Digital Elph Scores High on Cool-o-Meter

It's sleek. It's tiny. It's impressive. It's Canon's new PowerShot S100 Digital Elph camera--one of the snazziest gadgets around.

But with its attractive form factor comes a trade-off. At $699, the Elph is not within everyone's budget, and it faces competition from less-stylish, similarly priced 2-megapixel cameras that offer more advanced features.

Price aside, the cigarette-pack-size Digital Elph has an alluring, svelte design rendered in stainless steel. Taking a cue from its film-based counterpart, the Elph 2, the 6.7-ounce Digital Elph fits neatly into your pocket. It features a 2.1-megapixel CCD--the charge-coupled device that serves as the "eye" of the camera--that delivers colorful pictures at resolutions of up to 1600 by 1200, and vivid 8-by-10-inch printed photos.

While most digital cameras have at least three resolution modes, the Elph has only two such settings: 640 by 480, ideal for Web posting or e-mail, and 1600 by 1200, for maximum photographic quality. The camera also has 2X optical zoom and 8X digital zoom. Pictures are stored on a bundled 8MB Type I CompactFlash card, which holds 15 high-resolution shots or close to 50 low-res shots. (Type I CompactFlash cards are available in capacities up to 192MB.)

First-time users may find that the menu options (such as resolution) on the Elph's 1.5-inch LCD screen can be a little difficult to decipher--you must get used to navigating the submenus. Experienced users, on the other hand, shouldn't have a problem. The camera also has handy, though limited, manual settings for white balance and shutter speed, two features valued by experienced shutterbugs.