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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Vespobuteo" data-source="post: 3603248" data-attributes="member: 120830">What really makes the difference for noise is the sensor area used (when about equal sensor tech). The contradiction is that larger pixels are better in low light but smaller pixels when it comes to DR (at low ISO). So it's hard to get both* if you don't have small and large pixels (like in the old Fujifilm S5). DR is still more than enough in all the pro Nikon cameras IMO. My experience is that at least 10 stops DR is what I usually need and will decide the max ISO I will tend to use on a camera.D500 have 10 stops DR at ISO3200, the D5 reaches ISO6400 and the D810 is more like ISO1600+ at 10 stops DR. My old D300s had OK DR at ISO400, but not above, so the replacement D500 is 2 stops better in that regard, which is significant and pretty amazing.Significant improvements in the sensor tech is not to be expected in the D850. 10 MP extra is not that much in resolution either.Also remember that effective resolution for many (or perhaps most) lenses will still be below 46 MP with a margin. With some very good lenses you might get slightly more effective resolution than with the D810. But you will also need perfect conditions and technique. 46MP will mostly mean a lot of redundant fuzzy pixels...personally I'm fine with 16-20MP, when they are sharp, It's enough for the most critical publication format, a full magazine spread (A3).Shallow DOF/bokeh is definitely a good reason for a FF camera, and also low light/high ISO performance. But how many really need 46MP?And the lenses are big and heavy on FF. Never been a big fan of DX but with the D500 it seems that it's more than capable for most use-cases. But it's hard to get everything in one camera. A baby D5 sounds very good (better AF, FPS etc) but the extra pixels I could have done without. *Check out Measurements -> Dynamic range here:<a href="https://www.dxomark.com/Cameras/Compare/Side-by-side/Nikon-D5-versus-Nikon-D500-versus-Nikon-D810___1062_1061_963" target="_blank">https://www.dxomark.com/Cameras/Compare/Side-by-side/Nikon-D5-versus-Nikon-D500-versus-Nikon-D810___1062_1061_963</a>The fact that D810 get a high score in "sports/low-light ISO" is because scaling down 36MP to for example 20MP is equal to noise reduction. Noise per pixel is higher in the D810 than in the D5 at higher ISO.</blockquote>

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