Other Gadgets (general gadgets)

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by taxwonk
The D80 will give you more megapixels, about 10 v. 8 for the models you named. Also, the D80 will gove you the opportunity for more tweaking to adjust exposure and shutter speed, if you decide to get more creative. The two are close enough in price that, unless you're hunting around for a great bargain on the D40, I'd pay the small increment for the D80.

Agree on all fact points, but what I've discovered is that the incremental feature difference between the D80 and the D40 is extremely hard for an amateur to capitalize upon. You're better off sinking the price differential into the full-blown version of Photoshop, and sinking the time saved not having to learn the in-camera features of the D80 into learning Photoshop techniques.

Single most important decision factor between the D40 and the D80 isn't megapixels, because unless you're doing ridiculous blowups AND have kick-ass VR telephoto lenses, you just don't need the extra data. It's form factor. If you have big, meaty hands, the D40 will feel small, cheap and difficult to operate. If you have dainty lady hands, the D80 will feel like a heavy monstrosity. I would never recommend the D80 over the D40 to a woman unless she were a professional photographer.

I love my D80, but if I had lady hands, I'd buy a D40 and never regret the missed megapixels or feature set.

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?
The D80 is $1100 at Circuit City, while the D40 is $500. I don't think they're close in price at all.

I didn't realize the gap had widened that much. When I was looking, the difference in price was about $300 at the online stores. for a $600 difference, go with the D40. But before you buy, think about looking at Ritz or Abbe's of Maine online. They tend to have much better pricing than Circuit City. For the first week of the little sprog's life, get a disposable until your mail order arrives. Nobody will be able to tell the difference for snaps of the baby.

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?
I am looking at the D40 and Canon Rebel XTi. Any recommendations? I have non-digital SLR experience, but I haven't used an SLR camera in 10 years.

In the film era, you bought a camera body that would last 20 years. Now, camera bodies can become obsolete, so you're not buying a camera, you're buying a lens catalog from which to choose, because you'll eventually buy a new camera body and will not want to start over with lenses.

I have heard that supposebly sports photographers skew Canon because at any point in time it typically offers the best-in-breed highest shutter speed. Nature photographers supposebly skew Nikon because its color handling technology is best-in-breed. Frankly, you won't go wrong with either, but I strongly suggest that you spare yourself reading the Canon versus Nikon debates on the intranets. The feature sets hew so closely now that Canon versus Nikon isn't even Mac vs. PC, it's more like Ford versus Mercury.

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
Agree on all fact points, but what I've discovered is that the incremental feature difference between the D80 and the D40 is extremely hard for an amateur to capitalize upon. You're better off sinking the price differential into the full-blown version of Photoshop, and sinking the time saved not having to learn the in-camera features of the D80 into learning Photoshop techniques.

Single most important decision factor between the D40 and the D80 isn't megapixels, because unless you're doing ridiculous blowups AND have kick-ass VR telephoto lenses, you just don't need the extra data. It's form factor. If you have big, meaty hands, the D40 will feel small, cheap and difficult to operate. If you have dainty lady hands, the D80 will feel like a heavy monstrosity. I would never recommend the D80 over the D40 to a woman unless she were a professional photographer.

I love my D80, but if I had lady hands, I'd buy a D40 and never regret the missed megapixels or feature set.

Another big diffference, one I forgot to mention earlier, is that the D40 will only accept digital slr lenses. If, like me, you have 2 or 3 good analog slr lenses, the D80 will accept them. With the D40, you have expensive paperweights.

[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
Agree on all fact points, but what I've discovered is that the incremental feature difference between the D80 and the D40 is extremely hard for an amateur to capitalize upon. You're better off sinking the price differential into the full-blown version of Photoshop, and sinking the time saved not having to learn the in-camera features of the D80 into learning Photoshop techniques.

Single most important decision factor between the D40 and the D80 isn't megapixels, because unless you're doing ridiculous blowups AND have kick-ass VR telephoto lenses, you just don't need the extra data. It's form factor. If you have big, meaty hands, the D40 will feel small, cheap and difficult to operate. If you have dainty lady hands, the D80 will feel like a heavy monstrosity. I would never recommend the D80 over the D40 to a woman unless she were a professional photographer.

I love my D80, but if I had lady hands, I'd buy a D40 and never regret the missed megapixels or feature set.

Agree re: megapixels - I don't think I need 10 MP.

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?
The D80 is $1100 at Circuit City, while the D40 is $500. I don't think they're close in price at all.

That D80 price looks like it comes with a kit zoom lens, while the D40 price looks like body-only. Either that or Circuit City is screwing D80 buyers.

BTW, I'm very happy with my 18-135 kit lens, but I've since become convinced that I would benefit from the 18-200 VR lens, so that's why it's on my wish list even though it overlaps. I also have a 50 mm fixed focal length lens, which I picked up at a local store for $100 and has been a great investment.

[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

Originally posted by taxwonk
I didn't realize the gap had widened that much. When I was looking, the difference in price was about $300 at the online stores. for a $600 difference, go with the D40. But before you buy, think about looking at Ritz or Abbe's of Maine online. They tend to have much better pricing than Circuit City. For the first week of the little sprog's life, get a disposable until your mail order arrives. Nobody will be able to tell the difference for snaps of the baby.

Normally I'd go with a Ritz, etc., but I have $130 in Best Buy gift cards. The D40 is $499 at BB. I don't really care if I have it for the baby - the timing is mostly coincidence. We have an adequate point & shoot.

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?
We have an adequate point & shoot.

Indeed. Mazel tov!

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
The feature sets hew so closely now that Canon versus Nikon isn't even Mac vs. PC, it's more like Ford versus Mercury.

Here's the mac:

sony

[taxwonk]

Originally posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?
Agree re: megapixels - I don't think I need 10 MP.

IF you're planning on doing detail close-ups, like nature shots, or planning on blowing up beyond 8x10, you need 10. If you are just using the camera for family snapshots and vacation pictures, quite frankly, you may get more for your money by looking at the higher-end fixed-lens zoom digitals.

You can get a Panasonic-Lumix with a good 10x zoom and Leica optics for around $300.

[Oliver_Wendell_Ramone]

After about 4 1/2 years, my Direct TV Tivo seems to have crapped out on me (major frame-freezing, skipping, etc., followed by shut-down and re-acquisition of satelite, etc.). I'm assuming this can't be fixed, at least not reasonably.

So, maybe it's a good time to upgrade to HD. Anybody have experience with DirctTV's HD package/service? How about their DVR, now that they are no longer working with Tivo?

Also, any thoughts on tvs? Fairly small room (sort of narrow but long), currently with a 32" old school tube monster. Looks like for about the same price I could go with LCD in the 40-46 range or DLP in the 50-56 range ( I wouldn't want bigger in this room; in fact, I'm not sure if I can really go into the 50s or not). Thoughts?

[Paisley]

Originally posted by Oliver_Wendell_Ramone
After about 4 1/2 years, my Direct TV Tivo seems to have crapped out on me (major frame-freezing, skipping, etc., followed by shut-down and re-acquisition of satelite, etc.). I'm assuming this can't be fixed, at least not reasonably.

So, maybe it's a good time to upgrade to HD. Anybody have experience with DirctTV's HD package/service? How about their DVR, now that they are no longer working with Tivo?

Also, any thoughts on tvs? Fairly small room (sort of narrow but long), currently with a 32" old school tube monster. Looks like for about the same price I could go with LCD in the 40-46 range or DLP in the 50-56 range ( I wouldn't want bigger in this room; in fact, I'm not sure if I can really go into the 50s or not). Thoughts?

We just swiched to DirecTV HD. We had a 1st generation Tivo forever, and it rocked, but we moved to a new place and upgraded to HD tvs (a Pioneer 50 inch plasma - sorry not sure the exact model name - and a Sony 42 inch Bravia).

The DirecTV dvr is a huge disappointment as compared to Tivo. Way less user friendly, freezes up and loses picture or sound regularly. (I have heard that this is a standard complaint, unfortunately.) A recent attempt to tape a Laker game resulted in 2 1/2 hours of black screen . . .

That said, when it works, having HD is awesome. I find myself watching random nature shows because the picture is so impressive. The digital radio that comes with the HD package is great too.

We love our Pioneer tv. The picture on the Bravia is nowhere near as nice, but it's in the bedroom, so it's usually just on as background while we're getting ready in the morning.

[notcasesensitive]

Originally posted by Paisley
We just swiched to DirecTV HD. We had a 1st generation Tivo forever, and it rocked, but we moved to a new place and upgraded to HD tvs (a Pioneer 50 inch plasma - sorry not sure the exact model name - and a Sony 42 inch Bravia).

The DirecTV dvr is a huge disappointment as compared to Tivo. Way less user friendly, freezes up and loses picture or sound regularly. (I have heard that this is a standard complaint, unfortunately.) A recent attempt to tape a Laker game resulted in 2 1/2 hours of black screen . . .

That said, when it works, having HD is awesome. I find myself watching random nature shows because the picture is so impressive. The digital radio that comes with the HD package is great too.

We love our Pioneer tv. The picture on the Bravia is nowhere near as nice, but it's in the bedroom, so it's usually just on as background while we're getting ready in the morning.

I've had the Directv branded DVR for about 2 years now. It is much less user-firendly than Tivo for all the reasons Paisley mentioned (though, knock on wood, it hasn't really frozen up on me much lately - did it all the time when we first got it). The good news is that eventually you do get used to it. And since it is the only viable option for Directv, I guess that has to be good enough.

If you have any thoughts of going smaller on the tv, we have a 37" Aquos that we generally like a lot. Because we have a loong and narrow living room instead of a square room, it is the best option for us. Plus we have a ton of sunlight hitting the screen, so LCD works better for us than plasma. $.02

[NotFromHere]

Originally posted by Oliver_Wendell_Ramone
After about 4 1/2 years, my Direct TV Tivo seems to have crapped out on me (major frame-freezing, skipping, etc., followed by shut-down and re-acquisition of satelite, etc.). I'm assuming this can't be fixed, at least not reasonably.

So, maybe it's a good time to upgrade to HD. Anybody have experience with DirctTV's HD package/service? How about their DVR, now that they are no longer working with Tivo?

Also, any thoughts on tvs? Fairly small room (sort of narrow but long), currently with a 32" old school tube monster. Looks like for about the same price I could go with LCD in the 40-46 range or DLP in the 50-56 range ( I wouldn't want bigger in this room; in fact, I'm not sure if I can really go into the 50s or not). Thoughts?

The DirecTV HDDVR sucks ass. But there's no other choice, so what are you going to do? We currently have 3 HDDVR boxes in the house. They all have the same glitches. I have also had shows play back as empty crap. It geeks and digitizes and sometimes it has synching problems where the voice and the picture do not match. It's annoying, and you can't do the 2 tuner thing like you can with Tivo. I mean yes, you can watch 2 channels, but it won't buffer both channels. So when you switch to the back channel, you have lost all buffer on both channels.

If you're going to get a TV for main viewing, stick to plasma. WE have 2 plasmas and 1 LCD in the house. The LCD is fine for the weight room, and you can't bet a plasma below (I think) 42". It does much better for off angle and fast motion and gradient colors.

Otherwise, the programming is great. I really like HDNet, even though I swore I would not watch a channel owned by Mark Cuban. That guy has some excellent live music shows.
my .02

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by NotFromHere
The DirecTV HDDVR sucks ass. But there's no other choice, so what are you going to do?

Keep the HDDirecTivo we have until it grinds itself to dust? That's our plan. Sure, we miss put on the MPEG-4 channels being added, but the day they turn off the MPEG-2 channels is the day I buy an HD Tivo and give Comcast a booty call.

As you can see, I have 0 loyalty to DirecTV. Programming is a commodity; interface is everything.