I've never had a digital camera but I think I'll be buying one soon. Before I go on, I should note I'm looking for something less than $300 so that should cut out a lot of camera suggestions.

My question(s)...

I'll use the camera mainly to photograph things to be sold online, perhaps from the size of a coin at best (or baseball card at worst) to the size of a one-sheet movie poster (27 X 41 inches). I'd like for the focus to be as sharp as my budget will allow, as crappy photos won't sell items.

What specs should I be looking for in this regard? Will I focus my energy on finding a camera with a different setting(s) than your run of the mill cheap family cam? And if so, what should I be looking at.

Sorry to be so vague, but I'm new at this. Any advice and/or camera recommendations would be most appreciated.

Since March 2004 I've been using a Centon DC5 (http://www.pcpro.co.uk/buyer/reviews/57990/centon-dc5.html) bought from Jessops in Edinburgh.
Some photo's taken using it http://www.pcguide.com/vb/showthread.php?t=38705&page=1&highlight=Photographs
Great little camera. 92mm x 57mm x 33mm, 205g [all incl].
Comes with everything you'd need [suede pouch, wrist cord, power unit, rechargeable battery, memory card, USB cable, video cable for viewing images on the TV, manual, driver CD], except I was supplied with 32MB of Secure Digital [SD] memory and bought 128MB more [and a "Universal Card Reader"].
The camera [it seems to me] is rather sophisticated/complex; lots of settings to adjust, does almost EVERYTHING.
Because it's a 5 MegaPixel camera [2560 x 1920 max] the detail is really excellent. In Macro mode the subject can be as close as 90mm. Yesterday I used that to photograph a pear in close-up [300mm]; SUPERB, the image fills my monitor, and what detail!
On the downside, [or is it?], I'm now on my 3rd new replacement camera from Jessops [at no cost to me].
1. In the first the flash didn't work and was replaced within a week or two.
2. We've been using the second until Saturday past. It has had an intermittent fault where it reports "NO CARD" plus other problems.
3. Now on the third camera and so far it's looking good. The shop assistant insisted that this was the first return of that camera he'd ever seen.

The camera also takes short video's at 160x120 pixels, with sound, and you can record sound [describing the image?] to accompany a photo.
The resulting wave file, when downloaded to a PC, has the same identifying file number as the image file it matches.

My daughter bought a "Pentax Optio S5n" [83mmx52mmx20.5mm 105g (excl batt & card)]:
http://www.pentax.co.uk/product_details.php?divisionid=2&productid=1208&parentid=16
http://www.dpreview.com/news/0502/05021305pentax_optios5n.asp
This is smaller, neater, more sophisticated look to it, larger screen, battery lasts longer, costs more.
My first impression was that you'd wear it as an earing or fashion accessory, but as I tried it out I liked it. Haven't tried it out so much as my own.

I've never had a digital camera but I think I'll be buying one soon. Before I go on, I should note I'm looking for something less than $300 so that should cut out a lot of camera suggestions.

My question(s)...

I'll use the camera mainly to photograph things to be sold online, perhaps from the size of a coin at best (or baseball card at worst) to the size of a one-sheet movie poster (27 X 41 inches). I'd like for the focus to be as sharp as my budget will allow, as crappy photos won't sell items.

What specs should I be looking for in this regard? Will I focus my energy on finding a camera with a different setting(s) than your run of the mill cheap family cam? And if so, what should I be looking at.

Sorry to be so vague, but I'm new at this. Any advice and/or camera recommendations would be most appreciated.

Since you would like to shoot something as small as a coin ask for a camera which has the " MACRO" Feature. Go for a camera which has atleast 6.1MP coz u r gonna blow up the image, don't compromise the megapixcels atleast you should have 5.1. I think you can try the Nikon cool pix series 5600, 7600 S1, L1 series are all gud. if u can spend more go for the cool pix P1, which comes with an inbuild wifi adapter. One more think the camera should have gud Optical zoom. Hope thats helpfull

Regards
Ranjit