Olympus E-420 vs Ricoh GR Digital III

Its time to take a closer look at the Olympus E-420 and Ricoh GR Digital III, former being a Entry-Level DSLR while the other is a Small Sensor Compact by rivals Olympus and Ricoh. The resolution of the E-420 (10MP) and the GR Digital III (10MP) is very comparable but the E-420 (Four Thirds) and GR Digital III (1/1.7") come with totally different sensor dimensions.

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The E-420 was manufactured 13 months prior to the GR Digital III making the cameras a generation apart from one another. Both cameras come with different body type with the Olympus E-420 being a Compact SLR camera and the Ricoh GR Digital III being a Compact camera.

Before getting through a thorough comparison, below is a short summation of how the E-420 scores versus the GR Digital III in relation to portability, imaging, features and an overall grade.

This is a sample of the gallery pics for Olympus E-420 & Ricoh GR Digital III. The entire galleries are viewable at Olympus E-420 Gallery & Ricoh GR Digital III Gallery.

If you're planning to lug around your camera regularly, you'll need to consider its weight and volume. The Olympus E-420 comes with external dimensions of 130mm x 91mm x 53mm (5.1" x 3.6" x 2.1") having a weight of 426 grams (0.94 lbs) and the Ricoh GR Digital III has sizing of 109mm x 59mm x 26mm (4.3" x 2.3" x 1.0") with a weight of 208 grams (0.46 lbs).

Compare the Olympus E-420 and Ricoh GR Digital III in our brand new Camera & Lens Size Comparison Tool.

Bear in mind, the weight of an ILC will change depending on the lens you have at that time. Following is the front view proportions comparison of the E-420 compared to the GR Digital III.

Looking at dimensions and weight, the portability score of the E-420 and GR Digital III is 77 and 92 respectively.

More often than not, it is difficult to visualise the contrast in sensor measurements purely by going through technical specs. The visual below will help give you a much better sense of the sensor sizes in the E-420 and GR Digital III.

As you have seen, the 2 cameras posses the exact same megapixels but not the same sensor measurements. The E-420 has got the larger sensor which will make obtaining shallow depth of field simpler. The older E-420 will be disadvantaged in sensor innovation.