How come the GRD got such a lousy review at Dpreview? Was it the price? The photos here look fantastic!
In my opinion, the GRD3 gets lousy reviews on the big photo sites like DPReview because of the market it was thrown into. It's technically classified as a "Point and Shoot" although most of your generic consumers (moms, dads, grandparents, 8-year-olds, etc.) wouldn't know the difference between this camera and a Canon Elph. Except that this camera doesn't zoom.
They won't appreciate the special way this camera creates black and white images or the way it uses subtle but useful controls (MY settings, customizable buttons, etc.) to make this camera quick and easy for someone who will take the time to learn to use it.
Ricoh should remove the "Green-means-go" option from the control dial, replace it with a MY 4 and just have MY 1 - 4 as well as PASM on the control dial.
Also, DPReview and sites like it are expecting everything to have a big full-frame or medium format-sized sensor. Anything that doesn't gets knocked down a point or two automatically. No matter how good the camera is, if it uses a small sensor, it gets shunned by the DPR community.
They don't consider this to be a photographer's tool the way photographers consider it to be a tool. They look at how limited it is (no zoom, noisy, complicated to use, expensive accessories) and rather than harping on the camera's excellent points of interest, they tear it down with these negative points of interest.
Real photographers and people that know the Ricoh GR/D series love them and appreciate them for their abilities to create images in a unique style.
Grandma won't get it. And that is who DPR, BestBuy, Ritz/Wolf and Walmart cater to.
Ricoh really should be marketing this camera alongside the likes of the Sigma DP2, Leica X1 and Fuji X100 even though it's sensor is smaller, it's far more capable than your average "point and shoot" camera. Better even, in my opinion, than the Canon, Panasonic, Olympus and Nikon "advanced point and shoot" offerings.
It's a fixed lens camera with a specialized market and therefore shouldn't even try to compete with the zoom, HD video, dual mic recording and major branding of the other cameras.