Ummm...this is a Pentax forum, so I guess most of the answers would be biased towards Pentax. Consumer Reports gave thumbs up to the K200D based on performance, features, and value.
Beyond that, I would suggest that you spend some time to determine the kind of shooting you do and your needs as far as features are concerned. After that, try and find a retail outlet where you can actually handle the cameras that float to the top of your list. Camera handling is pretty important as is build quality. You might also want to tally up the system cost when you add in a few lenses.
For Pentax the short story is:
- Great build quality
- Moisture/Dust seals
- In-body shake reduction
- Good backwards compatibility to the used lens market
- Competitive pricing for bodies and lenses
- Better than average optical/build quality for consumer-level lenses
- Excellent optical/build quality for pro-level lenses
On the negative side:
- Fairly slow frames per second
- Few options for long glass
- Relatively poor image quality for in-camera JPEG using default settings (RAW, by comparison, is best in class)
Steve