Over the last few months I've gotten numerous phone calls and emails from friends asking if they should upgrade from their Nikon D200 to the new D300. Just got two more, which made me think it would be a good blog entry.

Here's my short answer: the key advantage with the D300 is its noticeably better low-noise (high-ISO) performance and better AF with Nikon's new 51-point system. I took advantage of both of those the other day when shooting track at my kids' school. It was a dreary gray day, so I pushed the ISO to 1600 so I could shoot the high jump at 1/3200 second and f/4.5.

So if you shoot at high ISOs regularly or shoot action, then the D300 can't be beat (I wrote about some of this in an earlier posting). Sure, there are a lot of other new and/or improved features, and a couple more megapixels, but I believe the noise and AF are the two "biggies." If you've got a D200 and shoot mainly in good light and don't need a better AF system, I'd suggest you consider investing in better lenses. Of course, if you buy the D300, you'll love it. But the D200 is FAR from obsolete. I've still got mine.

Now I'll point you to a couple of URLs. Dave Black's a great photographer and runs a nice website, www.daveblackphotography.com. He does a lot of work for Nikon, but tries to stay fairly objective. He's got stories on his experiences and opinions on both the D3 and D300 in the "Workshop at the Ranch" link.

Second, there's a Canadian photographer (Michael Reichmann) who has a website called the Luminous Landscape, which has loads of good articles and is very well respected. He's written a different kind of article, having switched to Canon ten years ago. Now he's also bought both the D3 and D300 and a slew of lenses, and writes about his experiences with them. http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/cameras/nikon-d3-d300.shtml

The key as always, though, is what you do with the gear. Used well, any of the good cameras out there today are capable of great pictures.