. . . . or rather has it improved in line with sensor sizes ?
I've recently been working on a slideshow project which has involved processing some images from as far back as 2006. Many of the images have not been looked at for some considerable time, but I have been pleasantly surprised at the quality.
To show what I mean, below is an image which I took on a Canon EOS 30D DSLR which had an 8.2 megapixel sensor.
I suppose any answer will depend on what we want to, or need to do with our images. For use online or in a slideshow using a resolution of 72 or 96ppi will obviously suffice. However, printing images at bigger sizes, say A3 or A2, at 300ppi, then we probably need bigger files created by a bigger sensor. But then again, I have produced good / excellent quality A3 prints from files from the Canon EOS 30D, and also my Canon EOS 50D with a 15.1 mp sensor.
It's certainly made me think.