If you search you'll find places like The Foto Geeks who sell all of those little parts (you could probably get that battery door from them, Bonzo, and do the repair yourself.)

I use a Canon EOS at work, it is several years old now but still does a great job. I was having difficulty with autofocus and we finally learned it was the chip in the lens (who knew the lens had it's own computer?) and replaced the lens. I could have sent it in for repair but it would have taken weeks and I use this camera all of the time. It was cheaper in that sense to get the new lens. I suppose I could now send the other one out for repair and keep it as a spare. This is a great macro lens that I use most often.

You know the old saying - it is more true than ever before - "They don't make things like they used to." Planned obsolescence - it's in there.

I keep my camera in a padded camera case, and when I don't want to haul the entire kit around, I have an extra padded case (meant for a netbook but works fine for the camera) that I use. This is to protect it from bumps and from dust and dirt.

SRS