Looking for advice on a new digital camera

I’m looking at replacing my ancient Canon Powershot with a new camera. I’ve looked through some catalogues and Amazon and I’m having a lot of difficulty choosing!

I need a camera that’s not too bulky, has a decent optical zoom (preferably >6x), is reasonably easy to use and has a good battery life. On my trips out I usually shoot 200-300 pics a day, which is easy for my old Canon as you can turn the LCD screen off and just use the optical view finder.

I’m not seeing many digital cameras with optical viewfinders about, and those that do, I’m not sure if you can shut off the LCD to conserve battery power.

My budget is around £100 ($160 US).

I quite like the look of the Canon PowerShot SX120 IS, but the user reports about battery usage are putting me off.

Does anyone have a recommendation for me?

Thanks!

We had a good talk about that around Christmas. Here’s the thread:

http://forum.galacticwatercooler.com/showthread.php?14636-Digital-camera-good-basic-simple-cheap&highlight=canon

Panasonic VDR-D150 is the one i use.