Nikon D90 Estimated Arrival

Spent sometime last night writing out some thoughts about the Nikon D90, which wordpress then decided to discard.

Anyway as a preface, there’s an interesting comparison at digitalreview.ca between the 2 year old Nikon D80 and the Sony Alpha 350. It’s a great look at how Nikon quality can overcome new technology, and certainly reassuring for D80 owners who may have forgotten just how good their camera is. The D80 is faster, smaller, and sports image quality comparable or better than the A350 (bear in mind the A350 is burdened with a less than suberb kit lens, the Sony DT 18-70mm f/3.5-5.6). True, the A350 does give you a somewhat larger print size but at a price, explained well here:

The reality however is that even though the Sony A350 incorporates an additional 4 megapixels, it does not provide a straight 40% increase in resolution.The Sony A350 generates an image that measures 4592 x 3056 pixels versus the Nikon D80 at 3872 x 2592 pixels, with Image quality set to Large size

What this means is that if you print the full native image from the A350 at 300 dpi you will get a print that measures approximately 10.2 x 15.3 inches compared to a print from the Nikon D80 that would measure 8.6 x 12.9 inches. The difference in final horizontal print size is simply 1.6 inches in height and 2.4 inches in width in favour of the Sony Alpha A350.

One of the primary tradeoff’s with respect to the 14 MP resolution advantage offered by the Sony A350 is having to deal with larger file sizes from both a storage and image capture perspective. Storage is not such a big issue considering the availability of larger capacity flash memory cards and back up hard drives at a relative inexpensive price in today’s market.

The tradeoff becomes more pronounced during image capture. The additional resolution provides extra image data that has to be recorded to the memory card which leads to a slower performance in write speed when compared to the capabilities of the Nikon D80.

but all in all the D80 is holding up quite well.

And that’s the problem facing those anticipating the D80 replacement, for arguments sake, the D90. The D80 is in a position similar to the Canon 5D, in that it’s a very good camera with little direct competion. So obviously Nikon has felt like they could ride it’s coattails for quite sometime. Even now in the forums it isn’t rare to see members bragging about a new D80 purchase. The end result has been a very long product cycle, which for D80 users has been great, with one caveat: anticipation.

I still think we’ll get a D90 announcement for Photokina, but there’s a real outside chance that it won’t arrive till the new year. Thom’s sources are still better than my hunches, but:

It seems that a D80 replacement should also be in that set of announcements, which should come just before Photokina, but we just haven’t seen any of the kinds of leaks and rumors we have with previous consumer bodies out of Thailand, so maybe the D80 replacement is going to be later than Photokina.

If we don’t get it at Photokina, it will be because they don’t have to, and not because they aren’t ready. There’s no doubt for me, base on an average of every best guess that I’ve read, that the D90 will follow the D80 model and be essentially 95 percent of the D300 stuffed into the D60 form factor. (little bit larger).
Thus our expectations remain:

• 14 bit A/D conversion
• 12 megapixels (with outside shot at 14–consumers at this price point more sensitive to the mega pixel wars)
• 51 point AF system straight from the D300
• 3 inch lcd with live view (seems a must now)
• HDMI out
• 4.5 FPS
• EXPEED digital image processor
• Sensor cleaning
• Dramatically improved ISO (100-3200 w/ boost to 6400)
• Improved metering (fingers crossed)
• Minor cosmetic changes, most likely not including any serious attempt at weather sealing.

Based on the likelihood of the feature set, I’d bet the camera will be well received and enjoy a similar product cycle. It’s the anticipation that’s killing me.

Tagged as: Nikon D90, preview, Rumors, specifications, specs