Sony NEX-6 preview extended: high ISO comparisons dissapoint

I agree with the others, unless you plan to shoot JPG, it's best to compare the RAWs. I'd also add that it's better to download the RAWs yourself and process them, especially if the tests were run a while ago. Adobe's noise reduction has improved dramatically.

There's also the problem that not all ISOs are the same. At ISO3200, according to DXO's measurements, the EM-5 ISO is effectively ISO1489. The NEX-6 ISO is also lower than it should be at ISO3200, by about 1/3 of a stop.

To make the point, compare the NEX-7 to the X-Pro1 at ISO 6400, in RAW or JPG using DPR's tool. The X-Pro1 is in another league, and the NEX-7 chroma noise is pretty horrific. Hardly surprising since the NEX-7 is famously poor at high ISO, and the X-Pro1 is a legend in this department.

Now look at this image, not compared at the same ISO, but where both images were taken at 1/1000s f/8 (NEX@3200; XPRO1@6400). They were processed in the latest version of Lightroom with only luminance NR applied to the NEX-7 image to bring the noise down to a similar level to the X-Pro1 image.

The NEX-7 is no longer a chroma noise monster, and is resolving an amazing amount of detail in the halftone pattern for this ISO. This NEX Lightroom image is also far better than the NEX OOC JPG.



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"The only thing that gets in the way of a really good photograph, is the camera"
Norman Parkinson