you also might want to peruse www.dpreview.com and www.steves-digicams.com for some reviews of the latest and greatest.

beware that these have a lot of hard core photogs and as such will tend to slightly deflect your stated budget upwards; just like with bike budgets.

you'd probably want to nail down your wants (zoom or no zoom, size of camera, pricing, will you be mostly printing the pictures or emailing/posting on webpages, how many pictures do you think you might take) and go from there. as with bikes, leave a little bit of money for accessories such as extra batteries (if they use rechargables or perhaps to BUY rechargables), bigger memory card (because the factory never includes a good sized one), filters, bag, tripod or anything else that you might need for your needs.

have fun!

bt