My wife wants to get her parents a new camera for Christmas. Right now, they've got an ancient Sony Mavica that writes on floppy disks. Almost anything would be a big improvement. The trick is how to get them something that isn't just cheap crap without spending a bundle. This is further complicated by their PC also being quite old and underpowered. It's probably got USB 1.0, but certainly not 2.0. Never mind having a smaller hard drive and so forth.

The cheapest cameras seem to be 4 megapixel cameras, from $130-150 or thereabouts, with a 512MB SD card being reasonably cheap as well (around $50). Reviews are spotty on these cheap cameras, since there are so many of them and they change so fast. Still, what I've found isn't encouraging. For example, consider this review on the $200 Samsung DigiMax U-CA 5 from PC Magazine: With a poor menu structure, small LCD, and noticeable shutter lag, this camera has little to recommend it.

Should we suck it up and buy something in the $250 price range instead? One camera that might be attractive is the Kodak EasyShare V530 ($259). Says PC Magazine: The V530 is inexpensive, very versatile, and easy to use. The excellent menus, blistering speed, and handy extras make it an easy pick for our Editors' Choice. DCResource mostly liked it, but complained about poor battery life. Likewise, at the same price point, is the much loved Canon PowerShot SD400. With a 512MB memory card, we're talking about $300, and then we'd have to buy some cheap USB card adapter as well.

Thoughts?