In years past, Canon's 10-megapixel PowerShot G7 might have garnered an Editors' Choice, as its predecessor the G6 did, especially considering the quality of its still pictures. In today's ultracompetitive point-and-shoot camera market, however, a camera manufacturer can't rest on its laurels. This is a good camera, but it falls short of greatness.

For example, while the G7 has expanded its LCD screen to a larger 2.5 inches, up from the G6's 2-inch LCD, the display is no longer articulating. In addition, the older G6 had a grip similar to the one found on the PowerShot A630 and A640, which made these cameras feel secure in your hand. By contrast, the G7 is extremely boxy and not all that pleasurable to hold.

Moreover, the G7 drops the G6's RAW file support. Removing this feature, which gives prosumers the ultimate control over their images and can be found on the Fuji FinePix E900, is a big mistake by Canon.

Luckily, the G7 still has a glass viewfinder, which is very helpful when bright light washes out the LCD screen. The device is a bit heavy for a point-and-shoot—about 13 ounces with battery, which nears what a D-SLR weighs. And at $599.95, one wonders if you might be better off just buying a full-fledged D-SLR, such as the Canon Rebel XTi.

On the plus side—and this is a really big plus—the G7's pictures are stunning. In my real-world tests, I found that the quality of color and sharpness in outdoor shots approached that of true D-SLR cameras—especially when taking portraits. But indoors, where I was hoping for better results (especially in low-light, high-ISO situations), there was too much noise in photos taken at 1,600 and 3,200 ISO settings.

Overall, the test shots had very good color saturation and accuracy. There was hardly any fringing in my lab test shots, although the contrast may have been a bit too strong. No highlights were blown out in the flash shots. The exposures were also quite good, and the colors were vibrant and accurate. Even better, images were incredibly sharp, with the average resolution 1,975 lines, excellent for a 10MP camera.

The G7 features a 6X optical zoom with a 7.4mm-to-44.4mm range (which is equivalent to a 35mm lens with a 35mm-to-210mm zoom) and corresponding maximum f-stops of f/2.8 to f.4.8. With all the carefully placed physical controls, it was a breeze to change camera settings quickly. For example, in manual mode, I easily changed the shutter speed and aperture size by turning the control dial. With many cameras burying more and more functionality within their menu structures, it's nice to see a lot of manual controls.

There are also some special features here, too, such as a burst mode that will attempt to refocus during each shot. Just keep in mind, though, that because it engages the focusing mechanism, this burst is slower than the standard burst mode. The ISO ranges from 80 to 3,200 (Hi). You can also adjust the intensity of the camera's built-in flash.

On top of the camera, you'll find a hot shoe for using an external flash. I'm seeing fewer of these on digital cameras these days. That's not too surprising to me, as the number of enthusiast camera models seems to be shrinking too, given the falling price of D-SLRs.

I was quite impressed with the quality of the G7's VGA video clips. And I was happy to see that the camera also lets you shoot in XGA-size (1,024-by-768) clips. Sadly, XGA video is captured at just 15 frames per second, which gives a streaky appearance to moving subjects. The G7 disappoints again when zooming, as it uses a 4X digital zoom, instead of an optical system, which some superzooms have. But you can opt to turn off the digital zoom function, which is what I'd suggest.

I wasn't overwhelmed by the G7's performance, although I did find its burst speed in standard mode to be excellent, letting you fire consistently for dozens of shots without stalling. The camera's boot-up time of 2.6 seconds is decent, but the 3.3-second recycle time was just okay. I was, however, disheartened to find some fairly prominent shutter lag, more than I'd like to see on an enthusiast camera. I found very little barrel or pincushion distortion, however. And the G7's lens-based image stabilization worked quite well too, in both bright and low light.

Despite the positive qualities of this camera, I think the Fuji FinePix E900 is a better deal. And as the G7's $599.95 price tag is pretty steep, you should opt for a real D-SLR, such as the relatively affordable Canon Rebel XTi.

Benchmark Test Results
Check out the PowerShot G7's test scores.

Compare the digital cameras mentioned above side by side