I got some good price quotes on this camera and am considering getting my wife a Leica she has 2 Nikons,Cannon, Minolta, as well as a slew of vintage cameras. All of them are 35m except for a Nikon S9 pocket camera for on the go with my kids. She always says that the Leica's are Lengendary and well I want to get her a SLR style. She is a professional photographer and worked with film most of her life and is now getting into digital. Some say that it's the same camera as the Panasonic DMC-FZ50 but I think the Leica will hold it's value more then the Panasonic. Any comments.

IMO your best choice is still the M8 – it is a continuation of the M series that began in 1954. Classic.

Leica really hasn't been Leica since the mid 1970's when it bought cameras from Minolta. The Minolta XE-7 was modified by Minolta with a Leica lens mount and metering system and sold as the Leica R-3. Later, the Minolta XD-11 underwent the same transformation and became the Leica R-4 & R-5.