Canon EOS Rebel XTi/400d DSLR Camera Review

After 3 weeks of owning this camera, I can safely say I'm reasonably pleased with it. It has 10.1 mega-pixels in it, which is great for enlargements. Battery life is super. The camera has the ability to shoot in RAW mode, which is unprocessed images that you can "tweak" yourself on the computer for best results. The best feature on this camera would definitely have to be the integrated cleaning system which uses ultrasonic vibrations on the sensor to shake off dust.

I bought it brand new from B&H Photo for $685, body only. The reason I bought it body only, was because the kit lens it comes with is complete utter crap. It's not a USM lens either, and optically it's not that great either. Instead, I bought a Sigma 17-70mm lens for roughly another $400.

My first impressions upon removing it from the box, I realized this is a really small camera for an SLR. However, Canon does make a battery grip that I purchased for another $130. With the grip attached it really is perfect for a person with normal to large sized hands. The grip also allows for easy vertical shooting with a second button built in.

Now this being a consumer priced camera, it does not have a 35mm full frame in it. Instead it uses a smaller sensor size, smaller mirror and smaller viewfinder than a traditional SLR. So with that said, it has a crop factor of 1.6x. Now you're probably wondering what that means. Long story short, you would take the focal length of a lens and multiply that by 1.6. So a 50mm lens, is really an 80mm lens on the Xti rather than a full frame SLR. That could be a pro or a con depending on how you look at it.

The image quality of this camera is superb. Put a good lens on this camera, and it will shine. There is one thing I have noticed though about exposures on this. The Xti tends to underexpose the images in order to save highlights and detail. That's due to the fact that you can always save an underexposed image on the computer, whereas an overexposed image your detail is completely lost. However if you don't like the underexposed images, you can use the exposure compensation setting which will suit your needs.

In the three weeks of owning this camera, I have put close to another $800 into this. Now that really isn't that much when compared to some other equipment out there, but you will get a camera system that shines like a pro.