what ppl need to understand is, there is a diminishing improvement as you bump up the megapixel count. the improvement in iso performance is most often thru the software, and slight improvements on the sensor design, but that doesn't go parallel with the megapixel improvement. think of it like a speaker.. more u wanna hear, more you bump the volume up.. but you get to a point where speakers aren't big enough (assuming u have a big enough amp). bumping up the volume will add nothing but more distortion (consider buzzing and distortion as the noise on your photos). u can come up with smarter box designs etc. even tho they will provide some improvement the real solution is bumping up the physical size of your speaker and going with something that can handle more power. well i hope that example made sense ..