Final stage: Down to two cameras- canon or panasonic

Hi I am looking for a good Point and Shoot camera, currently Ive decided between

a canonsd 870 is or a panasion panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ5. I thinking of stepping

into the panasonic line because the camera has a lot of nice features- 10x zoom

and can record movies in HD. Also they both have wide angle. Both seem small

and pocketable.

I know that canon has a great reputation and is always the way to go for P&S

1. any thoughts of the Canon SD870is VS the panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ5?

2. Also whats the difference in the panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ5S, the DMC-TZ5K,

and the DMC-TZ5(some other letter). Is it just a color difference?

THANKS!

Panasonic denotes body color by letter. Otherwise, they are identical. "S" is silver, "K" is black and "A" is blue.

The Canon is easily pocketable, the Panasonic is not as pocketable, but it will fit in a pair of mens pants pockets....I've done it.

My girlfriend has the predecessor to the Canon SD870...the SD800. Takes very nice images. With the TZ5 Panasonic has corrected many of the issues users have had...it completely eliminated the color bleeding and now ISO 400 is absolutely useable, as you can see in this page from the review done at DPReview..

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/panasonictz5/page6.asp

I've been very happy with my recent TZ5 purchase. The wide range of the zoom makes it a very versatile camera, and the improved flash performance and better higher ISO performance makes it a much more versatile camera than the SD870....but the SD870 is very easily carried anywhere and, within it's zoom range, makes getting nice images about as easy as it gets.

The Panasonic isn't exactly huge by comparison, especially when you think about how big most of the other 10X or more zoom lens cameras are.

You won't go wrong in terms of image quality with either choice when it comes to still photography. You need to take the "HD" movie thing with a grain of salt....no digicam designed first as a still camera will be able to lay a hand on a "real" movie camera in terms of movie quality. I haven't tried a movie yet with my TZ5 and probably won't....I'm not a movie shooter. Never have been.

If movie quality is really important, I hear the Canon TX1 is pretty impressive, but a little bulky and not exactly a normal type machine for still shooting.

There have been several complaints over on the Panasonic forum at DPReview about the continuous AF of the TZ5 during the movie mode that have those users a bit disappointed in the movie aspect of the camera....again, this is a non-issue for me, but maybe is something you should look at and go over to DPReview to the Panasonic section and see what's been said about that.