What is more important, Digital Zoom or Optical?

I need to order my camera Tomorrow! And I keep flip flopping on what the most important thing to get is...
I want to spen around $250-$300, would it be smarter to get a 3.2MP and an Optical Zoom of 10x, or something that that is 5MP and the Optical zoom is 3x??

I'm looking between Olympus, Canon, and perferebly Sony.

Any help would be great!!!

Thank you!

Digital zoom is only a magnification of the center of the frame, something that any software can do. Optical zoom is the actual magnification of the image, much higher quality. However, with larger zoom ranges quality tends to suffer either on the wide or the long end. I ould go for a smaller optical range, ignore the digital zoom altogether, and look for a camera whose lens has small f/stop numbers, like f/2 or f/3. Those will let more light in, which gets you many more benefits than any zoom range.

If you have access to a computer, digital zoom is totally pointless.

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Originally Posted by Sebastian

Digital zoom is only a magnification of the center of the frame, something that any software can do. Optical zoom is the actual magnification of the image, much higher quality. However, with larger zoom ranges quality tends to suffer either on the wide or the long end. I ould go for a smaller optical range, ignore the digital zoom altogether, and look for a camera whose lens has small f/stop numbers, like f/2 or f/3. Those will let more light in, which gets you many more benefits than any zoom range.

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Thanks for the quick info! What would you recommend if you were to get one. I've been looking at the Sony DSC-P72 or P92, and also was looking at the Olympus C-740. I found some good prices online. I leave for DC on Wed. Night and would like to get one in ASAP.
Thanks for your help!!!!