@MathewBaich, looking at the photos of friends and family over recent years I\'d have to say go with (in no particular order) a Sony, Canon or Nikon. They seem to consistently provide the best picture quality.
Get the best you can afford. And personally I\'d go with higher resolution over macro magnification (since you can artificially zoom by cropping down a higher-res image more than the higher magnification will tend to provide).
Good reviews and test images are available on a couple of sites, my fav is
Imaging Resource which has a direct side-by-side comparison feature that I think is very handy.
I\'d not recommend a Fuji or Konica Minolta unless you see the image quality
for that model firsthand. My brother got burned three times with Fujis and I\'m not happy with the noise levels on my DiImage Z3 although I love the functionality.
Originally posted by Orb
Been hanging on to my wonderful 20D for a good few years now......
I even have a photo of Rob holding said lovely piece of kit

Taken with my crappy Z3 unfortunately
Einion