Best DSLR for SLR newbie

[Gen.Ben]

Hey guys. I love photography, but never really had a great camera.

In the past I have just had point and shoot ones. I think a Canon A75 and my current camera is a Sony H5.

I have decided I want to go with a DSLR, wouldn't mind buying used but only if it's in good condition. What would be the best Camera + Lens combo for less than say... $750?

I have been looking at the D40 and it looks alright. For the lens someone recommended me the sigma 18-200. Suggestions?

Also, for the storage. I have a crappy old Ipod Mini 4gb that the battery is shot so I don't use it. In it there is a Hitachi 4GB Microdrive, seeing how most DSLR's support Microdrives would it work if I formatted it correctly?

Thanks.

 

[BradUF]

I have heard about lens issues with the D40 and that they are going to stop making it soon. Not saying that it is a bad camera just pointing that out. Maybe someone here can share some more info on the D40...

 

[jstuedle]

A search on this forum of the D40 will reveal it's pro's and con's. As for it being discontinued, I haven't heard that till now. So I can't comment to that. As for a lens for the D40, I would stick with the Nikon kit lens to start with. If for no other reason than it's resale value. If you decide to upgrade, it will be easier to sell. The D40 makes fine images but has it's limitations. But for the price there is a lot of value there IMO.

 

[Gen.Ben]

What about a Canon? Some type of Rebel?

 

[Trenton Romulox]

I don't know a lot about Canon, but I've heard good things about the Rebel XT and Rebel XTi. Anyone vouch for that?

 

[shorty6049]

other than feeling cheaper than pretty much all other amature dslrs on the market, i guess the rebels are good. My brother is looking to upgrade, or sidewaysgrade (i know, not a real word) to something besides his d40 becasue nobody makes autofocus lenses for it right now. If you plan on only using the kit lens you'd be fine, but if you want more lenses, they'll be harder to find. He played with a rebel xti at a store and said he didnt like it. They're small, light , quiet, and affordable. but they really do feel cheap (i challenge anyone to say differently) I guess my personal suggestion would be a sony a200 (shipping next month) or maybe the a100 (discontinued now but still a good camera) you could also look at what pentax has(k10d) but honestly, i loved my a100 (although the a700 is a lot better as far as build quality, image quality, and shutter noise, its also about twice as much at 1350$)

good luck

 

[HASHASHIN]

the rebel doesn't really feel cheap in my hands, it just feels really light.

i added the battery grip to it, and it feels much better in my big hands now. I love my xti, it takes great pictures, and i can use canon L glass. For the price it has great features, id get the new XSI though if you are going to get a new entry level canon camera.

 

[H0LLYW00D]

i just an XTi and it is an awsome first camera, I know Canon just released the XSi but dont know much about that model.

 

[fauxto]

Trenton,

The Canon has lower noise at high ISO. But the kit lens is not very good at all. I have students with the lens who get purple fringing, soem samples that are unsharp at infinity - but then you see $2500 Canon lens that have to be recalibrated.

Please don't buy a cheap aftermarket lens. I would rather use an old digital Rebel with a Canon "prosumer" lens, than an $8000 1Ds III with that sucky kit lens. Consider a 50 mm as well as a zoom - it's sharper, faster, smaller, and cheaper.

It's more about the lens than the camera, at this point. Except for Pentax, all DSLR's can make pretty goods images without too much post processing. That said,the Nikon is better built than the Canon Xti, but has more noise above ESO 400. I think the Nikon handles better, and the kit Nikkor lens is pretty good for a slow consumer lens.

Ken

 

[Gen.Ben]

Im looking at the prices of the D70. They are in my range. Should I go with one of those over a rebel or D40?

 

[Trenton Romulox]

Im looking at the prices of the D70. They are in my range. Should I go with one of those over a rebel or D40?

Well, the D70 is compatible with far more lenses than the D40, and the body isn't all that dissimilar from a D80. I've used my brother's D70 some, and it feels pretty good. So, if you're gonna go Nikon and you're coming down to D40 versus D70, I say go D70 just because of all the lenses you can use for the D70 compared to the D40.

 

[Antithesis]

If you want to go slightly cheaper, you can get a d40 and then buy a Nikkor 18-70 AF-S for a lens and you should be good for a while. The 18-70 is considered a very good lens, especially for the price.

A lot of people don't like the d40 because it cannot use 'normal' AF lenses, but there are a lot of really good lenses out there that use AF-S or similar focusing systems. You may eventually want to upgrade to a higher level body, but the d40 would be fine for most of what you would want to do as a beginner.

 

[XtremeElemenT]

I own a d40 and love it, I own a 50mm f/1.8 af lens and it works fine. Sure it does not auto focus but I manual focus every shot I have ever taken with the camera. You still have a wide range of lenses to put on a nikon d40 but only a handful will autofocus. It all depends on what type of photography you will be doing.

 

[shorty6049]

I own a d40 and love it, I own a 50mm f/1.8 af lens and it works fine. Sure it does not auto focus but I manual focus every shot I have ever taken with the camera. You still have a wide range of lenses to put on a nikon d40 but only a handful will autofocus. It all depends on what type of photography you will be doing.

although thats true, i'd still think i'd be a nuisance in the long run. Why buy something knowing that you wont be able to autofocus with a lot of the lenses you can afford? My brother is selling his d40 and this is one of the reasons

 

[Gen.Ben]

Does the D70 have that problem?