Product Reviews

Nikon knows a thing or two about making cameras, having been in the business since 1948. Its entry-level digital SLRs are something special, the D50 and D40 having already won Computer Buyer Best Buys. Even though the D40 was only launched a few months ago, this is an updated version, physically almost identical but making the leap from six to 10 megapixels that we'd expected in its predecessor.

Like the D40, it's a pleasure to use, solidly built and responsive. Nikon includes the same 18-55mm kit lens, offering 3x optical zoom; an 18-135mm lens is another option if you need more zoom, as is a twin kit with 18-55 and 55-200mm lenses. The D40x still lacks an internal focus drive motor, restricting your choice of additional lenses.

We like Nikon's

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built-in help system, which shows a thumbnail next to each entry depicting the kind of scene you should use that setting with. For example, an image of a dimly lit concert is shown by the ISO 1600 setting, while a sunny park represents ISO 100. Since there's no separate status LCD, all settings not in the viewfinder have to be relayed on the rear 2.5in screen. This makes for much slower changes, and the lack of dedicated buttons on the camera to jump directly to common settings (like white balance) doesn't help either.

There's no denying that the 10-megapixel light sensor is a huge boon. Not only were photos super-sharp, but the level of detail was amazing. With this many pixels you can enlarge shots to A3 size, or crop photos and still print them on A4 paper without them becoming blocky. As with the D40, we rarely saw any digital noise, and colours were faithful.

To ensure you never miss the moment, the D40x has a slightly better continuous mode than the D40 - we measured it at 2.7 frames per second. There's also a useful spot metering mode which allows you to take correctly exposed photos in tricky lighting conditions.

The D40x costs around £100 more than the D40, though, and unless you really need those extra pixels, it's a hefty premium. So this excellent camera can't quite wrest our Best Buy award from the D40.