Nikon has announced the Nikon D700. And there was much rejoicing in Nikonland. The D700 will be very similar to the Nikon D3, keeping the D3′s full frame (“DX” in Nikon terminology) 12.1 megapixel CMOS sensor. The body size is closer to the Nikon D300, though, making this a nice compact (in DSLR terms, of course) full-frame camera, smaller and lighter than the D3. It has a cheaper shutter than the D3, rated to 150,000 cycles instead of 300,000, only has one card slot, and doesn’t have the rear LCD info screen due to the smaller body size.

The usual bunch of features, 3″ high resolution LCD, live view, UDMA flash card support, HDMI output, etc. The viewfinder sounds especially nice and large compared to most other DSLRs.

And, right on time, DPReview has a hands-on preview of the D700. There’s not a whole lot of commentary, but if you want to see every menu on the camera and a whole lot of glamour shots, it’s worth a look.