Canon Powershot S2 IS 5MP Digital Camera with 12x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom

This is the most wonderful camera I have ever owned. It does not take bad pictures. I know nothing about photography, except I like to take pictures and like for them to be quality. I have a "point and click" mentality. Have never read the instruction book (shame on me). Truly, all you have to do is set it on automatic and then take perfect pictures to your heart's content. I would never be without the 12x zoom. Now I can get the wildlife pictures that have always been elusive to me. I would recommend this camera to novice or professional. It is simply the best!!

I bought this camera 3 years ago and have used it very heavily. I frequently come home with 200 or more pictures to download. I discovered it takes better video than my 5 year old video camera so now it's my primary video camera too. Thankfully, the price of SD cards has come down so I can carry a couple spare 2GB SD's with the camera.

When the camera was approximately one year old I encountered the black screen problem. I sent the camera to Canon and, after verifying that the camera had no water damage or other physical damage, they fixed it for free and returned it quickly. I did send the camera to Canon kind of on faith though because they did not promise to fix it for free. They gave me the impression that it was likely I would have to pay $129. Therefore, I was pleasantly surprised when they didn't charge me.

I wanted to write this review because I did have a good experience with Canon. Yes, the camera should not have had the black screen problem, however, Canon did do the right thing for me so I wanted to make sure that people know that Canon can do the right thing. I plan to buy Canon in the future but I'm not ready to retire this camera just yet. I'm still enjoying it enormously which is surprising because electronics improve so quickly that many products seem old after only a year or so! The only thing I'm feeling that I miss on this camera is face recognition technology which all the new cameras seem to have but it didn't exist when I bought this camera. Sometimes the camera focuses on the tree behind the two people I'm trying to photograph. Of course, I know how to work around that but the newer cameras do it for you.

I think the S2 has a serious reliability issue
I purchased this camera the Canon S2 from Amazon on April 6, 2006 for $[...]. Upon my recommendation my son-in-law purchased his about 1 month later but from Costco.
We both were amazed at the performance of this camera. It was all that we expected and more.
About 14 months of use I started to have a strange "black screen" at start up. This problem would come and go and at times it would only happen at start up and the camera would perform perfectly for hours of shooting. About two months after my problem started my son -in law's camera also started to exhibit the "exact" same problem He had purchased his camera from Costco.
As time went on it became apparent that a serious flaw in this camera was starting to creep in and after researching this issue I decided to check with Canon. There service department said that they knew of no serious flaw in the S2 and offered to repair it for $127 since it was out of warranty by 8 months.
My son -in-laws cameras also started to go down hill and he also notified Canon and received the same response. Canon's attitude is that this "black screen" problem at start up is just one of those product failures that happen with all brands of cameras. I agreed that since there warranty is for one year that any product that fails after that would not be covered unless there "failure" rate on a particular model is was above industry levels but to have TWO cameras failing at almost the same time with the EXACT same problem is pretty coincidental. Plus research on the net indicates many of these S2's failing with almost the EXACT same issue "black screen" at start up.
Before any one buys the Canon S2 they better research the forums and decide if they want to chance buying this camera. I give it 5 stars for performance and 0 stars for reliability. I am sure that there are many S2's that do not have this problem but I also believe that there is an "abnormally high" fail rate for this camera.
I worked in Aerospace Quality Control for 12 years and it is my guess that the failure rate on this camera is way to high for the price and brand name (Canon). For those of you that have had the same problem tell Amazon & Canon what you feel and maybe down the road there will be a recall.

After 16 months, my camera stopped working. The lens does not retract and I am getting the E18 error. Canon wants me to pay to repair because I am outside the 12 month warranty period. I am extremely disappointed.

This camera was great until it stopped working 6 months ago. Mine gets the E18 error message and won't take pictures. Canon will fix it for $150 but the camera itself is only worth $200 new. Even though this is a common problem for canon they refuse to fix it for free. I will NEVER buy a canon again.