Choosing the right Canon ultracompact camera

No fewer than 11 of Canon's ultrapopular, ultracompact digital cameras are still widely available, some are still going strong after more than a year--remarkable in such a fickle, high-churn market. With street prices ranging from about $150 to $400, there's not a lot of room for price differentiation, unless you're really pinching pennies. For the most part, they're all of equal quality, with extremely similar feature sets. The PowerShot SD430, which is more than two years old by now, stands out as the only model with Wi-Fi support--no hard decisions there. So if you've set your heart on one of these other sleek little snapshooters, how do you choose among them? Let a salesperson steer you toward the one that happens to be in stock? Perish the thought! Make your own decisions. Here are some guidelines that should help--we hope.

• If you're on a budget, the SD1000 is the least expensive of the lot.
• If money is no object, buy the SD850 IS. It's fast and produces the best photos of the line. It's also significantly cheaper and better than its successor, the SD890 IS.
• If you like to show off photos in the camera but don't want to spend a lot, the SD750 is your cheapest big-LCD model; the SD870 IS is a more expensive alternative, but adds image stabilization over the older model.
• If you want the smallest model with image stabilization, your choice is the SD1100 IS. Plus, it's the most colorful of the Elphs.
• If you want to print really large photos or crop them, the 12-megapixel SD950 has the resolution you'll need.
• If you want the very fastest, the SD870 IS holds the current title, though the veteran SD800 IS still holds the overall performance crown.