vinay_menon Posted September 14, 2007 Share Posted September 14, 2007 Hi I am planning to buy a Digital SLR soon (in a week or so). Ive been doing a lot of research online and have narrowed down my options to the following 3 cameras ... 1. Canon Digital Rebel XTi 2. Nikon D80 3. Nikon D100 These are the ones that fit my budget for a body right now. I now need to narrow down and one, and go ahead and buy it ... Im mainly looking for inputs on the following ... - Ruggedness / Durability - Lense Compatibility - Ease of Servicing / Maintenance Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated ... Regards Vinay Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fmueller Posted September 14, 2007 Share Posted September 14, 2007 <p><i>Im mainly looking for inputs on the following ...<br> - Ruggedness / Durability - Lense Compatibility - Ease of Servicing / Maintenance </i></p> <p>There is no significant difference in any of these three areas between the cameras you have in your inner choice. Get the one that feels best in your hands and you are most comfortable with. Most importantly, they are all good cameras, and you will enjoy whichever one you buy!</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimstrutz Posted September 14, 2007 Share Posted September 14, 2007 The old D100 would probably get the nod as being the most durable, but since it older, and probably used more, it may being nearing the expected life of the shutter. It's also has the lowest image quality of the three. Not that it's bad, it's just not as good. Both brands are compatible with the lenses that are built for it. You can't use old manual focus Canon lenses for the XTi, and you might not be able to meter with old Nikon lenses on the D80. (I'm not sure about this for the D80, but it's true of the D70.) Odly, you can use and meter just fine with old Nikon lenses on the Canon if you use an adapter, but adapted lenses loose autofocus and auto aperture. The Canon will also accept some other lens brands as well. This is also true of the Nikon, but to a lesser extent. Finally, no modern Canon lens will work on the Nikon without a special adapter with built in teleconverter optics. The bottom line: buy & use lenses the cameras were built for. It's easier that way. Neither one is going to be easy to fix if you are doing it yourself, but both are easily repaired by technicians all over the world. No one's got much of an edge here unless you have a Nikon or Canon shop nearby. Hopefully you won't need one anyway. To me it would come down to a personal choice between the D80 and the XTi. As I recall the Canon is a bit less money, and the Nikon feels like it's built better. Neither one has any durability/reliability issues. Since I have a sack full of Canon glass I would get the XTi, but if you were in the same boat you wouldn't even be asking. Right now Canon's new 40D has just started shipping and 30D prices are dropping rapidly as inventories are dumped. That might be another option for you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sanford Posted September 14, 2007 Share Posted September 14, 2007 I don't want to appear biased (I own the D80) but my observation has been that Nikon users just seem like a much nicer group of people compaired to Canon users. Just watch the press at any event and you will see how aggressive any pushy Canon usesr can be with their huge white lenses and machine gun motor drives. I blame the Canon full frame sensor for this as the Canon people have to get much closer to the action to compensate for the lack of a 1.5X lens multiplicaton factor and they must use huge FAST lenses to compensate for Canon's poor noise performance at higher ISO's. Just my opinion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ralph_jensen Posted September 14, 2007 Share Posted September 14, 2007 Sanford (Gerald?), are you serious or pulling our leg? For example, can you show any independent test results even *hinting* that Nikon outdoes Canon at high ISO's? (There are lots of reasons photographers might choose Nikon over Canon, but to date "performance at high ISO's" is certainly not one of them!) But I must say, your post provided lots of fun chuckles at the end of a long day... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sanford Posted September 14, 2007 Share Posted September 14, 2007 Just joking, but most of the newspaper guys use Canon and they are very aggressive. Canon for news, Nikon for art... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Former P.N Member Posted September 14, 2007 Share Posted September 14, 2007 <i>"I blame the Canon full frame sensor for this..."</i> <p> So I guess back in film only days the Nikon shooters were just as rude and pushy as the Canon shooters?... and when the Nikon D3 becomes available the Nikon shooters will again be just as rude and pushy? <p> <i>"...as the Canon people have to get much closer to the action to compensate for the lack of a 1.5X lens multiplicaton factor"</i> <p> Do your homework and you'll soon learn that Canon offers a number of digital bodies that have 1.3 and 1.6 <b>crop</b> (not lens multiplication) factors in addition to full frame. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Former P.N Member Posted September 14, 2007 Share Posted September 14, 2007 <i>"but most of the newspaper guys use Canon"</i> <p> Then the proper conclusion to reach would be that <b><i>newspaper</i></b> guys are rude and pushy - regardless of the equipment they use. Maybe it's a result of publication deadlines? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sanford Posted September 14, 2007 Share Posted September 14, 2007 I think it's just those big white lenses I don't like for some reason - just tooo pretensious. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Former P.N Member Posted September 14, 2007 Share Posted September 14, 2007 <i>"I think it's just those big white lenses I don't like for some reason - just tooo pretensious."</i> <p> Blame Nikon? ;-) <p> <a href="http://www.cameraquest.com/100063f.htm">http://www.cameraquest.com/100063f.htm</a> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sanford Posted September 14, 2007 Share Posted September 14, 2007 Good looking Nikon F hanging on the back of that thing Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tim_knight Posted September 15, 2007 Share Posted September 15, 2007 Vinay, They got off of the subject above, so let me suggest you go and hold and play with the controls of both cameras and determine which one you personally like. Both Nikon or Canon cameras would serve you well. I have a Nikon and my friend has a Canon, They both take great pictures and both brands offer plenty of choices of lenses for either camera. Good luck and enjoy the camera you choose. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
colinsouthern Posted September 15, 2007 Share Posted September 15, 2007 As others have mentioned, nothing really between the cameras, although Canon do have by far the better lens selection. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
todd peach seattle, washi Posted September 15, 2007 Share Posted September 15, 2007 Another factor to sway you: what do your friends / peers shoot with? Back when I first made a choice about what brand to buy, I looked at what the pro PJ's were shooting with, and it was all Nikon (late 70's). I wanted to be a PJ, so I bought Nikon. And I was polite. Sort of. If you go with the crowd, you have a bigger pool of gear available to you to borrow, swap, rent, etc. I think in the last ten years or so, I've been responsible for about ten people either buying Nikon stuff from scratch or scrapping their off-brand stuff and going with Nikon. That way we can all use each others stuff. I have the most gear of all my buddies, but it's still nice for me to be able to make a few phone calls and round up another three SB-800's for a big crowd shot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vinay_menon Posted September 15, 2007 Author Share Posted September 15, 2007 Thanks for all the inputs ... Tim : I went over to a Circuit City last evening, and played around with both the Cameras. I find the Nikon a lot more comfortable to use. Its bigger than the Canon and fits better in my hands. The XTi is a lot more compact (dunno if thats good or bad) and lighter. I found it harder to control ... Todd : It's almost an even split of Canon and Nikon between my friends .. and talking to them only gets me more confused ... :) I think at this point Im more inclined for the Nikon D80 ... I will be picking a couple of lenses over time ... and my research indicates that the ones from Sigma are amongst the best out there ... Are the lenses listed here (http://www.sigmaphoto.com/lenses/lenses_all.asp), compatible with any Digital SLR or are they specific to manufacturers ? I couldnt find anything specific to a manufacturer in the descriptions and am assuming that they fit all ... Am I right ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vinay_menon Posted September 15, 2007 Author Share Posted September 15, 2007 One more thing ... I love Black and White, and am sure thats what I would be doing most of the time ... Does that make a difference in choice ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michael s. Posted September 15, 2007 Share Posted September 15, 2007 << ... Black and White ... Does that make a difference in choice ? ... >> In my view, not at all. While the cameras do offer an in-camera choice of shooting b & w jpegs, I believe the most flexible and best looking conversions are done in post-processing, whether in Photoshop, in a plug-in such as Convert to BW, or in another editor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allen Herbert Posted September 15, 2007 Share Posted September 15, 2007 but my observation has been that Nikon users just seem like a much nicer group of people compaired to Canon users. Just watch the press at any event and you will see how aggressive any pushy Canon usesr Just cool, Sandford. Those big ugly Canons.....just gotta have big white long lenses....sort of a compensation thing. Thankfully, i'm a Nikon user, not being troubled with such issues ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calarrick Posted September 15, 2007 Share Posted September 15, 2007 The XTi and D80 are both used very effectively by a lot of people out there. One thing that would have me in the D80 camp is that the XTi only has one control wheel, the D80 has two... ultimately, that's twice as much that you can control with simple, immediately at your fingers, controls (e.g. aperture and shutter at once). But everyone's 'feel' for these things is different. One thing about the Nikon and Canon lines is they tend not to line camera bodies up directly against one another. So the D80 is a more 'premium' camera than the XTi, in terms of price and also build/ergonomics/features. But then it is another notch up (to the 30D/40D) for alternate Canon bodies. And then the Nikon D200/D300 are "up" again from being slotted directly against those. And so on. (When I was shopping, I hated the XTi ergonomically, but did think seriously about the 20D, which was discounted because of the new 30D. Something similar may happen to the 30D on account of the 40D.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calarrick Posted September 15, 2007 Share Posted September 15, 2007 ...oh, and regarding the Sigma lenses. On the site you linked to, if you click to read the description of each lens look at the section of the chart that reads "corresponding AF mounts." Sigma (and Tamron, Tokina, etc.) will tend to make variants of their lenses in both the Canon and Nikon mounts (and often also Pentax, Sony/Minolta, etc) as well as in their own proprietary Sigma mount. If you bought a Nikon, for example, you could use Sigma lenses but would have to buy the Nikon mount versions of those lenses. I haven't looked at them all, but I'd be really surprised if there are any for which they don't make both a Canon and a Nikon mount version. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sanford Posted September 15, 2007 Share Posted September 15, 2007 The D80 has a decent B&W mode with "filter effects". Probably not as good as converting from color after the fact in Photoshop but at least as good as B&W film. If you are thinking black and white it helps to be able to review shots in black and white while in the field. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
diane_madura Posted September 15, 2007 Share Posted September 15, 2007 Vinay, while the D100 is a very nice camera, it is old in terms of digital technology. I think it was first introduced in 2002. The Canon or the D80 have much newer technology. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
colinsouthern Posted September 16, 2007 Share Posted September 16, 2007 Vinay wrote: "I will be picking a couple of lenses over time ... and my research indicates that the ones from Sigma are amongst the best out there ... " You might want to do a bit more research! Sigma specialise in creating what I term "3rd party knock-offs". Optically they give -almost without exception - poorer performance than those made by Nikon & Canon, but they are cheaper. Personally I've never seen the logic in buying a Ferrari and then fitting 3rd party pram wheels to it! In summary, you get what you pay for. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tim_knight Posted September 16, 2007 Share Posted September 16, 2007 Vinay, here is a web site I use to first study lenes that I need. http://www.photozone.de/active/survey/querylenstxt.jsp?filter=%22brand='Nikkor'%20OR%20brand='Sigma%20AF'%20OR%20brand='Tamron%20AF'%20or%20brand='Tokina%20AF'%20or%20brand='Vivitar%20AF'%22 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vinay_menon Posted September 25, 2007 Author Share Posted September 25, 2007 Thanks for all the help ... I am now the proud owner of a Nikon D80 :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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