[msemma]

Wow - you live up to your username! That's really helpful for a novice like me, thanks.

[fo3nix]

At the current prices, I'd go for a 1GB card.

Even if you don't use all the space instantly, it'll either come in handy at some point with your current camera, or if you ever buy a camera with even more mega pixels (not that you'd need to, but if it ever breaks or something), then the 1GB card will set you in good stead.

http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index. html?rb=18206883511&action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN 0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=82393
�20, including VAT and P+P

[commoner]

My Canon PS S50 is a 5Mp camera and takes 88 pics on a 256 MB CF card at the highest quality.....the pics are actually compressed after taking so dont take up the space you would think on the card.............commoner.