Bear in mind I'm a beginner, so I don't have a lot of experience with any other cameras. If your dads in the same situation, then it might be relevent though.
I wanted to get into photography as a hobby, and despite a lot of people saying an SLR is going to be over the top at that stage, I went for a 350D as well - I like to chuck myself in at the deep end
. I'm not sure how this compares with other SLR's, but if you don't want to do everything manually, there are a lot of modes that do everything for you automatically, and a good balance between fully automatic and fully manual.
After a fully automatic mode, there are theme modes that automatically set the apature, shutter speed, exposure and ISO for scenes like indoors, night, sunny, cloudy etc. Even if you are more accustomed to cameras, these are useful for if you need to take a pic in a hurry without adjusting all the settings yourself. Speaking of which, the start up time from flicking the switch to being able to shoot is pretty much instant, unlike compact cameras.
The other useful modes to help you learn are Tv and Av. These 2 modes let you manually set the apature and shutter speed respectively while compensating the other to ensure a decent exposure. Finally, the manual mode lets you set everything independently as you would expect.
Before I took any pictures, I spent a couple of days reading a lot of guides and tutorials online and the manual. The best of which was ...
http://www.photoworkshop.com/canon/ - Click EOS digital rebel tutorial
Control wise, all the options are where you would expect, and I got to grips with it very quickly, I am an IT tech though. For an SLR it is relatively small I believe, but it feels very comfortable to me. That really is personal opinion though. I would suggest holding a few in ******* to get a feel for the one you like the best.
I am pretty much exclusively using manual mode as it's the most fun. I found that on my first shoot, about half the pictures were over/under exposed or out of focus. I did get some nice ones that I posted in this thread that I was pretty pleased with -
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=17580227 If you are going to use the manual modes, you'll get sharp pics, but it's a bit limiting if you are going after something a bit more creative.
One thing you'll have to budget for is another lens. As a beginner, I find the quality of the 18-55mm as fine, but the range is a bit restrictive for me, I think a 75-300mm is almost a essential purchase which will be about 160 quid (although you get a £35 cashback voucher with the camera for that lens).
Another good thing, especially if you are not 100% sure about getting into photography is that the camera will hold its value pretty well (check ebay prices). When I buy guitars, I usually go for for decent ones on the basis that if I come to sell them, I'll get back most of the money I spent. I'm pretty sure the same holds true for this, over some of the more budget models.
Hope that helps a bit!
I chose the 30D primarily because it felt right, the 350D felt too small and light for me so didn't inspire confidence. It may well feel completely different to you and your Dad.