Samsung GX20 Digital SLR (Single Lens Kit, 14MP, + 18-55mm Lens)

Samsung with Pentax have produced a DSLR which is quite different from the rest. Samsung provides the 14.6MP CMOS sensor and Pentax the body etc. The Samsung offering is not inferior to the Pentax one. The body is packed with features: usable weather proofing, lens focal plane adjust, pixel remapping, image stabiliser (so all lenses benefit), sensor vibrate clean, auto ISO range select, ISO seen as part of exposure and adjustable as such, configurable noise reduction, HDR, interval timer, etc. The firmware has so many functions and parameters to adjust to your taste (all accessible via a very good LCD interface. It uses Adobe's DNG (Digital NeGative) royalty free format for RAW and so that is pretty well universally acceptable.

IT uses SD/SDHC cards which are cheap and plentiful. The write speed is very fast and varies with the speed of your card. Using a Class 6 Transcend 8GB SDHC (£15) card is fast enough for me.

Crucially the sensor is a good one and Samsung's first... Canon must be worried. Many DSLRs have noise issues getting 10MP and 12MP onto an APS-C size sensor let alone 14.6. Samsung has managed it very well whilst keeping excellent detail. Shooting RAW mode the noise is comparable to my Canon 20D up to ISO 1600. The Samsung will go up to ISO 6400 but only use if you have to.

The body is excellent and water resistant - you can really shoot in the rain or dusty environments. In the rain/dust you must have a weatherproof lens for it to be effective. Don't be put off by the plastic on a rigid stainless steel frame. I have a Canon D60 which is made that way and that has done great service for over six years - but is not water resistant. Obviously there's plastic then there's Plastic. The body feels comfortable to hold and is not too heavy.

There's a reasonable array of lenses to suit most people by Samsung, Pentax, Sigma, Tamron and Tokina plus an array of older Pentax lenses that work too. The 18-55 kit lens is not bad and would do well until you could get something better - say a Pentax 16-45 f4 or Tamron 17-50 f2.8.

This is quite a leap for me from Canon. I got sick of Canon's incremental updates and wanted something new, faster and exciting. The Samsung is and with great a IQ too.

I've been playing around for a while with a Pentax k-7 trying to convince myself I can afford the upgrade. It is a great camera, and puts right all of my issues with Pentax/Samsung DSLRs - namely speed of focus and frame rate. After selling my K10d I was looking for my next camera, and decided I could not justify the additional money for the K-7, so I opted for the GX20, which offers insane value for money. Yes it is still a little on the slow side for focus and frame rate, but I had to ask myself how often it was really a problem and had to admit I couldn't remember the last time either bothered me with the k10d. It is basically similar speed to base canon (450d) and nikon (d3000) models and cost about the same, so it gets 5 stars because you simply cannot beat it for value for money.

I didn't go straight to it though, I did look very carefully at the nikon D90 and canon 40d - both of which were going to cost me more money, and in my opinion not give me superior image quality. More importantly there are some features that they don't have.

However, I will point out that if speed is your prime concern get a canon 40D, it is very fast even compared to the nikon.

So why the Samsung? -

Firstly I choose the gx20 over the K20d purely because it is cheaper. That said, I do prefer the buttons on the back of the gx20 and the menu system (it is slightly easier to navigate). I've got gear from my K10d that will work with this camera as well, so it is a very easy transition.

LENSES
I've got a couple of pentax/samsung fit lenses, including an old but fast (1.7) manual pentax 50mm lens. You can pick up tons of these old lenses cheaply on ebay and they really do give stunning results for the money. There are quite a good range of older lenses that will work with the samsung that again you pick up on ebay including newer auto focus prime and zoom lenses. They always seem to be cheaper than canon or nikon equivalents.

PRIORITY MODES
Only samsung/pentax have the sensitivity priority mode (set the ISO and camera changes the shutter and aperture) and the TAv mode, where you set the shutter speed and aperture and the camera changes the ISO to properly expose.

WEATHER SEALS/ANTI-DUST
Also I wanted a rugged weather sealed body, and felt that the Samsung was better than both the Nikon and Canon in this regard, and I still think it feels better made than the Canon (is it me or do they always feel cheaper than you expect them to?). So far the weather seals have worked a treat combined with the anti-dust features and I've not had to re-touch a single shot yet (taken about 1000 images).

PIXELS
I wanted to be able to crop images a little tighter than I had been able to with a 10MP camera - neither canon or nikon could match the samsung in this price range. I haven't noticed any major noise issues within the normal ISO range, and in fact seems to have less noise than my old k10d. There is one major exception to this, and that is any pics taken at over and ISO value of 1600. Above 3200 is pretty noisy and 6400 very - the noise reduction software does a good job reducing the worst elements but I still don't recommend going up to 6400 (unless of course you want to make a grainy image).

CUSTOMISATION
There is so much of it! I can change so many things like which dial controls which function (on the front and rear dials). I can create a user mode where my favourite settings are stored and can be brought back at the twiddle of a dial.

ANTI-SHAKE
I hadn't really realised, before I started looking at canon and nikon, that anti-shake is often not in the body of the camera but in the lens. For me, I want it in the body of the camera so that any lens I use will benefit. So even my old 50mm lens can benefit from having it.

There are some other features I love like the in camera processing, which builds on the previous models and adds in an HDR effect (curious setting that I have played with a little, and def makes a diference but is never going to replace proper HDR), and many others. It also adds in a picture wizard function by doubling up the function of the delete button. Press it in shoot mode and it jumps you to the picture wizard where you can quickly change the colour tone, saturation, contrast and sharpness. You can either adjust as you wish or choose some of the pre-set modes like portrait or landscape. You can even customise some of your own settings.

Live view is not great, but then I never really wanted to use it. If this is an important feature for you perhaps have a play around with a few different models and see what you think.

I've been very very happy with the picture quality and am looking forward to using it a lot in the future.

My first digital SLR, but very very happy with the quality. I read reviews that the kit lens were not good, but they are better than anything I ever took before with a non digital SLR. Particularly the rich colors and having 14.6 mega pixels to zoom in and crop while still getting great results. I generally take pics in RAW+JPG mode which still gets loads on an 8gig card. I even have taken pics in heavy rain (since the manual said you could) and standing in knee deep surf too, with sea water occasionally splashing on me. The weather proofing on this is great.