Spec me a camera please

[Trojan]

Ok, please bear with me here as I'm not very clued up on cameras. What I'm after is something that will fulfill the following criteria:

- Budget of £150
- Fit easily enough in jeans/trouser pocket for when on a nightout for example
- Decent optical zoom (3x minimum say)
- Good sized LCD screen
- Ability to take photos quickly
- Take decent quality photos in most lighting conditions (In nightclubs, at the beach, on the snowslopes etc)

Is this doable for the budget? If so can you recommend any models worth looking at? Thanks in advance.

 

[Hen_Dawg]

Well I just finished my research and have ordered a Fuji Finepix f31fd for £126.

Seems to fit the bill of everything you're asking for.
It's not quite as small as the smallest but it's definitely pocketable.
Minimal shutter lag
3x Optical zoom
Very good low light performance (3200 ISO)
Other manual settings and scene modes e.g. Beach, snow

See what you think of it

Oh, and if you want to see sample images, just go to flickr and search with the model number. Loads there

 

[Trojan]

Brilliant, I'll take a look now, thanks very much for the recommendation

 

[Trojan]

Right, I'm going out later on to purchase a camera as I need one for tomorrow. Looking at the stores I have available locally to me, I can get the f31fd for £140, or the f45fd for £150. As far as I can see, the only difference is that the 45 is 8Mp compared to the 6Mp of the 31. Would you say therefore that the 45 is worth the extra £10?