Wow! Pro quality for an affordable price!

I've been doing film photography for over 30 years (both taking and teaching), so it was hard for me to switch to digital. Even though I'm quite technical, I can get overwhelmed by all the menu options, for example. After much research, I decided to get the Olympus E-510 as soon as it came out. The main reason was the price, as I have two kids in college so money is tight. I got the 2-lens kit for $960. WOW! I think this might be the best camera on the planet for less than $1000!! I was concerned that the kit lenses were "slow" (i.e. their maximum aperture settings were not very large), but the image stabilization system *more* than make up for that. We've been out looking for a new house to move into, and it was my job to document each house quickly for us to refer back to later. I had to shoot in dark room, bright room, large rooms, etc. I was able to quickly select menu options for the right lighting, as well as the custom programs for some situations that were really odd. I could shoot an entire house, inside and out, top to bottom (about 50 pictures), in less than 15 minutes. Some lighting situations were so odd, I had to shoot in RAW format and use PhotoMatix software to bring out the details. Very nice results!! There were times when the camera couldn't determine focus, white balance, etc., so the shutter lag seemed to go on forever. However, I found that pressing the shutter halfway down while pointing to a high-contrast portion of the room, the camera locked quickly so I could re-compose the shot and press the shutter the rest of the way down for an immediate shot. Also, I had to re-take some shots because the flash went back to its default setting whenever I powered back up. I got used to it after awhile, but I would prefer the flash setting stay the way I set it. But some people might consider this a good thing if they want to always power-up to a common place.