Phil's A100 review up - Highly Recommended!

Phil might have been thinking of us poor folks that are vacillating back and forth about which to buy for our next camera...DSC R1...Sony A 100...

Thanks Phil for the review. DPreivew continues to amaze me with the amount of information available.

Again...thanks.

Cheng Bao said:

according to some user report, the SSS did improved over KM AS
greatly, at least I didn't see any report that SSS is worse than
AS, although Phil's review didn't show the improved.

Furthemore, from those reports, against common misunderstand, in
body AS/SSS actually works well on long focal, they are more
effective on long focal than wide angle.

Click to expand...

Any links to any of them?

lhk

Timothy S Broadley said:

First I hope Mr Synder will not mind me referencing his site:

http://www.mountevans.com/a100/MTE-MarmotAtLunch01.HTML

for a look at SSS witha long focal length lens ona A100 no less

Click to expand...

This is done with a window mount (equivalent to a tripod or better), so it doesn't really say anything about the effectiveness of SSS.

lhk

I suppose. I really don't know how one gets stuck in the R1 verses A100 spot. Not an issue of review, they are simply fundamentally different cameras in just about every way, I would think ones needs/wants would point one way or another fast and make it an issue of R1 verses other P&S, or A100 verses other SLR.

Still, what you say could be a reason.

I'd suspect it was mainly he just wanted another Sony camera to compare to. Since typically when a new model comes out to replace an old, he compares that. Sony doesn't have anything they are replacing.

I sorta think it would have been good to look at it as the A100 replacing the 5D, which it does, even if it's a different brand now.

Yes, it's old. But old isn't bad. It's a proven system that has served well.

Also a in-lens system is still mechanical. There is a motor and movement in there someplace no matter what you do, thus mechanical.

I have a few example with the KM Anti-shake at my web page if you don't mind my poor skills. All taken handheld. Look at the Album titled "Latest".

http://www.woeiming.com

rvogie said:

Noise Ninja allows you to make your own A100 profile-real simple.
Great solution for high ISO noise.

Click to expand...

And Noise Ninja is included in Bibble... I don't think that Bibble can
read the A100 RAW images yet, but they more than likely will.

It would be prudent for Sony to be in contact with the
Bibble creators, since it is an up and coming RAW file reader.

--
Gil
Sardis, BC
Canada

after reading the review..

I think the A-100, the SAL 16-80 mm F3.5-4.5 Carl Zeiss, 5600 flash, 2 batteries, 2x CF card would be a nice start of my DSLR adventure

Sorry David but you're wrong, the Nikkor F1.8 at that aperture is just as sharp, we're only talking about 10mp here, both those lenses will be good for twice that or more.

David Kilpatrick said:

Bulb said:

I wonder why he chose the 50mm lens instead of the kit lens for two
of the comparision tests...

since Sony also has a 18-70 lens...

why not mount the D200 with Nikkor 18-70mm lens as well...

Click to expand...

Because this is Phil's standard method. He uses the 50mm f1.4 for
all makes if available.

Hate to say it, but the high resolution figure compared to the
Nikon D200 is probably nothing to do with the camera. He has ended
up testing the lens instead. If there was any way you could fit a
50mm f1.4 Minolta to the Nikon, it would probably match the figures!

David

Click to expand...

--
Phil Askey
Editor / Owner, dpreview.com

buddythedog said:

jonny1976 said:

pitaw said:

Hmmm...noisy on iso 800 & iso 1600...

Click to expand...

yes but much more detail than canon 30d..see the bailey's
crop...for me you can shot iso 1600 and then use noise ninja and
have the same results than canon 30 d at iso 1600...you can
reproduce more detail if they are not there, but you an conrol
noise if it's there.
it's a great review for me, and the only con i can see is noise,
the other for me are more con added than real con, sorry phil but i
think this. great review but it seems to me that the cons are a
little bit stretched.
In the conclusion ihaven't read a clear judgement about Af
improvement, but it seems it's improved on behalf the minolta 7 and
5d

--
http://www.pbase.com/jon1976

Click to expand...

so, it's a wash but I prefer not to do excessive pp if one needs to
use high iso often.

Click to expand...

digital require pp. A lot of pp? I have bought noise ninja pro bundle for 70$. He has action and a batch command for cleaning bunch of images fastly.

I'm very curious to compare images of 30d out of the camera and images Of SONY ALPHA AT ISO 1600 with noise ninja. For me they will be very similar. If you look at the comparision in the review you can see clearly that sony keep more details.

My point is that at iso 100-400 these detail will be there, letting people crop and print bigger, at high iso you can clean the images.

THis is a compromise but for the most of photographers, mostly the ones thst shoot landscape, travelling, portrait,. macro ...it's better...fo those that want the best performance at olowlight straight out of the cam they need a canon with less detail but more clean images.

--
http://www.pbase.com/jon1976

Nothing has stopped us from telling A100 is such a good camera.
--
Mark K

Sorry boys but in Phil review i see noise on iso 400....where?? here --> http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/sonydslra100/page22.asp

another aspect is super steady shot --> Phil said it in his review that

"In our tests we observed a two stop shutter speed advantage using Super SteadyShot, which is good but not quite up to the 3.5 stops claimed. I'm also still not convinced that the 'hit rate' of sharp images is as good as a lens based optical stabilization system.
"

besides

• LCD anti-reflective coating becomes smeared with marks easily
• Power on not absolutely instant (just over a second)
• High sensitivity noise at ISO 800 and 1600
• Occasional Multi-segment metering under-exposure

and much much more very important things...

i saw his gallery and every picture on full resolution is blurry even he used good lens...so i think that 10 mp and 6mp isn't big difference...the test shots don't show it becouse it was made from very small distance...=)

So be happy if u want but i think it's smile by tears and your wish =)

in the shadow you'll see a little noise also at iso 200....the camera is very good....my 7d is tested for 2,5 stop of as..it's very strange that the sony has lower capacity of sss.

Noise is your obsession, so you problem. Again apart from noise look at the details and color. In both case canon 30 d is a loser. Have u seen the magenta and red produced by canon? Terrible.
A lot of other con?

You are not considering that this camera is 800 euro and half the price of niokon and a lot less than canon.
YOu should be more objective.

I'll bet you are a nikon fan with a beautiful d50!!!
--
http://www.pbase.com/jon1976

a little research and i saw u use d50.

Ok i understand you, one dial, no as , no antidust, no grip ( as a100), ridicolous viewfinder, plastic body ( as a100 but bulkier), less less less less detail, no antidust, no dynamic range, leaa battery capacity, worst lcd screen...yes better noise at iso 1600..)))))
i'll bet that a cleaned alpha iso 1600 will win hands down.
--
http://www.pbase.com/jon1976

Thanks Phil.
Now we know -- A100 -- we have a fairly respectable new camera out there.

===
Tom Pariz

jonny1976 said:

a little research and i saw u use d50.
Ok i understand you, one dial, no as , no antidust, no grip ( as
a100), ridicolous viewfinder, plastic body ( as a100 but bulkier),
less less less less detail, no antidust, no dynamic range, leaa
battery capacity, worst lcd screen...yes better noise at iso
1600..)))))
i'll bet that a cleaned alpha iso 1600 will win hands down.
--
http://www.pbase.com/jon1976

Click to expand...

now now no need to kick so hard!

Being fair the D50 is a decent camera. Its not really fair to compare the two as the A100 is a lot newer.

I can see both sides of the argument. Its clear for some the extra res is worth it..and they will be very happy. Its also fair to say that shooters who on a regular basis go to ISO 800.1600 would be better served with something else.

You cant have it both ways...not at the moment anyway!
--

i answered a little hard cause the posters in 10 days has said the same thing 1 thousand time...that somebody has a d50 it's no problem, but that the same people try to convince the world that d50 is better than alpha 100, that has the same image quality of d200 and a bunch of feature the d50 hasn't, that's only a lack of objectivenees.
--
http://www.pbase.com/jon1976

Phil's review was great except for one of his Cons - No dedicated control panel LCD means reliance on the main LCD.

Oddly enough, this wasn't a Con on Phil's 7D review. Instead, he wrote -

"It's worth noting that the 7D doesn't have 'control panel' LCD displays, instead it uses the LCD monitor to provide a virtual 'control panel' which summarizes virtually all of the camera's current settings. There are three recording display modes available; full, basic and off. This 'Recording mode display' intelligently rotates itself based on the current orientation of the camera (clever)."

I don't understand why it's become a negative issue now.

I appreciate the considerable effort that Mr. Askey has put into his review of the Alpha 100 and am grateful that his review was so prompt, putting to bed all the idle speculation about what he might say about the camera.

Based on Phil's Alpha 100 review - "the A100 is a very capable camera with a wide feature set, a good range of manual controls and some unique developments" - I feel reassured in waiting for the next higher model from Sony.

OK I'm a little late to the party but I would like to congratulate Phil for a detailed & balanced review. Shame he didn't include the 5D in the comparisons but I assume that he thought that wasn't worthwhile as the 5D has been discontinued.

It's quite revealing that he thought it correct to compare the A100 with the more expensive Nikon R200 & Canon 30D ( & Sony R-1 !!) That is down to the fact that the A100 is priced higher than current entry level DSLRs but of course it has already dropped in initial asking price & will drop further after the first wave of sales has finished. In any event it makes the choice for the new DSLR user easier - the A100 wins hands down. By the time any new user starts to get frustrated by any limitations they will be ready to move up to the next model.

Phil has managed to put the noise issue into perspective - Yes it has noise at ISO 800 & worse at ISO 1600 but his examples in tight crops & actual full frame photos are not nearly as bad as some others which have been posted here. He fairly pointed out that the small minority who regularly shoot in low light might be better served by other cameras.

Those who shoot the occasional low light photo & are prepared to use noise reduction before printing will find themselves agreeably surprised by the quality of their prints. There is some trade-off going on here because the A100 clearly has higher resolution due to its 10MP sensor.

Like another poster I thought that some of the 'con' comments were a bit 'padded' but to be fair they are the type of comment that others do make. The loss of the top-plate LCD is no loss to me. I was used to it from using the Minolta 7i & can honestly say that I never missed it in the 5D. The LCD display is well laid out & large & clear. Some of the perceived drawbacks are because people are very familiar with their present cameras & anything new is initially often seen as different & awkward.

The colour charts give the lie to many comments which criticise the A100s colour reproduction. Colour is good & can be boosted even further by those who like 'punch'

Like Phil I was disappointed that the DRO options, particularly the advanced option, are not included in the Sony RAW converter. Perhaps that can be done in the future & I am sure that would give Sony bonus points from those who have yet to master post processing. This DRO facility is a big plus for Sony & its full potential is yet to be fully realised. If more fine tuning was available it would be seen as a strong selling point- even if this could not be done in camera hardware then it surely could be implemented in off-camera computer software.

The software seems to have got off to a good start & ,I am sure, will get better with time. One area that I noticed is the narrow choice of selectable colour spaces & I think that we can all help Sony by making constructive suggestions for further improvements.

Keith-C

I would love for all Sony lenses to be cheaper and be SSM which I recognize is better. What I'm saying is that I hope Sony takes advantage of the fact that their camera body supports both types and gives us an option. I might decided that I could skip the SSM on some lenses to save some money.

If I could only have a choice of body based or SSM I would obviously take SSM since it is quieter/faster. I simply like the fact the the platform provides the ability to have both. Hopefully Sony's manufacturing might will get us more SSM lenses at a lower cost than KM could provide.

Same thing goes for AS. Apparently lens based AS is better for the longer lenses. There is no reason why Sony couldn't make their longer lenses with lens based AS (you'd probably have to disable the body based AS). All this would give me choice to spend my money on what I thought was most important.