The D50 is Nikon's entry level digital SLR, and is up against hot competition in the £500 - £600 price bracket, at the time of writing, it can be found for under £500 in some places. It's at a price range where it's likely to appeal to photographers progressing from point-and-shoot digital cameras, or from film SLRs. So, what do you get for your money?

What's in the box? Well, for one thing, the box may not necessarily include a lens. Nikon package this in two options, either bundled with an 18-55mm lens (approximately 3x zoom), or just as a body, in which case you'll need to find a lens. This last option is likely to be popular with owners of Nikon film SLRs, as the lenses are interchangeable.

The battery needs to be charged for two hours from it's completely flat state. These two hours can be spent either reading your manual, or idly sitting around pressing buttons and wondering what they all do. Fortunately, charging the battery isn't something that needs to be done all that often as you can get many hundreds of shots, even using the flash, off one charge. Once the battery is charged and the memory card inserted, it's time for a play.

Something which is very different about the D50 compared to a compact camera is that you cannot set up your shot using the screen on the back. This is due to the fundamental design of SLR cameras, you will have to use the viewfinder. At the bottom of the viewfinder, various settings are displayed, but more on these later.

Pushing the shutter release half way makes the camera focus the shot you're lining up; this is normally a very quick operation, although in poor light it can take a bit longer. There is a small light to one side of the lens to assist with the autofocus in dark conditions, though. Once the focus has locked on, photo taking is extremly quick. It is possible to set the camera up to shoot continuously, and it will do so at (according to Nikon) 2.5 shots per second. Experimentation with this has shown it to be quite handy for moving objects, especially birds and other wildlife. The shutter noise is unobtrusive, and apart from this, the only other noise is the occasional beep to let you know the autofocus has done it's job. The autofocus beep can be disabled if required; there is an indicator in the viewfinder telling you when it has locked on. Should the autofocus fail to do it's job, manual focussing is a fairly simple operation.

Plugging the supplied USB lead into a computer running Windows XP results in the camera showing up immediately as an extra drive so that images can just be taken straight off the camera with no fuss. Some people may prefer a separate card reader, which can be bought for under £10 from some online retailers. Nikon provide software with the camera to manage the photos, but I have found it awkward to install and use and have pretty much avoided it.

Working up through 400 and 800iso, the noise is also unobtrusive. At 1600iso, the fastest setting the camera offers, the noise is much more apparent, but by no means a huge issue. Generally 1600iso would only be used for capturing action or working in very low light, so it's certainly not going to be a problem for most.

There are very few things that I can think of that I'd mark this camera down on. I'd quite like it to go right down to 100iso, but this seems to be missing on many of the cameras in this price range. Also there is no depth of field preview to check on how much of your frame will be in focus, but unlike a film SLR this isn't so essential as you can quickly check after the shot and retake it with a different aperture if you don't get the results you like.

Naturally, the D50 isn't going to appeal to the vast majority of amateur shooters who merely want a camera for the odd snap. For the more creative amateur photographers who may be looking at a high-end compact camera, this may well be worthwhile looking at as an alternative, although the size compared to a compact may well put them off. For anyone who wants a sub-£500 DSLR, then in my opinion at least, choosing the D50 is a no-brainer.