Canon Rebel SL1.. Good things do come in small packages

  I have always carried a small point and shoot camera in the bag I shuttle to and from work, but never really liked the results it produced. It may be just me but I like a view finder and hate using an LCD to compose images. So when Canon release the new Rebel SL1 I thought this might be the solution I've been looking for. It is small, very light weight and accepts all of my current lenses, although it looks a little strange mounted on my 70-200mm.

 My 1st real outing with it was the Serena Rider concert at this year's Luminato Festival and I was impressed with the results. There was only the stage light, flash wasn't an option so the ISO had to be cranked up to 3200 at times and I was surprised how well the images looked. Noise was impressively low considering the ISO and holding the camera was a dream. It is big enough that you could hold it (unlike most point and shoots) but light enough that you hardly knew it was there.

I was a little skeptical of the Rebel's button layout and had never used an LCD touch screen to control a camera, but I was soon sold on this feature. I really liked being able to switch settings with the LCD, without my glasses I could easily make changes and being dark the LCD helped there too. I hope this feature is added to the 7D II which is supposed to be released soon, in fact I hope the 7D II also handles noise as well as this little SLR.

 The only draw back I found and I knew this going in was the RAW frame rate, I was bumping into the buffer more than I'd like but I didn't buy this camera for wild life per se so I can live with it. Overall a good little camera.

Canon: One Price Fixes All

Canon Canada has gone to a flat rate repair fee business model. If you send a camera or lens into their service center you will be charged a set fee for the repair regardless of the problem. Depending on the camera/lens model they set the price for your repair even before they look at the unit. This could work to your advantage if the repair were say replacing a sensor or shutter mechanism. The flip side is also true if your repair consisted of cleaning some lens contacts that you could have performed yourself.

The repair fees seem to be based on original model value, for instance a sample of their DSLR models breakout as:

Model	Repair Fee*
Rebel T2i	$149
EOS 60D	$199
EOS 7D	$219
EOS 1DS III	$299
* plus taxes and shipping

I recently sent in one of my Canon EOS 7D bodies for repair. I was getting an "error 30" code which points to a problem with the shutter. The camera was returned within 5 days and required a loose connection to be soldered. They also performed a sensor and eyepiece cleaning (they normally charge $40 for a sensor clean) and firmware upgrade (not sure about the firmware upgrade, was certain that I was up to date, maybe a reflash?). The complete cost was $247 including taxes and shipping (Mississauga to downtown Toronto). The repair warranty is good for 90 days, I will put this model to work and leave my newer model as a backup.

One has to ask "In store extended warranties are they worth it"? Henrys here in Toronto offers an "Extended Life Plan" which extends the warranty from 1 to 3 years and provides some lemon protection, price protection and full in store replacement in the early months of ownership. For a Canon EOS 7D they charge $219 which is the exact same price as a single out of warranty repair charge from Canon. Is it worth it, that is a great debate for sure. I've owned 4 DSLR bodies and this is the first out of warranty repair that I've had. I've only had one other dealing with Canon's repair center, which was a defective/recalled battery grip for my old 20D. Before deciding if you should spend the money on an extend warranty plan you may wish to first check the cost of an after warranty repair charge at this site: Canon Canada Repair Ctr.