March 6, 2008

Olympus E-420 Superlatives: Smallest, Lightest... Cheaper DSLR

Just when you thought the Olympus E-410 was the camera to invite to dinner, Olympus today debuted a better houseguest: the Olympus E-420. It's light, it's compact, it's chipper! We will point out that it put on some weight -- 2 ounces (oink, oink), for a total of 13.4 ounces. So it's heavier than its predecessor but lighter than any other DSLR in the marketplace. However, to make up for it Olympus priced the E-420 $200 less than the E-410! But we shouldn't compare siblings.

The 2.7-inch LCD screen features Live View -- a fancy phrase for the feature that allows you to see what you're taking a photo of on the screen instead of looking through the viewfinder. The E-420 flaunts face detection, shadow adjustment technology (see our earlier post on this goo) and onscreen auto-focus. 10 megapixels.

Now. We try not to be superficial here at PictureSnob but we have consumers to look out for... so, the 80s called and they want their camera body back. OK there, we said it. Ahem. At any rate, it's a good camera if you can handle the visual throwback. The Olympus E-410 goes on sale in May for $599 (with lens) or $499 for body only.