Review: Canon EOS Digital Rebel XT Camera

Ben Long

Canon’s original EOS Digital Rebel, released almost two years ago, was notable for several reasons. It was the first digital single-lens reflex (or SLR) camera with interchangeable lenses priced under $1,000; it introduced Canon’s EF-S lens mount, which allowed for smaller, lighter lenses more appropriate to a digital SLR; and most importantly, it delivered image quality identical to Canon’s mid-range, more expensive EOS 10D. Now Canon has finally released the first upgrade to the Rebel, called the EOS Digital Rebel XT.
Just as the original Rebel was a scaled-down version of the EOS 10D, the Rebel XT uses the same sensor and image processing hardware as Canon’s current mid-range offering, the EOS 20D. That means resolution has increased to 8 megapixels. (The original was 6MP.) Canon could have chosen to drop the 20Ds 8-megapixel sensor and guts into the old Rebel body, but instead decided to completely re-design the camera to produce a much lighter, substantially smaller Rebel. The result is a camera that offers high-end quality at only $899 for the body ($999 for the body and an EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 zoom lens).
Smaller Size, Lighter Weight
I was surprised by how much smaller the Rebel XT is than the original Rebel. While just a little shorter than its predecessor, the camera is substantially more narrow, especially on the left side. At 17.1 ounces, the camera weighs in about 4 ounces less than the previous Rebel and 7.1 ounces lighter than the EOS 20D.

The new Rebel XT has slimmed down.

 
Weight is a tricky issue when it comes to digital cameras. A lighter camera means less to lug, especially when you add two or three lenses. But a lighter camera can also be harder to stabilize, making for trickier shooting. Though the XT has gone on a diet, it’s not too light, and it has a good balance even when fitted with a large lens.

The Rebel XT is on the left. The 20D looms to the right.

 
While the lighter weight is good news, the XT’s smaller size is more of a liability. To make the camera narrower, Canon squished the hand grip closer to the lens barrel, leaving little space for the fingers of your right hand. Any handling of the camera — picking it up, changing lenses, passing it from hand to hand — feels more difficult, less comfortable, and less secure than with the older, larger Rebel, because it’s harder to get your fingers wrapped around the grip. If you regularly shoot in climates cold enough to warrant gloves, take your gloves to the camera store and try shooting with camera before buying.
Space is also a little compromised on the left side of the camera. You can no longer rest the left side of the camera against your palm, making for further stability problems.
Obviously, questions of size are subjective. For my hands, the XT is too small for comfortable, stable shooting, but you should get your own hands on one before making a final decision.
Buttons Better, LCD Lacking
The Rebel XT’s interface remains true to the spirit of the original Rebel controls, even though some buttons have been moved and reorganized. There are very few direct controls — buttons on the camera that let you directly alter a parameter. Rather, you change almost all of the XT’s parameters by pressing a button that takes you into a menu displayed on the camera’s 1.8″ rear-mounted LCD screen.
On the back of the XT, four buttons in a circle provide access to ISO, autofocus mode, white balance, and metering mode. Press any and you’re taken immediately into the appropriate spot on the menuing system. Once there, you can select from the menu by pressing the rear buttons or by using the control wheel on top of the camera. An additional button lets you change the Drive mode of the camera without going into the menuing system.
Positioned immediately above the color LCD is the camera’s LCD status display, which shows all current shooting parameters. This is the same configuration as the original Rebel, and the status display is well-organized and easy to read in bright light.
Nevertheless, I prefer a top-mounted status display — something not possible on the XT due to its small size — because it makes it easier to check out the camera when it’s hanging around your neck or sitting in your lap.
As with its predecessor and the rest of the Canon SLR line, you can use the XT’s control wheel behind the shutter release to automatically cycle through all reciprocal exposure settings, after you’ve metered. If you press the Av button on the back of the camera, the wheel becomes an exposure compensation control. With these two controls, you can achieve most of the manual override that you need, without changing out of Program shooting mode and without taking your eye from the viewfinder. This streamlined functionality is one of the reasons that shooting with Canon SLRs is so enjoyable.
The Rebel XT’s color LCD screen, on the other hand, is not so well designed. Though fine for reviewing images, reading menus on the XT’s screen is extremely difficult when you’re in direct sunlight. On the 20D, the entire array of menu options is in a single list that you can quickly scroll through with the camera’s rear-mounted wheel. On the XT, the list is divided into a series of tabbed pages. You can use the Jump button to switch between tabs, but the items on that particular page don’t light up until you scroll down into them, so it’s difficult to know what’s on each page until you try to select one of its items.
Eventually, you’ll learn where everything is without having to look. Until then, the menu system is frustrating for outdoor shooting.
Powerful Processor and Other Welcome Changes
The original Rebel had a scaled-down selection of the EOS 10D’s feature set. Many important 10D features, such as flash exposure compensation, were deactivated on the Rebel. (Thanks to some clever hacks, it is possible to re-activate these features, though it will void your warranty and, if Canon had its way, cause hair to grow on your palms.) The Rebel XT is not so hobbled, offering an almost identical feature set to the 20D, without requiring any scary firmware hacking.
The resolution increase from 6 to 8 megapixels is certainly welcome, but what is possibly more important is the camera’s substantial boost in processing power. Where the original Rebel takes around 1.5 to 2 seconds to boot up or wake from sleep, the XT boots and wakes seemingly instantaneously, meaning you won’t miss any shots while the camera was busy pulling itself together.
The faster processing also has practical implications when shooting. Though the original Rebel has a generous buffer and good write times, the menu system is inaccessible while the camera writes to its flash card. This means that once you’ve shot a burst of images, you can’t change the camera’s settings until that burst is done writing, making it impossible to shoot a series of images with one setting, then prepare an additional setting while the camera processes.
With the XT, there’s no such hang-up. You can, for example, select an auto-bracketing setting, put the camera into drive mode, rattle off three images, then immediately pop open the menu and change your bracketing settings while the camera finishes writing. By the time you’ve made your change and got the camera back up to your eye, the XT will probably have finished its write.
Canon has increased the size of the Rebel XT’s buffer, resulting in a camera that can shoot approximately eight high-quality JPEGs in a burst before slowing down. (If you opt for faster media, that number will go up.) In raw mode, the camera can manage about five frames before slowing. However, like the 20D, the XT does an excellent job of offloading images quickly, meaning you can be back up to full speed in just a few seconds.
Though the XT’s burst rate is slightly improved over the Rebel, it still clocks in around three frames per second.
Other notable new features include:

• A true Raw+JPEG mode which writes out separate Raw and JPEG files
• New custom functions that allow you to program the Set button on the back of the camera, just like the 20D
• Selectable long-exposure noise reduction, which performs an on-the-fly dark frame subtraction
• The option to switch the 35-zone flash metering system between evaluative, and centerweight.

The Rebel XT offers an excellent feature set for a camera at any price point. The fact that it’s priced under $1,000 makes its lengthy list of capabilities even more impressive.
Excellent Image Quality (Yawn)
It’s kind of sad, really. When it comes to image quality, Canon has set the bar so high that there’s no real surprise about the XT’s output. It’s great. (The truly newsworthy event would be if Canon released an EOS camera with lousy image quality.)
Seemingly identical to the 20D’s image quality (though 48 x 36 pixels smaller), the XT excels in all shooting situations. With an ISO range of 100 to 1600, it lacks the 20D’s additional 3200 ISO, but delivers images with even less noise than the original Rebel. With the XT, shooting at 1600 ISO delivers noise roughly equivalent to what the original Rebel would deliver at 800.
The XT offers the same Contrast, Sharpness, Saturation, and Color Tone settings as the 20D, enabling you to tweak the camera’s JPEG performance to your taste.
The XT’s image quality outperforms all of its competition in this price range, including the Olympus Evolt E300 and the Pentax *istDS.
Which Camera Gets the Nod?
My ideal Rebel upgrade would have been the XT guts inside the original Rebel body. Although the lighter weight has its benefits, I prefer a slightly larger camera. Note, however, that I said “prefer.” My size complaints are not a deal-breaker, because they’re worth overcoming in exchange for the camera’s zippy performance and excellent image quality.
The original Rebel is still available, at least for now, and the price has dropped to $799. Both cameras accept the full line of Canon lenses, including the new EF-S lenses. Both cameras deliver excellent image quality, though the XT images have slightly higher resolutions and a slightly less noise in low light.
If you’re shopping for an entry-level SLR, you may be tempted to save money by going with the original Rebel. I recommend you buy the XT instead. The performance improvements in the XT are definitely worth $100 and the hassle cause by a smaller camera body. Speedy startup, and the lack of lock-up during writing, means you’ll have a much smoother workflow when shooting.
If you’re trying to choose between the Rebel XT and the Canon EOS 20D, you can find more food for thought on my Web site, Complete Digital Photography. But there’s no getting around the extra cash you’d have to lay out for the 20D: $500.
As with its predecessor, the groundbreaking Rebel, the Rebel XT delivers the best price/performance camera value I know of.