After reading a lot of negatives, I still bought the camera as it has one of the longest zooms on the market and a lot of manual controls not available on other cameras. Thus, if you know what you are doing, you can control image quality BUT you need to read the manual first as a lot of the controls are not in the same place as previous Power Shots and there are some new features which aren't immedaiatley clear.
Battery life - I charged the battery each day before I went out (Dubai for 6 days) and never had any problems. It never even showed less than 100% the whole time and I use a lot of fill in flash.
Flash location. Nobody has really explained that when the flash pops up, there is a cover flap that also raises and you need to take your finger off that flap when powering down. BUT when you see it, understand it, you avoid it. I don not have very large hands and none of the issues reported in some other reviews affected me.
Size/weight - it never bothered me. At the same time and the weight difference is marginal and the size is not that big and you are getting a 12 X zoom.
I do think a tripod is going to be useful in low light and I do appreciate the ISO 1600 and settings avaialble so you can avoid flash.

CNET UK judgement:
On paper, the Canon PowerShot SX200 IS looks great. In the flesh, it's a disappointment. It's bulky, has annoying design and control issues, and the picture quality is variable. It's still a versatile camera that can be used to take great pictures, but it promises much more than it delivers