Before you buy any cameras . .

#1 Guest_kombizz_*

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Posted 19 February 2007 - 19:04

Before you buy any cameras, FIRST you should ask yourself what kind of application do you have and what you would like to do with it?
Then you have to think how much your maximum budgetfor it. Because any camera specially the digital one has many hidden costs such as:

1- A memory card with higher capacity such as 256MB, 512MB, or 1 gig.
2- A card reader
3- A case
4-If that camera comes with battery charger then it would be nice, otherwise you have to buy it separately

When you add the costs of above items then might be beyond of your budget.

Now you decide everything. Then where you go to buy?
As you mention you do NOT buy a camera from Argos, or those supermarket that sell everything!! You should buy it from a camera shop who is specialised in handeling them.
I am sure, there are so many of them in your area.

Before you go and buy, you should find the BEST ONE. So go to the following sites and check them out by looking at their full review and even they have facility to compare them side by side. These following website are EXCELLENT in explaining all of the details to you:

http://www.steves-digicams.com/
http://www.dpreview.com
http://www.dcviews.com/

Then you should find the righ price. In order to DO that you have to know that ALL of the main photography stores MATCH the prices either with internet shops or in a raduis of few miles around thei shops, and so on. The reason is because they want to compete.
For finding the right prices there are few sites that you could check with them as all of them have a search engines:

http://www.pricerunner.co.uk/
http://www.ciao.co.uk/
http://www.warehouseexpress.com/

Then after you find the cheapest price from 2 or 3 places on the internet, print them out for your documentation to show the sales person.
(Do not forget, before you show the printout to them, ask about the availibility of the camera, otherwise they would lie to you that they do NOT have them once they hear your cheap price !!)

The last not least TIME of buying is very important.

You might ask HOW?

Do NOT forget these main photography shops in order to compete with the intenet sites, and because they have a huge overhead expenses, THEY DO EVERYTHING when there is not many customers around in a shop !!!!!!!!!!!!
SO, the best time to buy would be Sunday morning whenthere is anybody around and the chief of store needs to sell million £/$ at the end of that day.

HOPE all of these info help you to find the best deal of century for you.

Good luck

#2 DJ Joker

Without me there is no FUN!

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925 posts

Posted 19 February 2007 - 22:04

Having recently bought a camera, thers some good advice here.

Thanks Kombizz

#3 David

There is only one...

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1,323 posts

Posted 20 February 2007 - 11:23

http://www.steves-digicams.com/ have some great reviews, have been reading everything i can find on Canon EOS 400D and this site had an excellent review! thanks kombizz

#4 namllihs

Obsessive Member

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376 posts

Gender:Male

Posted 22 February 2007 - 20:56

I usualy go to a shop and just pay what they ask

#5 wolfian

Advanced Member

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171 posts

Posted 23 February 2007 - 12:53

Some good advice...but having spent some time in a management position for a large independent camera retailer there are some issues that need to be considered. what is the price of customer service, what is the cost of the personal touch and where do you take a product purchased on the net when it goes wrong. We used to work for a miserly 5% commission and we were earning award wage so when people came in and behaved as if they were in a morrocan bazaar and wanted to haggle and play one off against the other...I wasn't very interested . We loved people who didn't haggle and often gave them a better price because of this. We loved people like you Steve and frequently gave them the best deal we could.Often chucking in a memory card or case. The time of day never made a difference to us as to what deals we offered.

What I will advise is that you always ensure that what you are buying is new and unopened. We would frequently sell display and demo stock as new. Check all plastic bags aren't crumpled and are sealed and boxes are sealed closed. If not then you can ask for a discount on the basis of condition. On DSLRs always check the shot counter to see how many clicks are on it already.

#6 Guest_eddie46_*

Guests

Posted 23 March 2007 - 03:26

I came across a cool site that lists all expert reviews for a digital camera in a single page. You might want to read them all from one page. Just compare what different experts are saying about a particular brand and model.

http://www.smartratings.com/photography/digital_cameras

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