[Leica] What would you do with $200

[aaron.sandler at duke.edu (Aaron Sandler)]

Scott,

I'm working on a post with more experiences with and thoughts on the cam 
which may help...hopefully I'll have it done later tonight or tomorrow am.

The brief answer is: Yes the LX1 has noise at high iso and when 
underexposed at low iso.  No, I don't have noise reduction software yet, so 
I can't speak to that.

The word on the street is that the LX1 has both higher res and higher noise 
than the competition.  To me, this is consistent with a decision by 
panasonic to go for higher res at the expense of noise, figuring that noise 
reduction can always be done after the fact, while lost resolution is 
tougher to recover.  If that's true, I appreciate them leaving it up to 
me!  We will see.

At this point I couldn't recommend it for anything above iso 80 if you're 
bothered by noise...if I get noise ninja or neatimage and they work well, I 
may amend that rec, but it's too early.

I believe the Leica shares all hardware, but may or may not have 
differences in the in-camera software.  But that's not on particularly good 
authority...maybe when the tests on the Leica version come out.

Best,
Aaron

>Aaron, on the DP Review site for the LX1 they really knock the sensor on 
>this camera for any shooting over 100 ASA. Are you finding that you need 
>to use software to clean up the digital noise or have you had a chance to 
>check that out yet. I wondered if the Leica sensor and innards are the 
>same!!!
>
>Thanks,
>Scott