Best one they've made

This is the best camera Sony has ever produced in my opinion from a value-for-your-dollar standpoint. A very capable, reasonably well-built camera with excellent ergonomics. It produces crisp, well-exposed images in most lighting conditions.

Sony's full frame SLRs (850/900), while very good, are very overpriced considering: 1. the slow continuous drive speeds. 2. low light performance/jpeg NR artifacts.

Sony's SLTs are fast but I'm not a fan of electronic viewfinders at all.

I would have remained with the Sony system otherwise, but now I'm considering the new, reasonably priced full-frame SLRs being launched by Canon and Nikon.

Nonetheless, the A700 is an outstanding camera to buy used considering what they sell for now. I'll keep mine as a backup body with a long-zoom lens, and continue to benefit from the APS-sized sensor boost.

Problems:

• Higher ISO settings (800+) are less than great - especially when shooting jpegs.

• If Pentax can make its cameras water resistant, why can't everyone else?