No offence Bill, as I know you know your stuff, but that dust removal system
doesn't cut it for me. Sounds like a lame gimmick. Where exactly does the
dust go???

However, never mind that, I have never had a problem with dust on the 20D
and I don't need use a blower on the sensor regularly to prevent this.
Although I have not shot in Africa. Saying that, if you have the bodies you
have, then you wouldn't have to change lenses very often.

The only true solution to dust on the sensor is a little care when changing
lenses and a weather sealed body/lens. Now, for the price of the 5D, Canon
should have had a weather sealed body.



"Bill Hilton" wrote in message
oups.com...


My wife bought one as a backup, replacing a 10D (her main camera is a
1D Mark II). Arrived yesterday from B&H and we played with it a bit
already ... for her it's a nice 'walk-around' camera (the 1D weighs
almost 3 lbs, the 400d weighs about 20 ounces). She got it because of
the sensor dust removal and the 10 Mpix and because we have a big trip
to Africa in January and it's unlikely they'll bring out a replacement
for the other bodies with dust removal before out trip.

If I were getting a lighter body for myself I'd probably hold out for a
5D type body with dust removal or, if going 1.6x (which I don't like)
I'd probably wait for the 30D replacement with dust removal. The 400d
feels too small in my hands.

I shot a couple hundred frames with it figuring out the menus etc and
to me it feels very, very small but I also like the light weight (both
my cameras are the 44 oz bricks). Even with a fairly light lens like
the 24-105 f/4 L IS the camera feels over-balanced by the lens so I
think we'll have to look at getting her an EF-S zoom for it (we skipped
buying the kit lens).

I think that with a small, light quality zoom it would do fine, also
with smaller fixed focus lenses we have like the 24 f/2.8, 35 f/2 and
85 f/1.8 it will be OK.

I didn't really mind the menu displaying only on the back panel, which
some are bitching about. Also, it's nice having a small pop-up flash,
though most of our lenses will probably block it. If I read the
booklet right you can't do flash exposure compensation with the
on-camera flash, which to me is a big negative (I think it said you can
only do flash compensation with an add-on flash but may have misread
it).

Haven't converted any RAW shots yet and haven't checked for dust, two
things I want to do soon. We can convert RAW files with both the Canon
DPP (which still looks clunky to me) and with Capture One LE 3.7.5,
which I just downloaded.

Overall I think it's fine if you need something really light and can
put up with something that feels pretty flimsy but I personally think
it's best suited for the EF-S lenses, assuming these are smaller, less
bulky lenses (I've never actually laid eyes on one).

Bill