Maybe I'm looking at it wrong... re: buying new gear

[rpm]

Is your camera good enough for the type of photography you're currently doing? If yes, then there's no point in upgrading. Of course there are always 15 models out there better than the model you have, all of them are mouth-watering to the point that you'd trade in your girlfriend for them.

Cameras tend to get obsolete quickly these days, therefore they lose their value fast, so every time you upgrade you're a bit poorer.

Stick with what you have, and only upgrade when you really need to. In the meantime, invest in lenses instead --lenses tend to hold their value much better than cameras.

this rings true until you hit a creative barrier on your current camera. for example i really enjoy people-portrait photography...with a D200 its all good and dandy until i think wow candle-lit/night portrait would be awesome...oh wait...darn i seldom go above iso 800 or keep to iso 400 max usually. now you cant take a tripod and ask your model to not movie for 3-5 seconds so i can get the exposure right lol...

but maybe that is an extreme, if i had a D300 or D700, then ya i wouldnt really need to upgrade to the next line so soon or hit a wall as quickly...