Canon EOS Digital Rebel (EOS 300D (Body only)

CNET Editors' Rating

2.5 stars
    Overall score: 5.9 (2.5 stars)

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Average User Rating

174 reviews

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CNET Editors' Review

CNET Editors' Rating

2.5 stars OK
    Overall score: 5.9 (2.5 stars)
  • Design: 5.0
  • Features: 4.0
  • Performance: 6.0
  • Image quality: 7.0
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  • Released on:
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The good: Aggressive price; excellent, low-noise images; speedy performance; long battery life.

The bad: Can't save custom settings; limited metering options; continuous-shooting mode snaps a maximum of four shots.

The bottom line: A low price boosts the Canon EOS Digital Rebel's appeal for amateur film-SLR photographers going digital and high-end snapshooters who want to experiment more.

Review: It's tempting to think of Canon's EOS Digital Rebel (known outside the United States as the 300D) as a light version of the ... Expand full review
It's tempting to think of Canon's EOS Digital Rebel (known outside the United States as the 300D) as a light version of the EOS 10D. But luckily for consumers, the Rebel is more of a middleweight champion, delivering slightly scaled-back performance but similar high-quality, 6.3-megapixel images and most of the EOS 10D's capabilities. And like its pricier brother, the EOS Digital Rebel combines automatic functions--which enable almost anyone to use it right out of the box--with most of the shooting features serious amateurs want. But the Rebel does it all at the lowest price we've yet seen for an interchangeable-lens dSLR.

Editor's note: We have changed the rating in this review to reflect recent changes in our rating scale. Click here to find out more.

PowerShot G5 and Olympus's C-5050 Zoom offer enthusiasts more flexibility.

For instance, those cameras allow you to select metering modes like a grown-up, whereas the EOS Digital Rebel limits your options, as do its film siblings. In full manual mode, the Rebel uses center-weighted metering, which isn't an option in the other modes. For those, you automatically get evaluative (pattern) metering. If you're shooting in any of the nonautomatic modes, you push the exposure-lock button to switch to partial metering. Similarly, the EOS Digital Rebel decides whether to use the AI Servo or One-shot focus method. Furthermore, though you can save sets of image-adjustment parameters, you can't save custom combinations of settings for file format, shooting mode, ISO, white balance, and drive mode.

And of course, the EOS Digital Rebel entirely forgoes some of the capabilities of the 10D and other more expensive models, but we doubt potential users will miss them. For example, the camera doesn't support the TIFF format; ISO speed settings top off at 1,600 instead of 3,200; and you can't tweak white balance in degrees Kelvin, assign functions to buttons and dials, or change behaviors such as shot order and increments for exposure bracketing.

Average User Rating

3.5 stars out of 174 user reviews

Rating Breakdown

  • 5 star: 71
  • 4 star: 82
  • 3 star: 8
  • 2 star: 9
  • 1 star: 4

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Most Helpful User Review

4.0 stars 5 of 5 users found this review helpful

"Good Camera, bad for people who want pro quality due to lens" By

Pros This is a very cheap, affordable (pending where you buy it) digital camera. It has lots of features that allow it to be a Pro camera or a standard consumer camera. If you stay with the automatic feature it is easy to use and you will have great pics with

Cons The lens that is bought with it makes it a consumer camera, but if you buy your own SLR lens with more control with your focus then it becomes a professional camera.

Most Recent User Reviews (Showing 2 of 174 reviews)

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Specifications

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Quick Specs

  • Digital camera type: SLR
  • Product Type: Digital camera - SLR
  • Resolution: 6.3 megapixels

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