A99 tested on DXO - score: 89

Buying a d800 has ancillary  costs attached to it.

We get 54meg NEF raw files so we had to upgrade out computers and our memory cards to deal with that. Never mind the working pros even the amateurs, you're 16gb cards are nothing now you need at least SDXC cards at 64gb to handle that file size, and a decent computer to run it.

IMO the extra pixels difference from 24mp and 36mp isn't that much if you're not blowing up an image and doing prints. We touch up skin and while I adore having the extra pixels to work it, it only means my native 100% view to edit from is 33% larger. I can heal brush a mole 33% more accurately now at the pain of paying a few hundred to upgrade memory cards and computers. At the the studio can justify that as a business expense, if a hobbyist can then I really don't think that hobbyist would care if Sony dropped their a99 price a few hundred bucks.