Nikon 16.2 Megapixels D5100 DSLR Camera Review by MacWorld With Rating 4/5

The Nikon D5100 ships in the US market from mid-April 2011, priced at around $800 body-only, or $900 in a bundle with the AF-S DX Zoom-NIKKOR 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR lens. Here's the summary of review by MacWorld, giving the camera a rating of 4 out of 5:

"The D5100 produces excellent still images, particularly when manual controls are used and the appropriate Picture Control settings are selected and tweaked. Natural-looking but well-saturated colors are the norm, and exposures, even under challenging conditions, are almost always accurate with good dynamic range. The latter is often made even better by implementing Nikon's D-Lighting. Even with the bump in megapixels from 12 to 16, the D5100 can easily handle the new, expanded ISO range without much strain, all the way up to ISO 1600. When in doubt, raw capture and processing will help keep image noise to a minimum and details intact. The AF-S 18-55mm VR lens bundled with the camera ($900 for the kit) is capable of producing surprisingly crisp images for a kit lens. Chromatic aberration was often visible, however, along high contrast edges. In our lab's subjective image tests, the D5100 earned a word score of Very Good for exposure, Good for both color and sharpness, and Superior for distortion. Click on any of our lab's test images to view them at full size. Video quality didn't disappoint either, producing footage that equals or exceeds that of other DSLRs in its class. In our subjective lab tests, the D5100 earned a word score of Good for video quality and Fair for audio quality. Colors were pleasing and videos were generally sharp-once the D5100's autofocus locked in. Shutter roll may occur when panning quickly but that's not unique to the D5100 and, overall, the camera produced some solid video. Audio quality is good and although we didn't have one to test, the ME-1 stereo microphone ($180) should be beneficial if you're serious about capturing live sound.

The Nikon D5100 is a solid option for photographers looking for a highly-capable yet (fairly) user-friendly sub-$1,000 DSLR. Although it doesn't have all the bells, whistles, and speed of the D7000, the D5100 delivers an excellent feature set and image quality that rivals or exceeds the competition. Current D5000 users may very well want to step-up to the new model thanks to a number of notable improvements. The D5100 is available body only for $800, or packaged with a kit 18-55mm lens for $900."