My local shop has the Asterist in stock now, I had a very brief look at it today. The thing is small and light. I think too small and too light. This teeney little camera body that is dwarfed by whatever lens you put on it. They had a 28-105 or some such on it, and it was so undersized compared to the lens it was silly. The operation was easy enough, though I disagree with Harold about the ease of using the control dial. I kept bumping my glasses with my thumb when operating the control dial with the camera at eye level. The way the camera is set up, the left hand is freed up to swill beer, while the right hand does all the work. Whether this is good or not, I don't know. I suppose it depends on how serious a drinker you are. I thought the auto focus was really noisy, and very annoyingly high pitched; to me, it sounds quite frenetic in operation. All in all, it seems like a nice enough camera for the market that it is targeted at. It certainly has enough features to keep anyone happy, provided they swing towards features over quality of feel as their primary motivator. It didn't instill much confidence in me as a tough and rugged camera.
William Robb
