Nikon D40x Review: Affordable 10MP CCD Camera in 2024

Nikon introduced the D40x in 2007 as pretty much a base model in their lineup. It had a 10MP CCD sensor and it could shoot at three frames per second in continuous shooting.

Some people prefer cameras that have CCD sensors compared to cameras that have CMOS sensors.

No camera manufacturer makes cameras with CCD sensors today. That’s because the camera reads the signal from the sensor line by line. That doesn’t mean CCD sensors are inevitably slow, but they are inherently at a disadvantage.

CMOS cameras record all the micro-lenses on the sensor simultaneously, so that’s what camera manufacturers use today.

Let me put the speed of the Nikon D40x in context. Three frames per second is about as fast as a person blinks. If a person tried to blink fast continuously they would soon slow down. They would slow down because of lack of oxygen to the eye muscles.

But let’s say that a person can blink about three times in a second. I just tried it using the stopwatch on my phone and I can blink that fast.

My Canon R6 with its CMOS sensor. can shoot continuously at 12 frames per second with a mechanical shutter. And it can shoot at 20 frames per second silently with the electronic shutter. It can keep on going as well. It can shoot bursts of up to 240 RAW files (or over 1,000 JPEGs) before it slows down. It slows down while it clears the buffer. Then in a moment, it can start again.

And it can do all that while tracking a moving subject and adjusting focus and exposure.

If you think that’s fast, here are two really fast cameras. The Sony A9 II can shoot at 120 frames per second. The Canon R3 can shoot at 195 frames per second.

So the D40x is not a speed demon. So what has it got going for it in 2024? Well, it is cheap. You can pick up a body for £60 or thereabouts. And the cheap little Nikon AF-S 35mm f1.8 G is a sharp lens.

But the camera is only 10 megapixels. And it is an old sensor. It is old even if it is a CCD sensor that they say delivers a cleaner signal to the processor.

Judge for yourself with this photo of a woman that I saw today while walking around the city. The second photo is a crop of the first.

And yes, it is not as sharp and clear as I can shoot with my Canon .But it’s not bad, is it?