striving: A couple of months ago I finally took the plunge and bought a Canon 30D and a Canon 24-105 F4 "L" lens. While I am very happy with the quality of the camera and lens, I must admit there was not as big of an improvement in photo quality as I was expecting (previous camera was a Canon S3).

What lenses you will need will depend on what you like to photograph. If you have only a few interests that can be covered with one lens, then your investment won't be that high. If, on the other hand, you will need a general purpose lens, a wide angle lens, and a tele-photo lens, flashes, etc, expect to spend a lot of money.

Personally, I am delaying the decision to buy more lenses and am debating selling my SLR to downgrade back to a pro-sumer model. Unfortunately, I am absolutely hooked on the quality, feel, and speed of the SLR.

As Gradient mentioned, SLR's are not for eveyone. If I buy one or two more lenses which I want to cover the zoom ranges that I like to shoot at, I will have at least $3500 invested in this setup. In my opinion, I don't think the price increase of the SLR+lenses setup is proportional to the increase in photo quality. Only you will be able to determine that for yourself based on your needs.

My favorite SLR features:

1. Autofocus speed
2. Quality and feel
3. Twisting the lens for zoom (instead of pushing a "zoom in" or "zoom out" button)
4. Saving files in the RAW format
5. Low noise at high ISO's
6. Manual focus ring on the lens

Dislikes:

1. Cost
2. LCD is for photo review/menu setup only, not as a viewfinder
3. Weight
4. Have to purchase and carry multiple lenses
5. Accessories are more expensive (and more of them)

Reasons for considering selling my SLR:

1. Portability of SLR+Lens+Accessories
2. Resell value - I would get most of my inital investment back
3. Additional lens costs if I kept the SLR

Matt