Gregg,
It's easy to be fooled. I've had my close calls on the internet.
If I were in the market and really watching my budget I might go for the Canon Powershot G7. A very recent introduction and can be had for a little under $500.
If you can't afford a DSLR this is a pretty good alternative. With 10mp and about all the controls you could ever want this is a very powerful camera. These so called point and shoot cameras are getting more and more sophisticated every day. As far as I can tell this camera is the top of the line when you drop from the DSLR category. DPReview gave it a "Highly Recommended."
You can read about it here:
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/canong7/