Thinking of investing in a new camera?

I currently have a sony cyber-shot dsc-x2. Its a very nice camera, i've had it for a few years now but its kind of out of date. It was gifted to me (just the camera and charger) i didn't get a user manual for it so i know that its not so user friendly when trying to change the settings. It takes great pictures but i would like better quality, so my question is what is a good camera for taking artistic photos (every thing from stills to action shots) that is not going to cost me an arm and a leg? One of my friends recently invested in a Nikon, i would love a Nikon but i don't have 500+ dolor's for a camera right now.

thank you for any and all help

Added (1). The main reason i want to upgrade is because my camera will do things that ruin pictures that are one in a million shots. For example i was going to take a picture of a bee, i had it all framed up and in focus. I hit the shutter and and it auto corrected to bring the background into focus as it made up more of the picture and the bee when out of focus. I also can't change the shutter speed (i've counted a delay of about 3 to 5 seconds between the pushing of the shutter button and the flash going off) which means i can't take pictures in an instant which means i can lose a perfect shot waiting on the shutter. I also get a barrel blur on the corners of all my photos, some are worse than others.these simple defects would not seem so bad to other people but they ruin the artistic quality of my photos

In the past when film was used, you could "invest" in a camera since they could be used for decades. All the technology was in the film.

Now all you can do is invest in lenses which still last for decades, but the cameras will need to be replaced every three to five years.

What you are really investing in is a camera system. That means that if you buy a $700 Nikon D3100 dSLR, all the lenses you begin to add to your system will be usable as you buy better and better cameras years in the future.

A camera like the P&S shoot (Sony DSC X2) is a disposable camera, not really an investment

I'd love to replace my Fuji Finepix S5200 that is 6 years old, but as it is, it takes better pictures than a "disposable" camera and it still works well and there's no reason to get a different camera.
So a point and shoot can be an investment, you just have to recognize that there will always be a better camera.
The difference between cameras and things like cell phones/computers is this:
The amount of light sensitivity needed for X shot doesn't change.
The amount of megapixels needed to print X inch by X inch photo doesn't change.

Ask yourself what specifically you would like your camera to do better, make a list of these things, and see what it would cost to get a camera that did these things better, without compromising what your camera does well.

For instance, my camera isn't particularly sharp when hand-held at full zoom or in low-light situations.
The sensor simply isn't that sensitive, and it has no image stabilization.
I'm just not quite ready to spend $2-300 on a camera that is a worthy upgrade.
That doesn't make mine disposable though, it's taken thousands of pics and may very well take thousands more.

If you go professional, that changes, but so does your budget.
I will not buy a professional(DSLR+) camera until I sell a photo I've taken with the camera I have.
Oh, wait… I've done that. Yup, I've sold photos I've taken with a point and shoot. And I'm not THAT good. So you can too.