3.5-5.6 DX VR Nikkor Lens

Customer Review:This is very simple, if you are a Nikon shooter looking for a new camera then stop reading and buy this camera. It's that good.

Handling

This camera is brilliant to hold and use. Nikon has done it again and has made the user interface more usable and streamlined. What to change flash modes. Press the flash pop-up button and rotate the control wheel. Sweet. Want to change create and use a User defined mode? There are two. Set your mode up. Go to the menu and save it. To use it rotate the shooting mode dial to U1 or U2. Presto you are there. In the D300 and D700 you to have to setup things in the menu and switch in the menu. Also, there were 2 sets of things you could change and they were not all inclusive. It was all horribly confusing and I never used it. Speaking of shooting modes. There is now one position on the shooting mode dial for scene mode shooting. You change through the different scene modes with the control wheel and the type scene shows up on the back screen. Sweet. I can go on and on but needless to say Nikon have really improved their interface. One caveat, I don't think it is quite up to par with the GH1 to change exposure compensation (IMO the most important control) but still a huge step in the correct direction in handling. I like the handling of the D7000 better than either the D700/300.

Low Light Shooting

The D300 wasn't that great for Hi ISO. It shoots clean at 400 ISO and usable up to 1600. (The D90 and D300s were better) The D700 was fantastic. Clean at 1600 ISO and usable up to 6400. It opened up new worlds. The D7000 is close to the equal of the D700. Enough said. Just to give you an example. The bouquet toss at a reception is often done in poor light. By using 1600 instead of 400 you get the equivalent of 4 times more light. At ISO400 you flash may need to use 1/4 power and you can get 1 maybe 2 shots of the toss and catch before the flash needs to recharge. At ISO1600 your flash would only need to use 1/16th power and now you can get 5-6 shots. This is huge.

Picture Quality

Like all modern DSLRs it takes great pictures. I don't pixel peep so I can't really say that I notice a difference between the pictures from the D7000 and any of my 12mp cameras. It makes really nice pictures and that is all I care about.

Useful Photography Features (Not Marketing Features)

--100% view finder! Big bright with 100% coverage. No more guessing of your framing. (It is not as bright as the D700. However, it is 100% vice 95%)
--2 SD slots - When your getting paid to shoot a wedding or any gig, my card broke is not an excuse. Very useful feature. For the home user put two smaller cards rather than one big card and save some money.
--Smaller and lighter than D300, D700, D3s, D3x- When you stand on your feet for 9 hours shooting the wedding and reception, you start to feel every ounce you are carrying. Often you will be carrying two bodies with a fast tele zoom and fast wide zoom. That starts to get heavy. Light weight here we come.
--2016-Segment RGB Meter- for spot on exposure and white balance--No one touches Nikon on this and this one is fantastic.
--1/8000th -- Very useful for shooting into the sun wide open with a bright lens
--1/250 -- Could be better (1/500th for D40) but could be much worse. Auto FP helps.
--Magnesium body and better sealing -- Shoot in dusty environments without messing up the inside your camera.
--Uses the ML-L3 infra red remote -- Small and cheap. IR sensor on the front and back of the camera.
--Autofocus focus motor for non-AF-S lenses

Marketing Features that will sometimes be Useful

--16Mp -- Nikon was obviously getting creamed in the marketing wars on this. This is going to lead to bigger files requiring larger hard drives and faster computers. Occasionally it will be useful if you can't frame as close as you would like and you need to crop or you need to print big. Alien Skin Blow Up 2, Image Resizing Plug-in Software for Photoshop, Macintosh & Windows and Genuine Fractals 6 Professional Edition 1-user Full are two very nice programs that can increase the size of your photos for printing large. 16 MP is nice by not necessary.
--39 Point Auto Focus -- To me in some ways this is better than the 51 point of the D300 and D700 as that gets too unwieldy. However, you really don't even need 39. However, still useful on occasion.
--6 frames per second-- I very rarely ever put my camera in 3 frames per second. When I do so it fills the card quickly. If you are shooting the big game then 6 is nice. Or it is nice for some cool special effects shots. Other than that you won't really find yourself using it that much.

Video
The other thing I am not really going to dwell on is the video capabilities. In my opinion all the various video options are mostly marketing hype really targeted at a niche market. Shallow depth of field video is difficult and time consuming to shoot and edit properly. The average family home user has neither the time nor inclination to do this. With that said, it is nice to only have to carry one device to take still pictures and video. So I do enjoy that feature, however 1080 is not really necessary. In fact with up converting DVD players standard def is still very usable and takes up far less space. Suffice it to say that the video capabilities are very good and should do anything a home user would need it to do. Can be used for pro Videos as demonstrated by Chase Jarvis.

Intangibles

This is a very nice camera and it feels very solid in your hands. It feels far more substantial than the D40/D90 without feeling like a brick the way the D300/D700 do. I am sure the D300 has more marketing features than the D7000 but I would have to research them to figure out what they are. As for the lens, I am not really that hot on this lens. It will do fine but the Nikon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G AF-S ED VR II Telephoto Zoom Lens for Nikon DX-Format Digital SLR Cameras is far more useful. Also, you can buy the Nikon 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G AF-S DX VR Nikkor Zoom Lens and Nikon 55-200mm f/4-5.6G ED IF AF-S DX VR [Vibration Reduction] Zoom Nikkor Lens for about the same price as the difference between this and the body only.

Conclusion

In the end it all comes down to what is important to you. Smaller weight and size is becoming much more important to me and this camera is a very good trade off of features for size and weight. Anything that is missing I don't even use so I am not sure what it may be. My D700 was recently stolen and while I miss it, the D7000 is a worthy replacement for it. I opted to get the D7000 and Panasonic GH2 and save the $300 difference for a lens.

Pros

--100% view finder!
--6 fps (7D is 8. However, I think this number is overhyped in most cases. Even shooting at 3 FPS will fill up you card with photos that look remarkably similar) 8+ is needed for professionals shooting professional sports. Not enthusiast shooting High School etc.
--16mp sensor (a marketing increase but still nice to allow some room for cropping)
--14 bit photos
--39 point auto focus sensors (19 cross point) this is a bit of a marketing thing but it is still nice and it does not matter about the 51 on D300s and above. Still very nice.
--2016 scene meter - compares against data base for WB setting and color settings
--Excellent battery life
--MD-11 Optional Battery Grip
--2 SD card slots for back up redundancy or double the card space! Outstanding
--Magnesium used to make camera stronger

Cons
--16mp senor (takes up more storage on your hard drive) (12mp JPG 3mb 12 mp RAW = 12 mb 16mp JPEG = 5 mb 16 mp RAW = 16 mb. This is for 12 bit. 14 bit would require more)
--Camera heavier than it used to be
--No swivel screen - after using the GH1 extensively you really miss this when shooting at weird angles. You especially miss it for macro photography.
--No full time live view - Ditto from above. Live view is what you see is what you get. Forgot to change white balance-- you will see that when people are yellow, blue or green. Have it set in manual and blowing everything out-- you'll see that as a white screen.

Decision Matrix

Nikon
For the Nikon shooter this is a no brainer. If you are in the market for a camera, then skip the D300s. The D700 is getting long in the tooth and many people are buying the D7000 while waiting for D800. If you already own a D700 then this camera is a very good complement to it. Use the money you saved over the more expensive camera to buy a nice lens.

Here is a breakdown vs other Nikon DSLRs

D3100-- Two completely different classes with the D7000 being worth the difference in many. However at the end of the day they will both make nice pictures. Also, the lenses are more important than the camera. You can get the D3100 and 18-200mm for the same price. Something to think about.
D5000-- Good sensor and nice camera. D3100 comments also apply here.
D90--Tough choice. The best DX sensor of its generation and still better than most. If you can't quite stretch to the D7000, this is a very tempting proposition.
D300S-- Irrelevant. The D7000 has a much better sensor, is smaller, lighter, cheaper, and better metering.
Nikon D700-- Would be a good complement to the D7000. Use D7000 when you need the 1.5x crop on the long end and a deeper depth of field due
+++++
I won't go in to lots of words, but I will tell you I have used a number of DSLR cameras (Nikon D40, D40x, D60, D50, D70, D70s, D80, D90, and now the D7000 as well as Canon 20D, 30D, 40D, 500D and 550D) and the Nikon D7000 may be one of the finest DX cameras I have ever used. In the past 24 hours I have logged 250 pictures and and I am impressed with the quality of the picture, and the ease of use with the camera. You might be tempted to think it's just a glorified D90, but you would wrong. It's better than the D90, and from what I am reading, better than the D300s which is more money. The camera feels good in the hands, has a solid feel, is weatherproof, and overall speaks professional photographer. For $1,500 in a kit, it is money well spent.

I waited for the D7000 over any other DSLR for one reason: Auto-Focus in video mode. It was worth the wait. I had almost dropped the $1,400 on the Canon 60D but hesitated because the 60D was dumbed down in many ways by Canon so as to not impede on 7D sales. Nikon went all out and demolished the need for the D300s, while making a DSLR worth having. The video mode allows you to run auto-focus while shooting, which no other DSLR has done to this point. Additionally, you can now shoot 1080p in 24 frames (23.97 actually) per second, which is cinema quality. Also, you can shoot up to 20 minutes of video in one shoot, versus only 12 minutes for the Canon 60D, T2i, and T1i. You may think you are buying the D7000 for photography only, but wait until you see what you can do with video. Being able to do DOF shooting makes the DSLR video even more valuable, allowing you to do things you would have to spend thousands on in a professional camera.

The D7000 may very well be Nikon's best DSLR in quite some time. I have used many, but this has quickly become my favorite.

Nikon D7000 Digital SLR Kit w/18-105mm f/3.5-5.6 DX VR Nikkor Lens

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Rosetta Stone V4 TOTALe: French Level 1-5 Set

Customer Review:Rosetta Stone TOTALe French v4 is marketed as an innovative, total language solution for someone wishing to learn to speak, read and write conversational French. It certainly meets and exceeds those claims - it's remarkable!

Apologies in advance for the length of this review. Rosetta Stone TOTALe represents a substantial financial investment so I am assuming people considering it will want a lot of information before making a buying decision.

Rosetta Stone is an immersion-style language program. That means that during the core lessons, there is no written or spoken language other that the one you are learning. There are no instructions or directions or translations in your native language, in my case English. The only words you will read or hear are French. The meanings are made clear through pictures, gestures and logic. It sounds almost impossible, but it is actually quite intuitive. It's amazing how quickly you pick up the words, the sentence structure, the grammar and the spellings. Immersion is how all children learn language, and it works just as well for many adults. However, because this software is quite expensive, you might want to make yourself familiar with immersion style to make sure you are comfortable with it before purchasing. I also use a free online French-English dictionary quite frequently after a lesson to make certain I am clear on some words and tenses. I will probably purchase a hard copy dictionary soon as a supplement. In other words, for anything further than being able to converse well and read signs or packaging or instructions, you will want some other resources.

The core program is divided into 5 levels, each with many, many lessons and reviews. Each lesson focuses on a particular aspect of the language - vocabulary, grammar, writing/spelling, pronunciation, etc. The lessons are short, so it is easy to do a lesson or two throughout the day when you have time. If you must end a particular lesson before it is finished, Rosetta picks up exactly where you left off the next time you sign in. This makes it extremely easy for even the busiest person to find time for lessons. They also move quickly from one exercise to another. Because of this, lessons are rarely tedious.

I particularly like that it employs numerous speakers, unlike courses that only use one male and one female voice. This way, you hear many different people saying the same words and phrases, which makes it much easier when you reach the point that you want to follow and understand conversations, french movies, etc.

The package includes a fairly nice, binaural usb headset with microphone. In most lessons, you are prompted to repeat, and later answer questions, in French. If your pronunciation is off, or if your answer is wrong, it prompts you to try again until you get it right. The voice recognition is good, but you will need to fine tune your headset settings and microphone position initially. The microphone needs to be pretty close to your mouth and the volume needs to be high enough. I suspect I will need to replace the headset regularly since I have several people in my house using it every day.

In addition to the core language levels (all 5 of them), there are also 4 companion audio CDs for each level - a total of 20 companion CDs. These are great for using in the car or in your MP3 player! Each CD includes the MP3 files for easy download to your player. It reinforces what you are learning and if you are chauffeuring kids around, they will be learning, too. I listen to them while on the treadmill because it makes the time go faster and I feel like I'm multi-tasking.

You can set up multiple users for the core program. My 20 year old son in college, my 8 year old son, and my husband are all users and working at their own pace. For me, it makes the cost of this program a little more reasonable. The 15 months of online support, which is the TOTALe part of this package, is only available for one user, so choose carefully which user will get this as it cannot be changed later.

The online services make Rosetta high octane. There are games and stories and individual tutoring sessions with native speakers and opportunities to converse in French with other learners. This feature absolutely speeds up the process of becoming conversational as quickly as possible. The individual sessions with native speaking tutors are scheduled, but the games and stories and other features are available anytime.

If the online opportunities don't appeal to you or you don't have enough time for scheduled sessions, you might consider purchasing one of the regular Rosetta Stone language packages. It's the same core language program, but without the 15 months of online services, and is less expensive. As an alternative to the online part, there are some free online communities, like Livemocha, where language learners can converse online with other learners. It's not as fluid as Rosetta Stone since the other learners are using many different programs and classes and are at different levels, but it's still a nice opportunity to practice speaking your new language.

A down side to Rosetta Stone is it's EULA. This software is non-transferable. If you don't like it, you are stuck and it would be a very expensive mistake. Also, I have read other reviews that say it is difficult to get help from Rosetta in the event of computer crashes or upgrades. I didn't have any issues with my install so I cannot speak to that, but it bears consideration.

If you want to learn French (or any new language) and can afford it, I heartily recommend Rosetta Stone. If you want/need to learn French as quickly as possible, Rosetta Stone TOTALe would probably be helpful in speeding up the process, although learning a new language well is never an overnight process.
+++++
Rosetta Stone Totale French

Once you get the application installed and working, it is a lot of fun. I actually look forward to learning the language. It gives no English interpretation but shows an image with each phrase. They call it Dynamic Immersion. You hear, see, say and even type the phrase. The program goes over learned material and also breaks down pronunciations. It's colorful and not only fun to use but to look at as well.

It is a fantastic program but not without its quirks.

Problem 1 - license agreement.
We rarely read license agreements but I have started to look them over. This is one that I was tempted to decline - too many lawyers got into this one. Stuff like you don't own it, this is a license to use, etc. Because of the license agreement I was hesitant to signup for the online features for fear I am walking into additional charges I will have trouble getting out of. But I did and will definitely update if that happens.

Installation
Installation went ok on my desktop (Windows 7) except for the headset. First thing starting the application it asks to setup the microphone but the headset wasn't listed. I tried support (see below). The instructions say to plug in the headset prior to installation. But after unplugging and reconnecting the headset after installation my computer found it. But then you have to go to your sound settings on the Control Panel and set it to default in order for this application to use it- every single time. They should have taken care of that step programmatically.

Installation on a Netbook
My netbook (with Windows XP) doesn't have a CD player. With all other applications I put the CD (or DVD) into my desktop and connect to it. But it didn't' work with this installation. I happened to have a CD player that I can connect via USB and that worked fine. As with my desktop I always have to choose the headset in Control Panel every single time.

Support
For support I tried the online chat. But it turns out support isn't familiar with Totale yet. The Knowledge Base was also lacking information on this particular version. Being a computer guy I was able to get everything working but still you should be able to install an application and run it with little difficulty, especially in this price range.

Getting Started
This is where the program really fails. While the screen is colorful and pretty nothing tells you what to do, what it's about, or how it works. There are tiny little icons on the upper right of the screen where you can eventually find this information. But when you start an application you should be guided right away. There is an arrow to continue but it took several screens before I was beginning to understand how to use this application.

Connecting online was worse. It kept asking me to signup so I finally did. But then it says I can't use it until certain things are completed. After looking at the online screens I later received an email that said I was scheduled to do something online which I had no idea what it was or why. When I clicked on the link it took me to a system check to tell me my speech recognition doesn't work and to download the update. Nothing about schedules but of course my headset worked. Then the next day I received an email saying they were sorry they missed me.

So many discs
With this version there are six application and language CDs and about 20 audio CDs. It would really help to include a DVD with everything on it and a install to copy all the audio so that it can easily be played on an mp3 player or ipod.

Problems Ripping Audio for MP3 Player
I used Windows Media Player (Windows 7) to rip the CDs to mp3s. Because there are so many I was just swapping discs when they were complete. Turns out some were overwritten and naming was not consistent making for a disaster figuring out what was transferred. I don't know where the fault lies but they better get with Microsoft to clear this up.

Adding Languages/Levels
This is one of the better features. All you need is the additional language/level disc (and activation code) and it adds it in a couple of clicks. But when using a computer like a netbook without a CD it currently will not work over the network.

Voice Recognition
This is a fantastic feature to be able to say the phrase and have the computer verify it. However, it is far from perfect and isn't that precise. It works about 95% of the time but occasionally I have trouble getting it to recognize what I said. And sometimes I wonder if what I said really was correct.

Performance
This is not something you will load up quickly and start using. It takes a long while to get into the application. Once into the lesson it can take a long time to get back to the home page. There is no hour glass or any indicator so if you try to quit sometimes Windows will come up and tell you the application is not responding and ask if you want to kill it. But if you wait a while it returns and you can close the application.

Navigation
It is very difficult to get around the lessons for instance if you want to start over or just go to a specific section. It tries to be intuitive and constantly asks if you want to continue where you left off even if you chose to reset everything. And sometimes it doesn't get that correct.

Scoring
It keeps score through your lessons. I have no idea why because you always have to choose the correct choice. And sometimes they are simply accidental clicks. The score really gives me no clue as to how I am doing. What tells me how I am doing is what I remember which is why I like to restart and go through it again.

Conclusion
Once you get by the quirks this application makes learning a lot of fun. I look forward to learning a new language using this application. I think the process works even though you don't get the English translation. Online it says you can legally install it on two computers. While that is a convenience, I do prefer using it on my netbook so I can use it just about anywhere. For what it is supposed to do - teach you a language, I think it is a great application and for that I would give it 5 stars. But for the price it should no way have so many issues. I only deducted one star as I can work around the issues. Others may find them more annoying than I did.