Melville, N.Y. — Olympus announced pricing today on its previously announced Evolt E-300 digital SLR, bringing the model, with lens, in at a suggested retail price of $1,399.
The company expects the estimated street price of the E-300 to be $999.99, placing it into contention with two other sub $1,000 d-SLRs: Canon’s Digital Rebel, the first to break the $1,000 price barrier, and Pentax’s *ist DS, announced in September.
Olympus’ 8-megapixel E-300 will ship in December.
Like the company’s existing E-1 d-SLR, the E-300 is based on the Four Thirds System developed by Kodak, Olympus and Fujifilm, among others, for a new generation of SLRs designed specifically for digital photography. Most d-SLRs on the market today rely on lenses developed for 35mm film SLRs and, as such, can deliver insufficient light at the edges of a digital camera’s image sensor, resulting in reduced sharpness and color definition, according to Olympus.
The 8-megapixel E-300 includes a compact Zuiko Digital 14–45mm lens (equivalent to 28–90mm in 35mm) for a 3.2x optical zoom. It features five scene-program modes and 15 select-scene program modes with descriptions on the LCD to guide a user through using the various modes.
The camera is compatible with a series of Zuiko Digital Specific accessories, including a 40-150mm f3.5 – f4.5 Lens for a suggested $349; the HLD-3 Battery Holder for a suggested $119.95; and a Semi Hard Case (CS3-SH) for a suggested $59.95.
