Since our D50 already used for 3 years, I think is time to upgrade to more modern and advance camera. So we decided to sell it off and keep the D80 then get another D90. Many asking us why not D300? After I have read many reviews in Internet and magazine, seems like the only things that D300 over D90 are tougher body, more (51 vs 11) focus points, faster focusing (CAM3500 vs CAM1000), faster continuous shooting (6fps vs 4.5fps). The other thing and the only thing I might need is faster shutter speed 1/8000 compare to D90 1/4000. Besides faster shutter speed, I don’t really need all these extra features. Don’t believe me? See what Kenrockwell said - If you’re considering a D300, forget it. Get the D90 instead.

Another other reason why I choose D90 over D300 is D90 and D80 are sharing the accessories, such as battery grip, IR remote control and SD memory card. So I can save some money since I don’t need to buy these accessories all over again.

Now, let’s compare the outlook of D90 & D80 see what are the differences in term of design. (Top is D90 & Bottom is D80)

Front:

Back:

Top:

In my opinion, the design doesn’t much especially the buttons location, except for the OK button now located in the center of the direction buttons. The most significant change is the 3″ LCD screen with better resolution and able to show your setting other than on top of the LCD panel.

Another interesting new feature of D90 is the Live View. When I first try, I felt very weird, holding the big DSLR in front of me doesn’t look nice. If you have chance, try this in front of mirror. However, during some situation while you want to shoot from unusual angle, it helps a lot. Therefore this is still a good feature with one drawback, slow auto focus in Live View mode.

For the Video Recording, I don’t have much comment, just like the video recording from any digital compact camera. It can shoot up to 1280×720 (HD) format. I found out one trick. If you start focus and shoot in widest end - 18mm, once you zoom further, let say 105mm, the camera unable to re-focus. So you will get blur video. However, if you focus and shoot in 105mm, but when you zoom to 18mm, everything still in focus. Hope Nikon will fix this in feature firmware release. You can see the resized test video below which I have uploaded to youtube or you can download the original full size (1280×720) video HERE (WARNING, BIG FILE SIZE - 77MB).

Active D-Lighting, is the most interested new feature in D90 compare to others. This feature automatically identifies highlight areas that will be lost, and does its best to bring them under control. Don’t understand? See the comparison below:

1. Below is the comparison with D80 and D90 with D-Lighting - OFF: (D90 auto white balance works much better than D80)

2. D90 D-Lighting - Off vs Auto

3. Below is comparison with different D-Lighting value. Low, Normal, High and Extra High.
From the photos above, you can see the Extra High can recover many details from the window bright area. However, I will only use Auto and let the camera to decide according to situation and I will just focus on composition or other more important setting.

Thanks to the newly designed Nikon DX-format CMOS image sensor - EXPEED with wide ISO sensitivity range with low noise, smooth tones, rich colors and fine details. The ISO3200 is definitely usable if you didn’t print bigger than A4 size. See the ISO comparison with D80 below.

1. Original photo with ISO3200 and the red box is test area with 100% cropped and re-size. Click the photo below to download the original full size photo (4.76MB)

That’s all about my mini review about Nikon D90. Now what I need to do is go out and shoot more!