"I have yet to see an OM owner say they wished this camera had more megapixels."

Well here's the problem as I see it, OMD needs to appeal to an broader audience outside of just current owners. An for that to happen, more base MP might just have to offered sooner than later.

First of all, nobody is having some huge debate over quality of pixels. I have championed smaller MP cameras many times across the spectrum of DPR forums an or articles. So anyone claiming I have some massive push for MP over anything else is simply missing the point.

Nobody really cares if 16mp was plenty enough for you. What they should an or might care about is 20mp enough in face of the today's stiff competition as part of an totally selling package for consumers in enough numbers to keep the lights on.

In fact, Panasonic's GH6 is expected to have an jump to 25mp with possible an more photo-centric G10 version to follow. So Calling more MP some "design by committee" is pure nonsense. It's far more than that.

Wrong. Nobody cares about more megapixels.

Nobody speaks for everyone concerning how many nor how little megapixels.

I do. I talk to people who actually use the format.

Okay, I overlooked the arctic traveller, hiking with a desire for a small camera.

What better options? Sony? Canon and Nikon users will say their camera is better than the Sony. Nikon? Both Canon and Sony will say theirs is better, etc. Until you have used this camera, you won't know how it compares.

You don’t need to be a attic traveler to appreciate a IP53 rating. Northern-Europe, Canada, countries with raining season and so on. Name me one comparable camera for €3000 with a decent lens.

jer81: Any camera in this price range will withstand rain. Anyway, just curious, why would an amateur demand a stacked sensor instead of, for example, higher dynamic range, more resolution or more affordable bright lenses?

It's not just about splash, it's about camera not freezing, or if you shoot where there is a lot of dust, dust not getting in the lenses and on the sensor (My D600's sensor still has dust spots on it btw, which has turned me off Nikon forever), and this is after being sent to Nikon for repair.

A full frame camera and lenses of this quality would cost twice as much, easy.

True but the gap between 20-24 is kind of minor. The MP junkie in me wants it to be as big as possible but in reality both are going end up effectively the same.

I'm wondering if it's a sensor engineering issue at the Sony plant that makes 20MP optimized over 24? Maybe pushing a M43 sized sensor to 24 and beyond starts to create noticeably worse performance in low light. Or reading off the stacked sensor has a decent performance boost at 20MP instead of 24. Or something as simple as a a wafer made up of 20MP sensors has a significant cost savings over 24MP?

Either way I think you're going to get about the same thing out of a 20MP sensor that you would a 24,

I have 20mp and 24 mp cameras. I can't tell the difference on a 4K monitor or big-screen TV. If you print huge maybe. I don't know. Been years since my last print back when digital was 10mp. 10mp looked great on 1080p displays. I think you need to get to 40+mp before you can see the difference on most monitors. I can see the difference between my 45mp file and 24/20 mp file on a 4K screen at normal viewing distance. But 24 vs 20-no visible difference.

gawd - yes. I wish more companies would take the smaller sensor sizes seriously for glass. The 12-100 and now this 40-150 - jebus - those are just the shiz. Almost worth converting to oly just to shoot those two lenses.

I think it's weird that we consider 25FPS a drawback to consider now.
The fact that you don't have to flip a thumb winder with each shot makes us more spoiled than half the famous photographers we look up to.

me too

well you could get an R6 for the same cash

Revenant: I made the mistake of clicking on Sony Northrup last night. The video was titled "m43 is alive" or something like that - I wanted to see whether he'd eat his words. Well, of course not. He said that the Canon 800mm f11 would be a better choice than the 300mm Pro + MC-14. 😆

the 30 MP EOS R + 800 F11 is 2475GBP OM-1 +300F4 pro+ MC-14 is 4450GBP this combo is equivalent to 840mm F11.2.. both rigs are the same weight ish ..i think the IQ will go to the FF..or spend a little more than the OM combo and replace the R with a R5

davev8: with the 800mm f11 you can only use the central AF points and C-AF is pretty much useless. To say nothing of image quality - the 300mm Pro is miles ahead - comparable to other exotic teleprimes like the 400mm or 600mm (in terms of detail resolution). Plus the far superior build, dual focusing motors etc. The f11 lenses are ... not to sound insulting but they're cr@p. Anyone equating the two is out of his/her mind.

The last Olympus camera that I recall watching Chris review was the E-M10 III. Their next-to-lowest end system camera offering, I felt that he was pretty dismissive of it. But when you just got done reviewing a top shelf $4,000 Sony and have to step down to a $500 Olympus, you know, it's going to be a big step down.

This review found him far more engaged and excited about the product. It was frankly refreshing to see a YouTube reviewer who was taking a non-full frame, sub-$3700 system camera seriously and exploring its merits. This is why I enjoy Chris and Jordan's reviews far more than most others.

@michael
Restriction 1) is unavoidable as the camera's electronics need to be powered up to negotiate the USB-PD delivery voltage. It's easily solved by turning off the camera. This lets the USB-PD device charge the internal battery. It doesn't take long for there to be enough charge in the battery for the USB-PD delivery voltage to be negotiated.
Restriction 2) is an issue for me. It was the same way in the E-M1iii. My work around for the E-M1iii was to use the external power socket on the optional battery grip. However the new battery grip for the OM-1, the HLD-10, lacks the external power socket. It looks like the only tethered external power option is a dummy battery.

It is also worth two in the bush.

Mr. Black, those birds in the hand are chickadees. Whiskey Jacks or AKA gray jays, Canada Jays are much larger.

For the AI computation I don't think there would be a difference but on the stacked sensor end the M43 should theoretically provide a performance boost. Even if it's the same 20MP as a 20MP FF sensor you're still having to pull the data from more photoreceptors on the larger sensor.
Although I'm thinking that bottleneck is going to be peanuts compared to the actual AI processing of the resulting images. The camera processor will still be the deciding factor of performance.

You might be right. I have bird feeders,there is no shortage of food, so holding out seeds in my hand actually seems to drive them away
I did once nearly train a young robin, which just forgot when we came back from a 3 week holiday.

The opening scenes were shot on the Panasonic S1H. Glad you liked the look!

@Impulses I use UHS-II cards in my a1, I never have buffer problems in crop mode, even 50mp is fine.

CFExpress-A are insanely expensive, and smaller capacity at that, capping at 160MB. I can easily fill two 256MB cards on a long morning wildlife shoot, three if it’s a great day.

Granted your file sizes will be much smaller, but if you’re shooting long 50fps bursts (which appears to be the talking point) then you will end up with an order of magnitude more shots than I take home.

Now I’m super interested this not for the burst speeds but or the Pro pre-shot caching, which should let me catch a lot of shots I miss — and that is the only good reason for buying a new camera IMO. We need moments. Culling 8000 photos every day is slow and dull and sometimes it tests your resolve to throw photos away. I don’t imagine it will put my a1 in the closet but I’d like to try it anyway, so I might take a dip. And hey, 3 year warranty for pre-orders.

@Impulses
The clear time is actually worse if you read other reviews (imaging-resource). The buffer takes ~90 images and clears in 25 seconds

And if the body doesn't offer advantages over the competition why chose it? There has to be something worthwhile. Could be MP, could be AF, could be buffer. But currently its none of those

'3 year warranty for pre-orders.'

Where, in the US?

Saw offers in mainland Europe this morning for body + one free extra battery and 5 year warranty if camera is registered on the OMS site.

Harold - the buffer clear time for a 50fps burst will be huge - even with 20mp images. So yes, it needs the fastest card tech available. The D500 tops out at 11fps and owners of that body typically spend on the fastest cards to clear out its enormous buffer.

@Impulses
Probably a pipeline thing. JPEG only is also only 90 images. The buffer clears a bit faster at 15sec, but nowhere near how fast it could. Maybe the processor is the limitation

"How often does one need to shoot 100 images in two seconds ?"
See now YOU'RE falling into the internet commenter syndrome of making excuses for the CONS in a review.

If you have a camera that can take 50 FPS, it's definitely important that your buffer can hold more than 100 frames and it doesn't take 25 seconds to clear those 100 frames out of the buffer.
Don't assume that no photographers will be hitting 100 images in 2 seconds just because you don't. And if it's a selling feature of the camera, you can't immediately brush off the fact that your camera will be non-functional for the next half a minute after your 2 seconds of shooting.

It's a very notable issue for a reviewer to point out that one new amazing feature is going to be hamstrung by another lack of a feature.

I would add that if this camera is to be taken seriously for birding or a pro sports camera - having a non-functional camera for 30 seconds is a non-starter for most photographers in high pressure sports situations.

Harold - BTW - I don't disagree about resolution - 20MP is more than good enough for 90% of photography. There are cases where more is better - but as you pointed out - the high res mode takes care of that. But - I think it is entirely appropriate to compare this camera to other sports oriented cameras. Yes, the sensor size is different - and the price is different - but this is the top end body in the MFT lineup. If it doesn't stack up to the A1 and Z9 then we should know where it is different. They are aimed at approximately the same audience.

Presumably they only had one M1 so shot bits with that and bits (when the M1 was in the shot) with other things. The fly-fishing was with an older Oly camera. Throw in a camera they can't mention (cough GH6) and that's where you are...

I'm a bit disappointed my 45/1.2 wasn't on the supported lenses list...
(Being a lot newer than the 75, although possibly, allegedly, they are both Sigma designs. Not that I care...)

>>I'm a bit disappointed my 45/1.2 wasn't on the supported lenses list...<<

Or the 25 1.2. I would think all of the Pro line lenses would be suppported.

"I keep saying I hope that M43's would focus more on smaller more compact and portable bodies" - we must be soul mates :-)

I'd love to see this sensor on a PEN but my guess is we won't see it on anything else <$2K for a year or two, hopefully not too much longer after that before it tickles down tho... I'd like to see them use the current 1/60 sensor on a PEN in the meantime, even on an E-PL.

Isn't this body the same size as an A7x,A1, Z6/Z7 etc...

I would definitely be inline for a smaller, more compact, for enthusiast camera...though I tend to think Panasonic is more likely than Oly...If Panny would just make a GM6 or an actually update to the GX8 in the size of their GX9, that would do.

As for all their AI based photo modes, etc., um...well, to be frankly honest, I think all of them, including Oly, needs to get off their ar$e and really start working hard on them. Google, Apple, are eating all their lunch in that field and it's not even close.

@panther fan Exactly, this is kind of a big M43 body, and it's the same size as an average FF body. If I'm going to be hauling something this big around why not just get a FF camera?

But M43 used to be awash in smaller bodies like the Oly PEN-E Pxx, Pany, GM, GFx, GXx cameras. Now only a few of those lines are left. The PEN E-P7 came really close, but seemed like a 2015 camera in 2021. The OM-1 gives me hope because it seems like a truly upgraded camera to be a M43 in 2022. It seems like a recovery from an earlier mis-step.
Now to cram most of these features and an EVF into the E-P8, or PEN-F II, or whatever.

24MP in the R3 and that cameras slower, but costs 3x what this does.

@ Imager of: Those doing real world photography know what can be done with 20 Mp. Hardly a major limitation for most amateur photographers, and even not for much professional work.

@Gkuzu
But only 20MP worth of microlenses. The 80MP can only be used for AF

Need to compensate for something? 😏
If you can't a good image out of this, you can't get a good image out of any medium format camera.

But it’s nothing new! Mobile phones will give same quality images. At least give it 4K 120fps. 😩

I'd like to see a mobile phone get a shot that's anywhere near as good as what I routinely get with an Oly 75/1.8 and a cheap entry level 16MP body tbh...

A 1/120+ readout M4/3 sensor. 😲🤤

Check the hand held high res picture of the Bee Hotel in the gallery. By all means, peep pixels.

@ jay jay02: To answer seriously: After working as a professional with digital for many years, also lots of large format posters and high quality books, I don't see a reason to be disappointed with 20 Mp, unless you work pretty specialized or regularly make very large prints.