Thats never an easy question to answer, for a number of reasons. Firstly, because the questions will vary from consumer to consumer. Secondly, because the digital camera manufacturers have inundated the digital camera marketplace with an excessive avalanche of technical babble and marketing hype. All the average consumer is looking for, is the camera that takes the best quality pictures in a fashion that is simple and easy to use for them.

Its not really that difficult of problem to solve. Unless your looking for professional level camera equipment, in which case things can get a bit tricky. For the sake of simplicity, lets just leave the pros out of the equation for now.

Point and shoot technology is great. Just select a setting (outdoor, sport, portrait, movie mode), point the camera, and take the picture. Theres no messing with manual settings like shutter speed, white balance and ISO settings. Maybe a nice simple button for flash, or no flash, and most amature photographers are ready to take their next Pulitzer prize winning photo. Cameras like the Canon PowerShot A570IS, and the SD1000 Digital Elph, excel in this category.

Those budding Ansel Adams in the crowd, may be looking for a bit more of a challenge though. For them, the best digital camera will be slightly different. Even if theyre a little reluctant to leave the safety net of point and shoot auto settings, they have nothing to fear. The niche of entry level SLR digital cameras is both very price competitive and accessible to advancing students of photography. Cameras like the Canon XTi Digital Rebel, the Nikon D40, and the Olympus Evolt E510 make it easy to cross over to the world of SLR photography. They also include many of the easy to use features of point and shoot digital cameras.

So, the best digital camera to buy, really depends on what you the consumer hopes to accomplish with your camera. Going down the path of least resistance makes available a wide choice of easy to use compact and ultra compact point and shoot digital cameras. Taking the road less traveled into the exciting world of SLR is a little more dangerous, but fraught with many rewards as well. Either way, you cant go wrong. The only real mistake you could make, would be to shy away from buying a digital camera, just because the technology can seem so intimidating.