With D800's popping into users' hands this week, a new common question seems to be flooding my In Box: is a D800 any more averse to hand holding than a D7000?
Short answer: no.
Nikon's technical paper on the D800--which warned about capture discipline--plus the comments of others, including some here on bythom, have scared a few potential D800 users. A few should be scared. You shouldn't be spending US$3000 for something to make casual photos with. You don't need a D800 for that, and you might find that you've chosen a bigger hammer than you're comfortable lifting if you approach photography casually. Most of the rest of us shouldn't be scared, at all.
But my D7000 versus D800 answer does need a bit more explaining. If you recall when the D7000 came out there were quite a few "it doesn't focus" comments. While I'd judge from the data I have that yes, D7000 bodies did seem to leave the factory with a bit less precision on focus tuning than some previous models, a lot of those "can't focus" comments were actually "not getting sharp images" comments. That's an important difference.
A few things have changed over the years, but some users didn't note the change. For example, the old 1/focal length rule of thumb for hand holding. On a 35mm film SLR with a 200mm lens, 1/200 or faster generally was a good starting point for getting sharp images handheld (assuming good technique). On a DX DSLR with a 200mm lens, you really should use 1/300 as the new rule of thumb. Moreover, as pixel densities go up, you might want to push that further.
While I don't want to get into complicated age arguments, I'd also point out that all those folk that remember hand-holding their N90s film SLR at 1/200 and getting sharp images probably can't do the same today. They just remember getting steady images at 1/200 and assume that nothing's changed. They've lost muscle mass and sometimes fine coordination, but that happened so slowly that they are probably wrong when they think they can still do what they did 30 years ago. I know I can't hold a camera as steady at 60 as I did at 30. I doubt you could, either.
As I noted at the time, the 12mp cameras needed a bit more attention to capture discipline than the 6mp cameras. Likewise, I noted that again with the 16mp D7000, and those moving from 6mp to 16mp got a double hit. As I've also explained (see my VR article), VR isn't a solution to every problem in terms of handling a camera, either. Throw in a bunch of auto settings that can make wrong decisions and a new autofocus system, and the D7000 was a challenge for some to master. Add cameras with a factory-tuned focus system that was a bit off, and there's no wonder we got a lot of complaints about sharpness.
All that said, the D800 has almost exactly the same pixel density as a D7000. If you can get sharp images with a D7000, you'll be able to do so with a D800, especially if we put the same lens on and just look at the central area of the frame, where all lenses perform best.
The notion some people have that the D800 can't be handheld is wrong. It can. It just takes the same level of technique that D7000 users have had to attain.