You will see visually no difference between 8 and 10 MP The big difference is in print size and even a 4 or 5 MP camera will make a decent 8 by 10. Digital and optical zooms are common among what is called point and shoot. Simple, basically the camera does all of the setup itself.
Optical zoom is the important factor and basically the only one that is really benificial to use Optical is actually moving the lens elements forward and back to change the magnitude of the object being photographed.
Digital zoom is manipulating the pixies around in center of picture to make the image look bigger. Not a good practice at all. Some of the better point and shoot cameras have the basic functions of being set up manually to come close to Dslr's. Cannon S3 IS and Cannon S5 IS are two of the better P & S camera's that I am familular with
I still have a Cannon S1 IS as a backup but I moved up to Pentax Dslr which is a 6.1mp and I have no probloem with 8X10 photo's or regular pictures.

Photo from Canon S1 3MP
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Photo's with Canon S3 5MP
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Couple with Pentax K100 D 6.1Mp
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Hope this has been of some help to you. jim

rjinja, ask yourself what kind of photos you will be taking most of the time. Do you need a long zoom for birds and wildlife? The megapixels are going to matter if you are taking photos of a 6-inch bird 50-feet away. That's when you need all the pixels you can get to blow that bird up and fill the photo. Having as much zoom as possible will matter with small objects at a distance. Sports a hundred feet away on the field or track, on stage performances, squirrels in trees, all require a long lens. If you are are primarily taking photos of kids and pets at 10-feet or even landscapes at a distance, 5-mp with a 10x or 12x zoom will be fine.

Here is a 5-inch bird at 50-feet, 12x lense, 5 mp. Not too clear. 10mp would let me blow this up more without loosing definition.
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A 7-inch bird at 10-feet, same 12x zoom, same 5-mp. Altho it is cropped a little, 5-mp gives me plenty of detail.
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Macro capabilities are important to me.

But my experience thus far with digitals verses film SLR has brought forth some interesting peeves. Focussing and jitter control are often automatic and a lot of folks just shoot and let the auto feature handle things like this because they don't want to delve deeper into how to take advantage of all the camera's features. Especially when using the Macro setting, the auto focus can be a huge pain. The autofocus mechanism works by picking a point that IT considers the prime target and focuses on that. However, what it picks to focus on is not always the subject. Admittedly, I haven't had my new digital long enough to get comfortable yet with manual control of shutter speed or focal length settings, something every good photographer should have control over. But for the neophyte or beginner, it's not that big a problem as you aren't wasting film and you can review your shot and go back and try again.

Most cameras have features to adjust for camera shake or jitter. It can be tough to control this though, even with those features and a tripod is valuable. However, I have tended to repeat shots hand-held because it is so easy and quick to review a shot and try again.

I tend to take reasonably good pics and if you go view the photo tours, 'A Place for a New Garden', 'I Think I'm Going Japanese, #1 and #2' and 'Walk Like an Egyptian', you'll see examples where I did not go back and redo a shot that suffered focus problems or jitter problems. For an example of jitter, look at the Golden Head of the Mummy Sarcophagus in 'Walk Like an Egyptian'. That is not a focus problem. It is jitter. Note that in other shots, there is a pane of glass between the camera and the subject and the shots suffer from light reflection off that glass. But OK. So what I'm saying is that the very good device that cameras have built in to control jitter ... does not always do the job. Be aware and use a tripod or be prepared to make several tries if the shot is important to you or you want to make sure your work is good.

I've generally found that the digital cameras are extremely flexible and useful, but the old SLR can still do things that digitals can not.

When rating digital cameras, a lot of folks condemned the early ones because their controls were hard to finger and they made 'noise'. The newer cameras are very quiet and the control surfaces and interfaces have been much improved.

You can find my latest photo tour of South Bay Gardens in the California Gardening Forum. It is called 'China Grove' and covers San Jose's Overfelt Gardens.

One other thing that the current crop of digital cameras that don't support interchangeable lenses fall flat on is wide angle PICS. In outdoor photography, there are often situations where a wide angle lense is an absolute necesity. The fact that you can't change lenses on many of these digitals leaves you hanging when you need this.

I am looking into an 18x zoom for shooting birds and nature. Two that I am leaning toward are: Fuji Finepix S8100fd and Panasonic FZ18. Both have image stabilization which is a must. I'm tired of taking pictures through my binoculars so I need to make a decision soon. Right now I own a 3x zoom, 7.1 mp and it takes nice pictures but isn't practical for getting good shots of birds far away. I've also looked into the Canon S5, Olympus 560, Sony H9 and Kodak 812. Anybody have anymore suggestions?? Thanks!

How the heck does one take pictures though binoculars?

I have an fz10 and I am looking at the fz18 also. They are not as sharp as some of the truly incredible pictures I see here from slr's but I have had 2 telephoto lumix and they are very convenient and I have gotten some nice wildlife pictures courtesy of the image stabilization. I do not own a tripod or carrying case. A lens cover does it and I can carry it as I bike ride. They also might not be the best pick for indoor pictures but over all the price is right and I get good pictures with the 4meg 12 x, so I am expecting even more fun with the 8 meg 18 x. btw, the hawk pictures I posted above were NOT taken with the panasonic lumix.

Rest your elbow on something sturdy, balance the binoculars in one hand and the camera in the other, try to zoom at the same time and get the picture in focus, then finally try to snap the picture before the bird flies away. It's pretty much a pain in the neck!

JMC is right about 8 va 10 mp also about the diff. in zooms. Digital zoom is not that good in quality as you you are only using a portion of the MP as you zoom in; infact if you zoom in a lot you may only have 2 mp quality. I use a DSLR with different focal length lens and they are always at 8.1 mp See kenrockwell.com for more info. John

I recommend to buy Canon IXUS 85 IS because camera is excellent. It is very small and compact but packs a real punch. The image quality is very good (if you don't compare it to a Digital SLR) and it also has pretty good video quality too.It is a good choice for personal use

Here is a link that might be useful: Personal finance tools

So here's the deal: If you want to drop a couple hundred dollars, and get a DECENT point-and-shoot, that's up to you. If I were you, I'd save a bit more, and get yourself a used DSLR with a coupla lenses. I shoot a Nikon D80, and for nature shots (as well as many others) I use a 70-300mm f/5.4 VR lens. I think they're around $800 new, but you could easily find something used, that will work just as well if not better, for much less (most of the lenses I use on a day-to-day basis are used, and each cost me less than $50).

As for MP: It doesn't matter. You could spend $25 on a Holga, and shoot award-winning photos, or you could drop $10K on the latest 32MP Hasselblad and shoot crap. My recommendation? Get a decent little DSLR (the convenience of digital for anyone who doesn't shoot professionally is well worth the *SLIGHT* loss of clarity, which only shows up at %100 magnification or more [for an 8MP camera, that's a final print size of over 5 feet]), and invest in the lenses. Your camera, quite literally, doesn't matter. It's all about the lenses, and how you use them.

And if you want any shots to turn out even halfway decent, DO NOT USE DIGITAL ZOOM. It ALWAYS looks like crap.