I love my Nikon. It comes with a rechargable battery that lasts pretty long. I have two and so one is always charging while the other is in the camera (woohoo, life is good!)

I have the Nikon Coolpix 5400. There are less expensive Coolpix models that do just as nice a job. I think mine is actually pretty good pricewise now.

It takes great closeup shots, hard indoor with poor lighting, and action

Here's an indoor action shot - lighting was pretty awful and I was quite a distance away

Closeup in natural light


Sunset


Action, VERY poor light, with flash


Anothor action shot. No flash, only light source was the stained glass lamp


Uploading is a snap, plug it in and download. No extra software needed, but it comes with it (I never use it)