Please keep your responses civil.
What's "civil" about
maybe CHDK isn't for you
, when obviously I am looking for answers and at least some reassurance that this thing will not permanently damage my camera? I don't know anything about it at this point. I don't find such a flippant remark in any way helpful or appropriate. It is rude, condescending, and meant to discourage and intimidate the newbie--which BTW you can't succeed in doing.
I think MY response was civil by comparison and appropriate in light of that fact. I don't see you chiding the originator of the comment so why do you jump all over the newbie?
While they do provide updates for their DSLR's, Canon rarely provides firmware updates for P&S cameras - I'm only aware of three across their entire product range for the last decade.
It is true that only one of the 4 Canon digital cameras I have had one update, and it was an EOS--BTW the updater is an executable. I don't know if that means that the software guys write good code or that Canon doesn't really care that much. But I have to admit, I have had great service from this company for years and no apparent firmware problems. I still think they should provide the means of reinstalling the original firmware though, even if they never update it. Where's the harm in that? It beats having to send the camera in for, probably expensive, repairs for so simple a cause. I have had the experience of a firmware update crippling a product and the manufacturer removing the previous updates so I couldn't go back without getting a copy elsewhere. The service person told me the product was out of date and that I should get a new one. That despite the fact that it was working perfectly before the update. I think it could have been deliberate. Fortunately the downgrade restored the previous working state.
I think the point you missed is that CHDK does not update the camera firmware. It is loaded at startup using some special tricks and vanishes the moment the camera is turned off. If you insert an SD card without CHDK installed then the camera will start up without CHDK.
That wasn't my concern. See my earlier remarks about this.
While it is possible to compile a version that has the capability to damage the built in firmware you would have to try very very hard to do this.
I would certainly hope so.
