'twas my birthday yesterday and instead of actual presents, I was given approval to make a photographic spend. yay

So, after spending some time playing with all the settings and features of my lovely new 580EX-II, I have figured out the following:

- Full E-TTL auto mode is quite good and using FEC to tweek the results works well.
- Manual is good too, but will take some time to master.

The two (of five) metering modes available to me on the 400D are E-TTL and Manual External Metering. Both modes yielded good results, but the External Metering mode seemed to offer more info and options on screen.

I'm wondering what mode(s) people tend to gravitate to and why?