Personally I reccomend the Sony DSC F717. It has memory cards up to 1gig, zoom up to 5 optical (x2 digital for a total of 10x zoom). Also it has excellent Macro ability up to less than 1 inch. All the work that is on my sight (www.zhounder.com) I did with the 707 which is the predicessor of the 717. You can also check my gallery on 'osity. All this and you can go completely manual to completely point and shoot and everywhere in between. Plus 15 second movies with sound! The only issue I have with Camedia is the propriatary software. If they update it your friend can be forced into upgrading. I know of one person that has had this issue. There are great reviews of all digital cameras at dpreview.com and stevesdigicams.com. Magick Michael