as there seems to a bit of Trolling going on in this thread - from
an E300 owner too !!! I AM Suprised! (you expect the odd D70 owner
to do it but NOT Oly owners!) I thought I'd put forward my UNBIASED
Comparison , and it IS unbiased too ...
I had the excellent E300 for 3 months and used every raw converter
which supports it and it's a superb camera but even in RAW it only
matches the JPG engine in the C8080 (which I still own and Like A
LOT) both at lowest ISO ..
Compared to the E300, the 350D resolves fine infinity detail in
landscapes better, has better Auto whitebalance and far better
metering and way lower noise at any given ISO - AF is much the same
(IE:- Excellent) regardless of light, shutter lag is better on the
350D as is the viewfinder and card write speeds are in a different
universe..
I prefer the more Pro Build of the E300 but the 350D is a better
shape for me - battery life is much the same.. Both take IR
remotes, neither comes with one, the Oly RM1 (C2100UZ / C3030
remote) is far more functional as the 350D takes the old 1-button
RM1 from the EOS10 and NOT the G3 remote.. the E300 has a vastly
better LCD but it needs it as there is no Mono one and you have to
squint to see the in-viewfinder display which is at the right.. I
don't like the Lit AF areas on either camera at all - the 350D has
tiny pinprick dots which can be hard to see whereas the E300 goes
the total opposite with massive red blurry dots which look like
you've focussed on an LED on a 1970s music centre - neither are
like the refined squares which light up even in the old D60!.
Pixel mapping is a nonevent, I only had 1 hottie on my UZI after 4
years (I remapped it) and literally Wore out a D60's shutter in
commercial work but there were no bad pixels - the E300's Dust
shaker is a worthwhile thing but it won't shake off the sticky muck
my 1DS seems to attract.. the 350D has fast USB2 transfer, the E300
has terminally slow USB1 (WHY? the 8080 is USB2) but even USB2 is
as much a nonevent as Pixel mapping as it's far better to use a
card reader..
Kit lenses are in a different universe also - the 350D comes with a
Dogtoy which is sharp wide open at one end (and one side!) whereas
the E300 comes with a Kit lens which is every bit as good as a
Canon or Nikon 24-85 USM/AFS in both build and optics, superb from
edge to edge wide open but VERY prone to CA / PF (I compared it to
the 14-54 E1 Kit lens and although the E300 is more prone to PF
than the 350D itself, most of it is the 14-45 kit lens, the 14-54
was far better). the 350D has the advantage of 17 years of used EOS
glass behind it, the E300 has the advantage of THE BEST "DX", "DC"
type smaller sensor lenses available (to make the most of the 350D
the best lenses are Full Frame, even Tamron and Sigmas!)
Both are excellent cameras, you choose based on what YOU need. the
350D definately walks it on image quality though, you have to jump
through hoops to get the E300 to match the 8080 even!.
--
Please ignore the Typos, I'm the world's worst Typist
