Assuming that your lenses are Maxxum (Dynax) lenses (A-mount), then the recently
released 6 MPix Maxxum (Dynax) 7D fits the bill perfectly
(If your lenses are MC/MD then you are SOL).

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/specs/Konica_Minolta/konicaminolta_7d.asp

This camera boasts anti-shake, a large LCD monitor and rugged construction.

US$1600 is the current price, but it is listed on the Dell website at $1359.
There is also a $150 rebate applicable to further lens purchases.

Cheers,
Alan

H.,

I was in exactly the same position about two years ago.

Again, my advice won't apply unless you have the same lenses that I
started with (your letter isn't specific about your lens format).
Since you've been collecting lenses for 20 years, and the first
Minolta autofocus Maxxum came out in 1985 or '86, perhaps these AF
lenses are what you have.

As the owner of a Minolta 7xi, there was only one choice for digital
bodies that would go with my assortment of Maxxum auto-focus lenses.
That was the RD-175, a digital camera with about a 1.75 megapixel
image size (pretty small by today's standards).  When new, the camera
was about $5,000 (here in Canada, anyway) and featured some extremely
advanced design elements (like the use of three separate CCD sensors
and a computer chip to stitch the final image from this composite).

In its defence, I must say that the image quality is surprisingly
good!  This is due to a couple of things.  First, the digital
circuitry does a great job of preserving the image and recording it
faithfully.  Second, Minolta lenses are fantastic, and no CCD or CMOS
can ever compensate for a bad initial image coming from an inferior
lens.

Anyway, my particular path toward digital photography took a bit of a
detour, because while looking for a good used RD-175, I stumbled
across a good used RD3000.  This was the new Minolta digital that came
out about five years after the first.  I bought the RD3000 thinking
I'd never actually find my RD-175, but then I found the RD-175 for
sale THE SAME DAY and bought it, too.  Life is what happens when
you've made other plans.

So I now have a digital that uses my previous Maxxum AF lenses
(Minolta 50mm macro, Tamron 28-70mm, Tamron 70-210mm, Minolta xi
100-300mm, Sigma 400mm) and flash (Minolta 5400HS), but I've also had
to buy new lenses for the RD3000!  It takes Dimage lenses that were
intended for the smaller-format (APS film) Vectic cameras.  The
smaller lenses work well for digital, since the CCD/CMOS area of a
digital is MUCH smaller than the film area of a regular camera.

And this is an important point, because when you use "regular" lenses
on a digital body, the digital image sensor will only be recording a
small rectangular section out of the middle of the image that the lens
is producing.  In other words, you will get an instant magnification
factor with this arrangement.  A 70-210mm lens will behave like a
100-300mm lens (for example, and depending on the level of
magnification between your lens and the camera's sensor).  I believe
that my RD3000 provides about 25% of magnification, and that the
RD-175 might providing as much as 40% or so -- though I think the body
incorporates a sub-lens arrangement between the lens mount and the
sensor that somewhat corrects for this.  I can't recall at the moment.

I'm afraid that, having spent my camera budget for the next five years
already, I have done no research into Minolta's newer models and
cannot provide any advice beyond the RD-175 and RD3000 models.

And if you can't find a suitable body, and need to sell your lenses --
hey, what lenses have you got???  Heh heh.

Good luck.

Hamilton D.