A Green Label Each Day

I use a point and shoot camera. An Olympus Stylus 760 if you wanted to know. It has traveled thousands and thousands of miles by plane, train, car, truck, bus, bike, foot, and sea (most important). Its about 3 years old now but I use it all the time. Go figure right? I have wanted to upgrade to an SLR for a long time, but its hard to come up with $750.00 for a camera. At some point (I hope in the next couple months) I am going to snag one.


I looked at Nikon again today. Models are changing and the cameras I was interested in are no longer available. My two real options (with Nikon anyway) are the D3000 and D5000. Both offer great features and are very similar. The 3000 is a couple hundred bucks cheaper, but is missing some cool stuff. One upside to the 5000, it has HD Video. While, I don't take a lot of videos, I do take a handful. The ones I do take, I wish were MUCH better quality. The 5000 also has a higher megapixel count (I know I know, I have heard the pixel argument), live view, and is only slightly larger than the 3000. 


At the point of buying a SLR... Is the higher price worth it?


Do any of you have either camera? Likes, dislikes, complete hatreds? 


There is a poll on the side bar about camera brands. What about cameras other than Nikon? Any first hand experience?