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Replacement or upgrade for Olympus SP-590 UZ? Recommendations?

Started Mar 17, 2014 | Questions thread
Henry Falkner
Henry Falkner Forum Pro • Posts: 15,899
Re: Replacement or upgrade for Olympus SP-590 UZ? Recommendations?
1

JohnUser wrote:

The short: I have the above camera and I was looking to upgrade in either the compact area or small DSLR. I was looking at the Stylus SP-100 and the OM-D E-M10. There are just so many camera's to choose from! Suggestions?

I'm leaning towards the OM-D E-M10. I still have and old film Nikon F2 I haven't used in eons so no complete stranger to interchangeable lenses and all. But, I really liked the portability and zoom of the 590 in one unit.

The OM-D E-M10 is establishing a favourable reputation for itself.

In my perception, with the SP100 it depends a lot on which design team did it. If it is that behind the Stylus 1, you may end up with 11-year-old design features (clicking AF sound in videos, worse, the camera will not shut down properly before the battery dies, leaving the lens extended).

If it is the SH-50 design team, you should have a camera that never lets you down.

My last SP-series bridge camera is the SP-570UZ, which does have quirks: All rotations for 'up' go counter-clockwise. Some menu features shut out others. and with some duplication of functions it may take a while to find out what is shutting down what.

So until someone actually has an SP-100EE, I consider its useability open to question. I would like its 50x optical zoom. The red dot sight would enable me to zoom in closer to flying gannets without loosing them.

But my emphasis these days is on reliability and speed of functions.

As an illustration, when Sandra posed for me 14 years ago she complained about the delays, some of which were due to the C-2500L not talking reliably to the FL-40 flash. She continued expressing irritation about delays (for any reason) when taking photo of her, with her or for her until I got the SZ-30MR. The SH-50 operation is faster and more consistent still, in a package small enough that does not make her feel she is competing with the camera for attention.

A camera the size of the SP-100 or the OMD E M10 will compete with Sandra for attention, and at this precise moment, it is the E M10 that has a defined and favourable reputation.

Henry

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 Henry Falkner's gear list:Henry Falkner's gear list
Olympus SP-570 UZ Olympus SH-50 Olympus Stylus SH-1 Olympus OM-D E-M10 II Olympus OM-D E-M10 IV +1 more
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