On YLovePhoto, you will find a commentary drawing a relation between the possible future Nikon D800 and the other possible replacement of the existing Nikon D700: Nikon D800 instead of D700s?

• Nikon D3 sensor: Full Frame, 12 MP
• Dust cleaning on the sensor
• 200-6400ISO
• From 1/8000s to 30s (flash synchro at 1/250s)
• 5 frames/seconde (8fps with MB-D10)
• Virtual horizon?
• Viewfinder a little more limited than on the D3, with 95% field coverage
• Integrated flash, NG11
• Batteries: EN-EL3e
• Compact Flash cards
• Weight: 1076g
• Price: 2599€ (about the price I estimated previously, but for the more expensive end of the FF market)

Source: An email from a German Internet user.

French magazine Chasseur d’Image went to the extreme of reporting about it “as a rumour confirming the information they already have”.

And a Nikon representative said that the manual pages that were used to base the disclosure were taken from the printing agency in charge of producing the actual manuals.

We will not get more, but it seems that 99% of what was told about the Nikon D700 is true. But, possibly, the name of the D700 will be actually Nikon D700 FX to clearly reflect the presence of the Full Frame sensor in a near-D300 body.

The Nikon D700 would be, according to Nikon Rumours [1], a Full Frame D-SLR with a 12.1 mega-pixel sensor taken from the Nikon D3. This means that instead of pushing the resolution, Nikon decidedly wants to keep focusing on image quality with big pixels able to collect as much light as possible. So, this is quite normally leading to the maximum sensitivity of 6400 ISO (and even 25600 ISO in extended Hi2 mode). If the D3 is representative of the result on the D700, the images will be absolutely superbly stunning – and the image management is in 16-bits after a 14-bit A/D conversion.

Interestingly, the camera would be able to use the DX lenses (obviously cutting the image down to a limited frame siwe, which is still a very good solution to use existing cheap lenses; But the buyer of such a beast will probably be willing to attach much more serious glass).

Apart from that, this is really a high-end camera product: 51-zone Auto-Focus (incl. 15 cross-type) coming from the Nikon D3 (this is going to be a competition-ready type of AF), light metering with a 1005-pixel matrix, Flash system borrowed from the D3. On the opposite, there would be a LiveView mode integrated with a contrast detection AF.

Unfortunately, the images are still lacking (remember, this is not confirmed by Nikon) and nobody seems to have the camera (or the NDAs are very tight). However, NR tells us that the price would be $2999. Still expensive (too much for me anyway, even if I was not equipped with Sony), but this “baby D3” is announcing the Full Frame for all…