Nikon D40x Digital Camera with AF-S DX 18-55mm Lens

Having tried a friends Nikon D40x
I was hooked, my Olympus E10 is a nice bit of kit, but so slow to react and store or review photos.
The Nikon is so far fulfilling my expectations, with it's almost instant initiation, and it's point and shoot auto mode giving good results.
I have yet to explore all the functions available.
Another reason for buying was:
Having seen test pictures from Canon & Nikon lenses supplied as standard,the 18/55 that came with it appears to give a better result..
So far the pictures I have taken are very clean with good detail and faithful colour.
The large LCD gives excellent viewing of the captured photos,but I do fear it might be a bit prone to bumps and scratches, so I need to source a screen protection cover.
I like the auto flash that activates when the cameras decides, and the options are available to change it's mode of function..like almost everything else on the camera.
I prefer the auto focus to be set for the center sensor, leaving it to pick multi zone tends to pick up near objects off center, rendering the distant object as least important.
One minor niggle, nothing wrong with the camera..just Nikon's NEF format.
I would like to work with the raw files the 10 meg sensor gives. the option is available to store data as NEF, or various size JPEG's
Their supplied programs will read the format, but there are only minimal adjustments for the photos, it's not an editing suite.
My older Photoshop programs wont read NEF files, and so far I can't work on these files without having to reinvest in another editing suite.
But the JPEG option on the camera does give a good quality and small file, thankfully.. as I have requirements of a minimum pixel count of 2500 on the shortest side of the frame, and saved as JPEG..