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The AF system is also predictably superb. It appears to be the same system used in the EOS 30D, which is no bad thing. It is extremely quick and accurate even in low light, and it would probably be even quicker if it wasn’t for the camera’s one weak point. The supplied kit lens is a cheap piece of plastic tat that I would be mildly disappointed to find in a Christmas cracker. It lacks contrast, shows significant barrel distortion at its widest setting, and just feels cheap and nasty. It has a plastic lens mount, a rather loose zoom action and the front element tube wobbles when provoked.

I’m a bit puzzled by the image quality. I’ve read some reviews that have absolutely raved about it, saying it’s easily the best of the 10MP DSLRs, but personally I wasn’t that impressed. It’s good, don’t get me wrong, but it’s not that good. In terms of absolute sharpness and detail, it produced virtually identical results to the Olympus E-400, Sony A100 and Nikon D80. I’ve taken the same shots with all four cameras, and for three of them at least you can compare the results right here by clicking on the links in the first paragraph of this review. I think you’ll agree that it really is no better. I also found significant levels of purple fringing around some burned-out highlights, and while it might have marginally superior dynamic range, it’s not enough to give it a significant advantage. Colour rendition was very good, but then again it’s not a problem for any recent DSLR that I’ve tried.

Surprisingly for a canon DSLR, I was also not massively impressed by the image noise control. Shots at 100-400 ISO were fine, but there was noticeable colour speckling in darker areas at 800, which spread to the mid-tones at 1600 ISO.

Verdict
While the 400D is unquestionably a very good camera, with superb performance, an excellent control system and wide range of picture control options, and while it is a distinct improvement on the 350D, it doesn’t really stand out in comparison to any of the other entry-level 10MP DSLRs that are currently available. The kit lens is also very weak.

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