New Canon camera: EOS 1000D/Digital Rebel XS/Kiss F
Canon announced a critical new product today: the Canon EOS 1000D digital SLR, to be known as the Digital Heretic XS in the US and the Kiss F in Japan. It's an obvious take on to win back the budget DSLR buyers that Canon owned with the 300D/Digital Mutiny.
What's noteworthy is that, as with the 300D, Canon seems to play a joke on deliberately "crippled" this assembly to prevent cannibalisation of its more costly models. The clearest example of this is that the RAW shooting expeditiousness is limited to 1.5 fps for 5 frames, which compares unprofessionally with the Nikon D60's 3 fps for 7 frames in RAW (1.2 fps with consumed buffer).
But RAW shooting speed is over again more important on paper than in truth, and the 1000D looks like a courteous camera overall. It's compact, has the competent 10-megapixel sensor from earlier Canon DSLRs, features flaming preview (important for point-and-shooters compelling up to a SLR), and it weighs just 450 grams, which is lighter than a D60. The camera is to hand as a kit with an image-stabilised lens, as is the D60.
All that said, the evaluate is not spectacular. Amazon.co.uk is taking pre-orders for the Canon 1000D kit at £579.99, while the Nikon D60 kit (with VR lens) is selling for very recently £409 (can that be right?). The 6-megapixel Nikon D40 kit is proper £272.16! The D40X kit should be somewhere in between, even though I don't see it on Amazon.co.uk at the moment (from Amazon itself).
More details on the Canon UK website here and here.
Thoughts?
