Recommendations for around $300 ?

I bought my first digital camera - a Fujifilm Finepix S3500 - a few
weeks ago, but am not satisfied with it. I'd appreciate your
recommendations for other makes/models.

What I like about the S3500 (for this price class): 6x optical zoom,
electronic viewfinder in addition to the LCD screen, lens hood/adapter,
SLR-type appearance. Good colour capture, good macro. Simple menus,
easy to use.

What I don't like : Slow auto-focus (about one full second), most of
all - inability to focus except on a well-lit scene. E.g., the AF fails
under subdued indoor lighting.

Other dislikes that I can live with (Am I asking too much for the
price?) - Weak flash, limited aperture-priority setting (min 8),
details lost in brightly-lit areas. Low video frame rate of 10fps.

Can you please recommend other makes and models that equal or better
the "likes" while substantially improving on the dislikes, especially
the AF ? I'd prefer not to go above $350, but that's not an absolute
limit.

wrote:
I bought my first digital camera - a Fujifilm Finepix S3500 - a few
weeks ago, but am not satisfied with it. I'd appreciate your
recommendations for other makes/models.

What I like about the S3500 (for this price class): 6x optical zoom,
electronic viewfinder in addition to the LCD screen, lens
hood/adapter, SLR-type appearance. Good colour capture, good macro.
Simple menus, easy to use.

What I don't like : Slow auto-focus (about one full second), most of
all - inability to focus except on a well-lit scene. E.g., the AF
fails under subdued indoor lighting.

Other dislikes that I can live with (Am I asking too much for the
price?) - Weak flash, limited aperture-priority setting (min 8),
details lost in brightly-lit areas. Low video frame rate of 10fps.

Can you please recommend other makes and models that equal or better
the "likes" while substantially improving on the dislikes, especially
the AF ? I'd prefer not to go above $350, but that's not an absolute
limit.

Cameras which I know have fast auto-focus include the Nikon 8400 (wide
angle is its speciality, and it can do 30 fps video) and the Panasonic FZ5
(image-stabilised 12X optical zoom telephoto is its speciality, 15 fps
video).

The restricted minimum aperture is a limitation of all small sensor
cameras, because of the small sensor and the short focal length lenses
required. It's caused by diffraction.

David

A sony W5 -W7 and maybe others P200 can have focus on to continualy
focus when powered, batteries wont last as long, other than focus I have
no way to compare what you like. Pushing shutter half way also
prefocuses in regular mode.