Originally Posted by Nightshade
Find one that allows full manual control.
Pixel count for that price range should be a minimum of 4.3 or better even.
Play with it for a while in store before you buy to make sure it is something that is comfortable for you.
Take a memory card with you to shoot some shots on and take home to see the quality....or you can ask them to put one in the camera, shoot some shots, and have them burn them to disc (yes if you ask they many times will do this).
I concur. Thats an excellent idea about taking a memory card with you. The only problem with that is that they may take different cards, ie xd, cf, etc.
On a side note, if you find a decent point and shoot you are interested in, read some online reviews on it before making the purchase.
www.dpreview.com is a good site for this.