Six months after the PowerShot A1000 IS, Canon has renewed its entry level compact. It is largely unchanged, the main innovation being the gain from 10 to 12 megapixels and the new Digic 4 chip, that is there to improve image processing, especially high sensitivity images.

Handling

The casing of the A1100 IS has not really evolved from that of its predessor. All the elements are there but with a very plastic finish. No surprises with the handling, the bulge on the side being identical to the old model; at the very most the chrome coated bar down the front gives a better grip for the middle finger. The distribution of commands is identical to the previous model, which certainly isn’t a bad decision: the position of buttons is clear and the handling presents no difficulties.

In contrast the 6.4 com screen, limited to 115,000 points is, according to current standards, very poor indeed. The vertical angles of vision are among the narrowest we have seen and the lack of definition is manifest even at an armslength. Already remarked on on the A1000 IS, the use of the same screen six months down the line is real fault.


As on the Ixus 110 IS, you’ll note that the camera is slower than the previous generation. Slow to start-up, the focus on the telephoto lens is better but it is very slow between two photos: the wait is one second longer. Is this down to the processing of the two extra megapixels? Or processing of noise? Whatever, but you’ll have to wait more than three seconds between two images.

Image quality

In this domain, the camera doesn’t do badly. Moving up to 12 megapixels is one thing but image processing generation is another. The results are above average and we didn’t note any major faults; sure there are problemes in strong light but this is a fault common to all current compacts – although Ricoh and Fuji will sound be launching solutions that we’ll be studying in this area.

Precision is good, including on the periphery, thanks to an effective autofucus even in low lighting and effective stabilisation. Colours are faithful to the brand tradition: automatic white balance is effective and retains an agreeable warmth.


Noise processing on the new Digic 4 is however very different to that on the previous Digic III. As of 800 iso, the image, already grainy but still precise, is smooth and exempt from superfluous noise. It’s the same at 1600 iso, where the image noise only appears slightly but where figures become unreadable – in spite of having 2 Mpx less, the A1000 IS can handle more detail at this iso.

You’ll get a file that you can develop on A4 that is well defined and not at all grainy. The reframing maniacs will dislike this automatic smoothing – they might prefer to manage the noise with specialised software, or with black and white for example, but this new trend does correspond to the A1100 IS general consumer target.


The camera is faithful at VGA definition. Don’t expect miracles, although it does handle itself honorably. The zoom is inactive during image recording, replaced by a digital zoom of doubtful quality.