Our first "serious" digital, and the only one we ever sold & then bought again. In May 2004 we made a move towards making "serious" photos also have no costs associated with them. It would take some serious money, we couldn't afford a D-SLR but we could afford this--a Nikon Coolpix 5700, my 1st "serious" digital camera which we got May 2004 (eBay, $475). It did what we expected--it had the resolution & manual controls for serious "photography," but without the costs of film. We had to sell this model mid-Feb 2005 {2-7} after 9 happy months, when our car croaked--but happily reacquired it on Oct 31st 2005 for $325--only to then sell AGAIN for something else not yet decided.