S70 review opinion

[Chad Wills]

Like many people, I've been awaiting the long overdue Sony S70 review, even knowing full well, that despite all of it's features, it will be shadowed by the Nikon 990 by this site. Don't get me wrong, there is nothing necessarily bad with Nikon, but Phil, you seem to so obviously an assboy for them, you're reviews aren't objective enough. To start out, let's look at the final comments for each camera:

Construction
Nikon 9, Sony 8

Besides a smaller handgrip(in your opinion), I would argue the Sony has a much better construction than the Nikon 990. Sure the swivel is nice on the Nikon, but it is one more part that moves, thus is prone to failure. Not everybody has the resources to buy a new digital camera every year, and moving parts that will wear out or loosen over time do weigh into purchasing decisions. You also fail to add in that the Sony S70 allows access to both media and battery while on a tripod. The Nikon 990's battery compartment is covered. Also take into account the noisy focusing motor of the 990, that could have been better also. Yet the Nikon wins out in this score, hmmm???

Features
Nikon 9.5, Sony 7

I concede the Nikon is the stronger camera here, although I do think a 7 is a little harsh for a camera with such a good battery metering system, good battery/media access, mpeg audio/video recording and playback. Granted, it doesn't allow full manual control, but neither do many other 2 or 3 megapixel cameras you've reviewed that have gotten higher ratings. It does offer some manual control, and ISO is locked at 100 in aperture and shutter priority modes. As you're reviews do not have any kind of red-eye comparisons(I wonder why?), the extremely poor flash on the Nikon 990 is downplayed. Not everyone has the time to spend in the "digital darkroom" to remove red-eye, and an anti-red-eye flash is a big plus in many of our books.

Image Quality
Nikon 9, Sony 9

This is a joke, right? I mean, what other camera in this price range has better image quality? The S70 wins hands down with less noise and chromatic aberrations than the 990, yet they both receive the same rating! What about the poor autofocusing system of the 990 in low light situations. Unless you switch to manual focusing, your image quality is definitely going to suffer. It's pretty clear on your bottles shots, just how much better the S70 handles detail than the 990. As for color balance/saturation, that's more of an opinion than anything, and can always be dealt with in software. You used that excuse yourself, downplaying the noise on the 990 by saying:

"Not surprisingly the S70 produced very little red channel noise in blue or light blue shades, certainly not as much as we'd seen on the 990 and C-3030Z. Whether this is down to the CCD, electronics systems, algorithms or JPEG compression it's there in the final image and therefore becomes visible in certain circumstances. That said, this noise can be corrected using third party tools."

Lens/CCD Combination
Nikon 8, Sony 9

Good job, that said, this point would have been pretty hard to argue given the Zeiss lens.

Ease of Use
Nikon 8, Sony 9

Hard to say in this world of auto-everything.

Value for Money
Nikon 10, Sony 8.5

I don't understand this one at all(well I do, you LOVE Nikon, duh). You claim that for about $100 more, a person could buy a 990 rather than the S70. To some of us, image quality is worth every penny, and the lower price of the S70 makes it a better buy to anything at any price. But anyway, back to the $$$ issue. Your math seemed a wee bit off to me, so I checked Cnet Shopper to compare prices. The lowest price on the Sony S70 was $665 and it was in stock at that price. The lowest price on the Nikon 990 was $850, however, the lowest IN-STOCK price was $899. Well, my first grade math skills tell me that $899 - $665 = $234 price difference. A far cry from your $100 figure. If you know where we can purchase a 990 for $765 in stock, let us know. As long as we're talking about spending money, you should also figure in the price of some rechargeable batteries and a charger for the Nikon 990, as it comes with neither. The Sony S70 on the other hand, comes with a charger and battery, seems like a value to me.

So Phil, that is my opinion on your Highly Recommended vs. Very Highly recommended reviews of the S70 and 990 respectively. And before all of the flaming starts, no I do not work for Sony, and no, I do not have anything against Phil or this site. But this is the internet, and everyone knows opinions are like assholes, everybody's got one. So there is mine. Flame on.

 

[Phil Askey]

I'm not going to be dragged into a flaming war. A review is a review, it's written by a human being with opinions. I consider my reviews unbiased and in fact I certainly own a hell of a lot more Sony equipment than any other manufacturer..

If you go back to the review you'll find a page where I compared the S70 to (not just a Nikon) the Olympus C-3030Z and the Coolpix 990. If you go down that comparison and see what I've pointed out you'll see why I feel the 990 is still a better camera for the money, photography is about taking photographs, that's a combination of everything at your disposal, the 990 offers levels of flexibility which just aren't there on the S70, that doesn't make it a bad camera, just a different one.

People love Sony, People love Olympus, People love Nikon. When you publish a review, especially if it's positive about another manufacturer you'll automatically get responses like Chad's.

Assboy? Well.. that's up to you to decide.

So Phil, that is my opinion on your Highly Recommended vs. Very Highly
recommended reviews of the S70 and 990 respectively. And before all of
the flaming starts, no I do not work for Sony, and no, I do not have
anything against Phil or this site. But this is the internet, and
everyone knows opinions are like assholes, everybody's got one. So there
is mine. Flame on.

 

[Bryan Biggers]

Chad Wills wrote:
(I deleted some stuff)

This is a joke, right? I mean, what other camera in this price range has
better image quality? The S70 wins hands down with less noise and
chromatic aberrations than the 990, yet they both receive the same
rating! What about the poor autofocusing system of the 990 in low light
situations. Unless you switch to manual focusing, your image quality is
definitely going to suffer. It's pretty clear on your bottles shots,

I hear this over and over, but every time I get a chance to test it myself I find that the 990 focuses in low light just as well (not including cameras wiht autofocus assist lights). Since you have both cameras in your hands, Phil, maybe you could do a quick low light focus test (point poth cameras at an object in low light and start pressing) and comment on this. One thing that complicates interperting the results is that some cameras, the Oly 2020 in particular, do not give an indication that they have not focused in low light; they seem to pick some "pretty good" settings and fire away.
Bryan

 

[JoeK]

Hi Chad:

Your words are a little strong. However, you are entitled to make your point as you choose.

I agree with you ONLY to the extent that Phil has a small bias towards Nikon (lets just refer to it as bias). There is nothing wrong with that - it is impossible to to do what he does without some bias. Often, I don't agree with his "Conclusions" section. It is entirely possible that bias on my part (regarding how I would weigh certain features, performance, and problems) leads me to a different "Conclusion". For example, I am biased towards a true TTL camera (non-TTL cameras should never be rated higher than a 3). Also, I don't believe one camera should be rated higher than another because you can take better night pictures - who cares about shooting in the dark. IMHO, Phil has a fixation on night shooting. I am biased towards good autofocus performance - no autofocus assist, hey - no rating greater than a 2. The list of my bias goes on and on. I don't feel bad because of my bias list, and Phil should not feel bad either (and I bet he doesn't).

Phil has a LOT to be proud of. His reviews are VERY detailed and provide excellent support data for us to make our own decision. He is the only reviewer I am aware of that actually rates cameras (in the "Conclusion" section). IMHO, that takes guts. He is also an individual that handles a lot more cameras than I do. Phil will probably forget more about cameras in the next five minutes than I will ever learn in my lifetime. Based on first hand knowledge of my personal limitations, when Phil lists a number in his conclusion and that number doesn't agree with my rating after reading his review, I take another look at the review. Often, after multiple reads of the same section in his review, I begin to understand why his rating is different than mine, and I begin to understand where I made a mistake. Of course, sometimes he is dead wrong (maybe).

I'm not a Nikon fan defending Phil. The only Nikon in my house is a film scanner. All my film camera equipment is Canon (guess who I root for). I bought an Olympus C2500L in spite of Phils review and low rating. I am interested in a D1 purchase (an on/off affair). Chad - I don't think you can find an agenda on my part based on equipment that I own.

I thank Phil for his detailed reviews and for providing "we the user" with excellent tools to make our own final decision. I thank Phil for being objective (as humanly possible). I especially thank Phil for discussing the problem areas of a camera (who cares about the good stuff, it is the problems that drive us all nuts). IMHO - there is only thing wrong with Phil's reviews - his conclusions do not always agree with mine. So who cares! I give Phil a 10 for effort, 8 for execution, 9 for detail, and 6 for conclusions. For creating the best camera site on the planet, I'll throw in another 7 to give him a perfect 10.

VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

Joe Kurkjian

Like many people, I've been awaiting the long overdue Sony S70 review,
even knowing full well, that despite all of it's features, it will be
shadowed by the Nikon 990 by this site. Don't get me wrong, there is
nothing necessarily bad with Nikon, but Phil, you seem to so obviously an
assboy for them, you're reviews aren't objective enough. To start out,
let's look at the final comments for each camera:

Construction
Nikon 9, Sony 8

Besides a smaller handgrip(in your opinion), I would argue the Sony has a
much better construction than the Nikon 990. Sure the swivel is nice on
the Nikon, but it is one more part that moves, thus is prone to failure.
Not everybody has the resources to buy a new digital camera every year,
and moving parts that will wear out or loosen over time do weigh into
purchasing decisions. You also fail to add in that the Sony S70 allows
access to both media and battery while on a tripod. The Nikon 990's
battery compartment is covered. Also take into account the noisy
focusing motor of the 990, that could have been better also. Yet the
Nikon wins out in this score, hmmm???

Features
Nikon 9.5, Sony 7

I concede the Nikon is the stronger camera here, although I do think a 7
is a little harsh for a camera with such a good battery metering system,
good battery/media access, mpeg audio/video recording and playback.
Granted, it doesn't allow full manual control, but neither do many other
2 or 3 megapixel cameras you've reviewed that have gotten higher ratings.
It does offer some manual control, and ISO is locked at 100 in aperture
and shutter priority modes. As you're reviews do not have any kind of
red-eye comparisons(I wonder why?), the extremely poor flash on the Nikon
990 is downplayed. Not everyone has the time to spend in the "digital
darkroom" to remove red-eye, and an anti-red-eye flash is a big plus in
many of our books.

Image Quality
Nikon 9, Sony 9

This is a joke, right? I mean, what other camera in this price range has
better image quality? The S70 wins hands down with less noise and
chromatic aberrations than the 990, yet they both receive the same
rating! What about the poor autofocusing system of the 990 in low light
situations. Unless you switch to manual focusing, your image quality is
definitely going to suffer. It's pretty clear on your bottles shots,
just how much better the S70 handles detail than the 990. As for color
balance/saturation, that's more of an opinion than anything, and can
always be dealt with in software. You used that excuse yourself,
downplaying the noise on the 990 by saying:

"Not surprisingly the S70 produced very little red channel noise in blue
or light blue shades, certainly not as much as we'd seen on the 990 and
C-3030Z. Whether this is down to the CCD, electronics systems, algorithms
or JPEG compression it's there in the final image and therefore becomes
visible in certain circumstances. That said, this noise can be corrected
using third party tools."

Lens/CCD Combination
Nikon 8, Sony 9

Good job, that said, this point would have been pretty hard to argue
given the Zeiss lens.

Ease of Use
Nikon 8, Sony 9

Hard to say in this world of auto-everything.

Value for Money
Nikon 10, Sony 8.5

I don't understand this one at all(well I do, you LOVE Nikon, duh). You
claim that for about $100 more, a person could buy a 990 rather than the
S70. To some of us, image quality is worth every penny, and the lower
price of the S70 makes it a better buy to anything at any price. But
anyway, back to the $$$ issue. Your math seemed a wee bit off to me, so
I checked Cnet Shopper to compare prices. The lowest price on the Sony
S70 was $665 and it was in stock at that price. The lowest price on the
Nikon 990 was $850, however, the lowest IN-STOCK price was $899. Well,
my first grade math skills tell me that $899 - $665 = $234 price
difference. A far cry from your $100 figure. If you know where we can
purchase a 990 for $765 in stock, let us know. As long as we're talking
about spending money, you should also figure in the price of some
rechargeable batteries and a charger for the Nikon 990, as it comes with
neither. The Sony S70 on the other hand, comes with a charger and
battery, seems like a value to me.

So Phil, that is my opinion on your Highly Recommended vs. Very Highly
recommended reviews of the S70 and 990 respectively. And before all of
the flaming starts, no I do not work for Sony, and no, I do not have
anything against Phil or this site. But this is the internet, and
everyone knows opinions are like assholes, everybody's got one. So there
is mine. Flame on.

 

[Vincent Bockaert]

I don't think the review was biased at all. On the contrary, it gave the CP990 a very hard time in many ways.

• The review stated several times the Sony was superior in sharpness, which is true from the sample pix.
• The comparison table at the end was a (often painful) reality check on the strenghts and weaknesses of ALL three cameras.

Reading both unbelievably detailed reviews, it is very easy to make a decision between the two cameras depending on what your priorities are.

On the other hand, your "review of the review" has some biased elements, take construction for instance:

• The swivel IS lovely. Prone to failure ? That is new. Bearings are designed to rotate thousands of times per second. So what is a few thousand times per year ?
• Focusing noise ? At least you hear when it has stopped focusing, now I am getting biased

Vincent

Like many people, I've been awaiting the long overdue Sony S70 review,
even knowing full well, that despite all of it's features, it will be
shadowed by the Nikon 990 by this site. Don't get me wrong, there is
nothing necessarily bad with Nikon, but Phil, you seem to so obviously an
assboy for them, you're reviews aren't objective enough. To start out,
let's look at the final comments for each camera:

Construction
Nikon 9, Sony 8

Besides a smaller handgrip(in your opinion), I would argue the Sony has a
much better construction than the Nikon 990. Sure the swivel is nice on
the Nikon, but it is one more part that moves, thus is prone to failure.
Not everybody has the resources to buy a new digital camera every year,
and moving parts that will wear out or loosen over time do weigh into
purchasing decisions. You also fail to add in that the Sony S70 allows
access to both media and battery while on a tripod. The Nikon 990's
battery compartment is covered. Also take into account the noisy
focusing motor of the 990, that could have been better also. Yet the
Nikon wins out in this score, hmmm???

Features
Nikon 9.5, Sony 7

I concede the Nikon is the stronger camera here, although I do think a 7
is a little harsh for a camera with such a good battery metering system,
good battery/media access, mpeg audio/video recording and playback.
Granted, it doesn't allow full manual control, but neither do many other
2 or 3 megapixel cameras you've reviewed that have gotten higher ratings.
It does offer some manual control, and ISO is locked at 100 in aperture
and shutter priority modes. As you're reviews do not have any kind of
red-eye comparisons(I wonder why?), the extremely poor flash on the Nikon
990 is downplayed. Not everyone has the time to spend in the "digital
darkroom" to remove red-eye, and an anti-red-eye flash is a big plus in
many of our books.

Image Quality
Nikon 9, Sony 9

This is a joke, right? I mean, what other camera in this price range has
better image quality? The S70 wins hands down with less noise and
chromatic aberrations than the 990, yet they both receive the same
rating! What about the poor autofocusing system of the 990 in low light
situations. Unless you switch to manual focusing, your image quality is
definitely going to suffer. It's pretty clear on your bottles shots,
just how much better the S70 handles detail than the 990. As for color
balance/saturation, that's more of an opinion than anything, and can
always be dealt with in software. You used that excuse yourself,
downplaying the noise on the 990 by saying:

"Not surprisingly the S70 produced very little red channel noise in blue
or light blue shades, certainly not as much as we'd seen on the 990 and
C-3030Z. Whether this is down to the CCD, electronics systems, algorithms
or JPEG compression it's there in the final image and therefore becomes
visible in certain circumstances. That said, this noise can be corrected
using third party tools."

Lens/CCD Combination
Nikon 8, Sony 9

Good job, that said, this point would have been pretty hard to argue
given the Zeiss lens.

Ease of Use
Nikon 8, Sony 9

Hard to say in this world of auto-everything.

Value for Money
Nikon 10, Sony 8.5

I don't understand this one at all(well I do, you LOVE Nikon, duh). You
claim that for about $100 more, a person could buy a 990 rather than the
S70. To some of us, image quality is worth every penny, and the lower
price of the S70 makes it a better buy to anything at any price. But
anyway, back to the $$$ issue. Your math seemed a wee bit off to me, so
I checked Cnet Shopper to compare prices. The lowest price on the Sony
S70 was $665 and it was in stock at that price. The lowest price on the
Nikon 990 was $850, however, the lowest IN-STOCK price was $899. Well,
my first grade math skills tell me that $899 - $665 = $234 price
difference. A far cry from your $100 figure. If you know where we can
purchase a 990 for $765 in stock, let us know. As long as we're talking
about spending money, you should also figure in the price of some
rechargeable batteries and a charger for the Nikon 990, as it comes with
neither. The Sony S70 on the other hand, comes with a charger and
battery, seems like a value to me.

So Phil, that is my opinion on your Highly Recommended vs. Very Highly
recommended reviews of the S70 and 990 respectively. And before all of
the flaming starts, no I do not work for Sony, and no, I do not have
anything against Phil or this site. But this is the internet, and
everyone knows opinions are like assholes, everybody's got one. So there
is mine. Flame on.

 

[harry]

Phil is getting himself in trouble for offering free online reviews. Digital photography has been evolving faster than most people expected. It's like a moving target that the benchmark was constantly raised higher. As Phil's comparison chart for 990, 3030, and S70 shows, no brand/model is best on everything. That's the ploy of manufacturers, they want you to buy things that's kind of addictive and so you could get back to buy the latest and greatest later.

With the current technology (I mean CURRENT), there's no reason why one single company could make a digicam that provides all the best features from 990, 3030, and S70. And yet, we got CF (no type II) for 990, SM for 3030, and MS for S70.

Personally I still believe that for the moment, get the best deal now and enjoy the new technology for 6-12 months, then sell the digicam for about 2/3 of the price and get the next latest and greatest. Eventually, I probably would settle for a 10X (or when I settle for that one, the 20X would be available - don't you see even the cheap camcorders now has 20X+ zoom?), good manual controls, and faster lense? Oly C2100, I am waiting for you....

Easyn40

If you go back to the review you'll find a page where I compared the S70
to (not just a Nikon) the Olympus C-3030Z and the Coolpix 990. If you go
down that comparison and see what I've pointed out you'll see why I feel
the 990 is still a better camera for the money, photography is about
taking photographs, that's a combination of everything at your disposal,
the 990 offers levels of flexibility which just aren't there on the S70,
that doesn't make it a bad camera, just a different one.

People love Sony, People love Olympus, People love Nikon. When you
publish a review, especially if it's positive about another manufacturer
you'll automatically get responses like Chad's.

Assboy? Well.. that's up to you to decide.

So Phil, that is my opinion on your Highly Recommended vs. Very Highly
recommended reviews of the S70 and 990 respectively. And before all of
the flaming starts, no I do not work for Sony, and no, I do not have
anything against Phil or this site. But this is the internet, and
everyone knows opinions are like assholes, everybody's got one. So there
is mine. Flame on.

 

[Dale Cotton]

Open letter to Phil Askey:

Personally, I'm tired of this whole pattern: New review posted; vituperation from someone who disagrees; passionate defenses from those who love this site; loop and repeat.

I suspect the numerical ratings are the crux of the problem. Personally, I don't need them; I do need the incredible detail that leads up to them. From that detail I can draw my own conclusions, based on my own needs. Yet I do feel they add a certain stand-up-and-be-counted decisiveness to the reviews. What to do?

I finally realised that the main problem with the numerical rankings is the fact that most readers seem to miss the critical few words that precede them:

"Here's my rating of the [XXXX]"

In the posting I am replying to you say: "I consider my reviews unbiased", "written by a human being with opinions". Why even try to tight-rope the narrow wire of inhuman objectivity? To be human is to have a bias; it's a fundamental part of being an individual.

Another reviewer (of craft beers) named Stephen Beaumont describes himself and his reviews as being passionately [and unashamedly] opinonated. When I see he has assigned three stars to an ale I know he means that that particular ale pleases his particular palate to that degree. I also know his palate differs from mine, occasionally drastically. Because he does not even try to be dispassionate, I can apply a simple co-ordinate transform and mark his opinion on a mental graph as a useful datum.

Phil, I think you would fare better by switching to the passionately opinionated camp. Stamp "personal opinion" or "this is the way I see it!" all over your numerical ranking section (or, better, the entire conclusions page). From then on you become empowered to tell rude SOBs where to take their obscenities and what to do with them when they get there. The fine print-ish "Here's my rating of the [XXXX]" is clearly too easy to ignore.

I'd like to leave the matter at that, but since I'm suggesting one change to the rankings section, I may as well go the whole hog. Another concern that I'm sure has occurred to you is ageing. If I look back at the Coolpix 950's ratings I find the image quality ranked as a 9. So is the 990's. The construction and features rankings actually drop down from the 950 to the 990. Yes, certainly I can see how both sets of numbers fit in appropriately to the context of the month and year they were posted, but an eager new buyer coming to this site and to digital cameras for the first time would probably not have that perspective. (Both the 950 and the 990 are on the same shelf at the local camera store, the 950 ranks higher yet costs less -- must be a steal!)

One solution to all the above might be a bold, coloured disclaimer to replace "Here's my ranking". Something like:

"Here's how I personally rank this camera compared to all the other prosumer cameras in its class as of June 28, 2000. Your own ranking may and probably should differ!"

Fly a proud Don't Tread On Me with snarling snake banner above it all and you're home free!

 

[Darin Cline14548]

I guess I'll jump in too. Of course, I concur with all of the positive comments about Phil's reviews, the difficulties of maintaining this type of site, etc. He has the right to present his information in any way he sees fit. I also expect that he does have some interest in how the patrons of this site view his presentations, knowing that he can decide "that's a valid point, maybe I should change xxx", or "good point, but screw it, I don't feel like changing a thing", or "what an idiot". I'm sure most of us would agree that Phil is much more qualified than any of us to make these decisions.

That being said, I want to say that I agree with Dale's comment about the aging of the reviews. Digicams are changing so fast, it's really hard to put the static ratings of various cameras from various time periods into perspective of when they were written. And in a related note, it's also difficult to understand what those numbers mean relative to other cameras that target different needs. There were several discussions in the Canon forum trying to quantify the numerical ratings from the S100 review. Obviously the S100 can't compete imagewise with a D1, and in fact, it's even a notch down from it's older brother, the S10. Given that it's a newer camera, you would think it would have scored much worse than the S10 if you try and scale the ratings for timeline. But look at that thing... you could hide it in places only a full body cavity search would reveal! The fact that they fit the image quality in the package at that price point is amazing, and I'm sure affected the ratings. I still like the numerical ratings though, as they do help give a quick idea of how Phil is rating a camera, and also helps us to quantify his points (and probably helps him too).

So what to do? A thought I had is to change the rating to a relative system. Pick a couple of cameras to compare the reviewed camera to (such as the Oly & Nikon in the S70 review), and have the numbers be relative to those. There should always be one camera in the comparisons that can be used for some time (such as the CP950), and it would have all zeros. Each camera in the comparison can have positive and negative scores relative to the 950. If the CP990 is a good choice to succeed the 950 as "the" benchmark, then include it along with the 950 in the comparisons for a decent amount of time so that everyone can get a feel for the new benchmark. During this time period, the 990 would have all zeros, and the 950's scores would be relative to the 990, but included for informational purposes.

In the case of the S100, we would see a picture quality score relative to the 950 (or 990 or whatever), so we would have a better understanding of how that camera actually compares. Of courrse, there would be plenty of information in the review that lets us understand how remarkable it is that it fits in the case it's in. Two years from now, we will still know how it compared to the 950, and by following benchmark changes, could relate that to the benchmarks of that time.

Now that I look back and see I've typed four paragraphs, I'm beginning to think this is really much ado about nothing. Phil's reviews are very informative, and everyone is going to have an opinion about how they might like to see them. If nothing else, at least when we get on these topics, and stop to think about it, we realize how difficult it is to keep up in such a dynamic market.

Open letter to Phil Askey:

Personally, I'm tired of this whole pattern: New review posted;
vituperation from someone who disagrees; passionate defenses from those
who love this site; loop and repeat.

I suspect the numerical ratings are the crux of the problem. Personally,
I don't need them; I do need the incredible detail that leads up to them.
From that detail I can draw my own conclusions, based on my own needs.
Yet I do feel they add a certain stand-up-and-be-counted decisiveness to
the reviews. What to do?

I finally realised that the main problem with the numerical rankings is
the fact that most readers seem to miss the critical few words that
precede them:

"Here's my rating of the [XXXX]"

In the posting I am replying to you say: "I consider my reviews
unbiased", "written by a human being with opinions". Why even try to
tight-rope the narrow wire of inhuman objectivity? To be human is to have
a bias; it's a fundamental part of being an individual.

Another reviewer (of craft beers) named Stephen Beaumont describes
himself and his reviews as being passionately [and unashamedly]
opinonated. When I see he has assigned three stars to an ale I know he
means that that particular ale pleases his particular palate to that
degree. I also know his palate differs from mine, occasionally
drastically. Because he does not even try to be dispassionate, I can
apply a simple co-ordinate transform and mark his opinion on a mental
graph as a useful datum.

Phil, I think you would fare better by switching to the passionately
opinionated camp. Stamp "personal opinion" or "this is the way I see
it!" all over your numerical ranking section (or, better, the entire
conclusions page). From then on you become empowered to tell rude SOBs
where to take their obscenities and what to do with them when they get
there. The fine print-ish "Here's my rating of the [XXXX]" is clearly too
easy to ignore.

I'd like to leave the matter at that, but since I'm suggesting one change
to the rankings section, I may as well go the whole hog. Another concern
that I'm sure has occurred to you is ageing. If I look back at the
Coolpix 950's ratings I find the image quality ranked as a 9. So is the
990's. The construction and features rankings actually drop down from the
950 to the 990. Yes, certainly I can see how both sets of numbers fit in
appropriately to the context of the month and year they were posted, but
an eager new buyer coming to this site and to digital cameras for the
first time would probably not have that perspective. (Both the 950 and
the 990 are on the same shelf at the local camera store, the 950 ranks
higher yet costs less -- must be a steal!)

One solution to all the above might be a bold, coloured disclaimer to
replace "Here's my ranking". Something like:

"Here's how I personally rank this camera compared to all the other
prosumer cameras in its class as of June 28, 2000. Your own ranking may
and probably should differ!"

Fly a proud Don't Tread On Me with snarling snake banner above it all and
you're home free!

 

[Rob Patterson]

The review has the necessary info to make a decision of whether or not to purchase for any experienced photographer.

A new photographer can also use the info to help decide.That new photographer should spend some time learning about cameras controls and what they do so the differences in each individual manufacturers equivelant models will be understood. That's the job of the buyer. Any problems afterwards are due to lack of investigation on the buyers part.

As an example, I'll use myself and the reviews info to formulate a decision to purchase it or the 990 or the 3030. The situation is a hypothetical one in which I do not own a digital. In reality I already own a 990.

Here goes. I wouldn't buy it. Why? Because of it's lack of manual controls. I want that feature to be maximum. This camera lacks the amount of control I desire. I'm very impressed with it's resolution and ability to seperate colors. I wish the 990 were as good. It's oversaturated colors don't turn me off. That's easy to adjust. It's limited white balance control is a big disapointment and weighs heavily against a purchase consideration. The battery is superior, but doesn't carry sufficient weight to warrant using that feature as a consideration to purchase. I love the Zeiss lens. Faster glass weighs heavily in my decision. I prefer CF to Sony's card. It's common, easily obtainable in Hodunk Alabama where Sony's card may not be found.

The heaviest weight in favor of the Nikon is the Manual control. Very, very important to me. If this new Sony with it's superior resolution had equal manual control, I just may consider selling my 990 and buying it. Without that control No way.

For others manual control may not be an issue. In fact it may hinder their point and shoot preference.

The review supplied the info I needed. I'd cross reference it with other sites before finalizing any opinion.

Like many people, I've been awaiting the long overdue Sony S70 review,
even knowing full well, that despite all of it's features, it will be
shadowed by the Nikon 990 by this site. Don't get me wrong, there is
nothing necessarily bad with Nikon, but Phil, you seem to so obviously an
assboy for them, you're reviews aren't objective enough. To start out,
let's look at the final comments for each camera:

Construction
Nikon 9, Sony 8

Besides a smaller handgrip(in your opinion), I would argue the Sony has a
much better construction than the Nikon 990. Sure the swivel is nice on
the Nikon, but it is one more part that moves, thus is prone to failure.
Not everybody has the resources to buy a new digital camera every year,
and moving parts that will wear out or loosen over time do weigh into
purchasing decisions. You also fail to add in that the Sony S70 allows
access to both media and battery while on a tripod. The Nikon 990's
battery compartment is covered. Also take into account the noisy
focusing motor of the 990, that could have been better also. Yet the
Nikon wins out in this score, hmmm???

Features
Nikon 9.5, Sony 7

I concede the Nikon is the stronger camera here, although I do think a 7
is a little harsh for a camera with such a good battery metering system,
good battery/media access, mpeg audio/video recording and playback.
Granted, it doesn't allow full manual control, but neither do many other
2 or 3 megapixel cameras you've reviewed that have gotten higher ratings.
It does offer some manual control, and ISO is locked at 100 in aperture
and shutter priority modes. As you're reviews do not have any kind of
red-eye comparisons(I wonder why?), the extremely poor flash on the Nikon
990 is downplayed. Not everyone has the time to spend in the "digital
darkroom" to remove red-eye, and an anti-red-eye flash is a big plus in
many of our books.

Image Quality
Nikon 9, Sony 9

This is a joke, right? I mean, what other camera in this price range has
better image quality? The S70 wins hands down with less noise and
chromatic aberrations than the 990, yet they both receive the same
rating! What about the poor autofocusing system of the 990 in low light
situations. Unless you switch to manual focusing, your image quality is
definitely going to suffer. It's pretty clear on your bottles shots,
just how much better the S70 handles detail than the 990. As for color
balance/saturation, that's more of an opinion than anything, and can
always be dealt with in software. You used that excuse yourself,
downplaying the noise on the 990 by saying:

"Not surprisingly the S70 produced very little red channel noise in blue
or light blue shades, certainly not as much as we'd seen on the 990 and
C-3030Z. Whether this is down to the CCD, electronics systems, algorithms
or JPEG compression it's there in the final image and therefore becomes
visible in certain circumstances. That said, this noise can be corrected
using third party tools."

Lens/CCD Combination
Nikon 8, Sony 9

Good job, that said, this point would have been pretty hard to argue
given the Zeiss lens.

Ease of Use
Nikon 8, Sony 9

Hard to say in this world of auto-everything.

Value for Money
Nikon 10, Sony 8.5

I don't understand this one at all(well I do, you LOVE Nikon, duh). You
claim that for about $100 more, a person could buy a 990 rather than the
S70. To some of us, image quality is worth every penny, and the lower
price of the S70 makes it a better buy to anything at any price. But
anyway, back to the $$$ issue. Your math seemed a wee bit off to me, so
I checked Cnet Shopper to compare prices. The lowest price on the Sony
S70 was $665 and it was in stock at that price. The lowest price on the
Nikon 990 was $850, however, the lowest IN-STOCK price was $899. Well,
my first grade math skills tell me that $899 - $665 = $234 price
difference. A far cry from your $100 figure. If you know where we can
purchase a 990 for $765 in stock, let us know. As long as we're talking
about spending money, you should also figure in the price of some
rechargeable batteries and a charger for the Nikon 990, as it comes with
neither. The Sony S70 on the other hand, comes with a charger and
battery, seems like a value to me.

So Phil, that is my opinion on your Highly Recommended vs. Very Highly
recommended reviews of the S70 and 990 respectively. And before all of
the flaming starts, no I do not work for Sony, and no, I do not have
anything against Phil or this site. But this is the internet, and
everyone knows opinions are like assholes, everybody's got one. So there
is mine. Flame on.

 

[David Godsey]

This note is for Phil who must by now feel like he is under attack.

Phil:

As one of the damned that is adrift in the sea of shifting technology, prices, capability,etc, etc, I understand where alot of the flack is coming from. Part of it is taking you for granted. Thank goodness you are here and do what you do so well. Bet it ain't makin' you rich.

Guys like me have a deathgrip on our wallets as we perch in the precipice of......

ACTUALLY BUYING A CAMERA

Like so many converts at Jonestown, we want someone to decend from the mount and give us 'the answer' in clear, crisp instructions. Instead of weighing in to the fray, I would add a suggestion useful to idiots like me.

How about a rating system to help people decide what is important to them? It's very simple I stole from GE (called KT Decision Analysis) and the system I will use to make my buying decision:

1. List MUST items: gotta have's- if the item lacks it, off the list.

2. List WANT features: desireables but not life or death. Then assign weights to each want based on how important it is.

When evaluating a camera, via your terrific reviews, I simply assign a value to how well each survivor satisfies the wants, multiply the weight by how it performs and voila!

It is not a failsafe system but it helps sort through the bezillion digital offerings to help make a decision. Might actually get you down to 3 to 6 cameras.

If anyone else out there in camera land has a good way, please share it. Who better to give us a great personal evaluation system for buying decisions than Phil?

Would be a boon to fence sitters like me. Whadyasay Phil?

Thanks for the wonderful reviews. It is a terrific service. Mucho gracias!

Dave

With the current technology (I mean CURRENT), there's no reason why one
single company could make a digicam that provides all the best features
from 990, 3030, and S70. And yet, we got CF (no type II) for 990, SM for
3030, and MS for S70.

Personally I still believe that for the moment, get the best deal now and
enjoy the new technology for 6-12 months, then sell the digicam for about
2/3 of the price and get the next latest and greatest. Eventually, I
probably would settle for a 10X (or when I settle for that one, the 20X
would be available - don't you see even the cheap camcorders now has 20X+
zoom?), good manual controls, and faster lense? Oly C2100, I am waiting
for you....

Easyn40

If you go back to the review you'll find a page where I compared the S70
to (not just a Nikon) the Olympus C-3030Z and the Coolpix 990. If you go
down that comparison and see what I've pointed out you'll see why I feel
the 990 is still a better camera for the money, photography is about
taking photographs, that's a combination of everything at your disposal,
the 990 offers levels of flexibility which just aren't there on the S70,
that doesn't make it a bad camera, just a different one.

People love Sony, People love Olympus, People love Nikon. When you
publish a review, especially if it's positive about another manufacturer
you'll automatically get responses like Chad's.

Assboy? Well.. that's up to you to decide.

So Phil, that is my opinion on your Highly Recommended vs. Very Highly
recommended reviews of the S70 and 990 respectively. And before all of
the flaming starts, no I do not work for Sony, and no, I do not have
anything against Phil or this site. But this is the internet, and
everyone knows opinions are like assholes, everybody's got one. So there
is mine. Flame on.

 

[Peter iNova]

Like many people, I've been awaiting the long overdue Sony S70 review,
even knowing full well, that despite all of it's features, it will be
shadowed by the Nikon 990 by this site. Don't get me wrong, there is
nothing necessarily bad with Nikon, but Phil, you seem to so obviously an
assboy for them, you're reviews aren't objective enough. To start out,

Lost me right there, Chad. Anybody who starts a review of a review with a comment like that obviously doesn't know squat. Or shouldn't be considered among the Squatgnocenti.

-iNova

 

[Pepe]

First of all, I don't think that it is right to call Phil an assboy - that is going a bit too far. In defense of Phil, he has exerted a lot of effort and spent a lot of time to write the review - he does not deserve to be called any other name besides Phil. =)

Reviews are done by humans -- they are bound to be biased towards a particular product or preference. Giving an unbiased review is almost impossible. The point of the review is to expose the advantages and disadvantages of a particular product against what is available out there - a basis for comparison is used and more often than not, this is the reviewer's preferred product. I agree with you that Phil's reviews somehow tend to be Nikon-leaning but hey! You can't blame him for that.

Everytime there is a new review here, I usually go straight to the Conclusions page to see the Pros and Cons and I ignore the rating system because it is very subjective (as you are pointing out now). I wish Phil will do away with that and simply stick to the PROs and CONs and change the rating to listing the MUST HAVEs and GOOD TO HAVEs against what the particular camera can offer. It will assist buyers better than the rating system.

As the Filipinos say, "Trabaho lang, walang personalan" (read: "It is only a job, nothing personal").

Like many people, I've been awaiting the long overdue Sony S70 review,
even knowing full well, that despite all of it's features, it will be
shadowed by the Nikon 990 by this site. Don't get me wrong, there is
nothing necessarily bad with Nikon, but Phil, you seem to so obviously an
assboy for them, you're reviews aren't objective enough. To start out,
let's look at the final comments for each camera:

Construction
Nikon 9, Sony 8

Besides a smaller handgrip(in your opinion), I would argue the Sony has a
much better construction than the Nikon 990. Sure the swivel is nice on
the Nikon, but it is one more part that moves, thus is prone to failure.
Not everybody has the resources to buy a new digital camera every year,
and moving parts that will wear out or loosen over time do weigh into
purchasing decisions. You also fail to add in that the Sony S70 allows
access to both media and battery while on a tripod. The Nikon 990's
battery compartment is covered. Also take into account the noisy
focusing motor of the 990, that could have been better also. Yet the
Nikon wins out in this score, hmmm???

Features
Nikon 9.5, Sony 7

I concede the Nikon is the stronger camera here, although I do think a 7
is a little harsh for a camera with such a good battery metering system,
good battery/media access, mpeg audio/video recording and playback.
Granted, it doesn't allow full manual control, but neither do many other
2 or 3 megapixel cameras you've reviewed that have gotten higher ratings.
It does offer some manual control, and ISO is locked at 100 in aperture
and shutter priority modes. As you're reviews do not have any kind of
red-eye comparisons(I wonder why?), the extremely poor flash on the Nikon
990 is downplayed. Not everyone has the time to spend in the "digital
darkroom" to remove red-eye, and an anti-red-eye flash is a big plus in
many of our books.

Image Quality
Nikon 9, Sony 9

This is a joke, right? I mean, what other camera in this price range has
better image quality? The S70 wins hands down with less noise and
chromatic aberrations than the 990, yet they both receive the same
rating! What about the poor autofocusing system of the 990 in low light
situations. Unless you switch to manual focusing, your image quality is
definitely going to suffer. It's pretty clear on your bottles shots,
just how much better the S70 handles detail than the 990. As for color
balance/saturation, that's more of an opinion than anything, and can
always be dealt with in software. You used that excuse yourself,
downplaying the noise on the 990 by saying:

"Not surprisingly the S70 produced very little red channel noise in blue
or light blue shades, certainly not as much as we'd seen on the 990 and
C-3030Z. Whether this is down to the CCD, electronics systems, algorithms
or JPEG compression it's there in the final image and therefore becomes
visible in certain circumstances. That said, this noise can be corrected
using third party tools."

Lens/CCD Combination
Nikon 8, Sony 9

Good job, that said, this point would have been pretty hard to argue
given the Zeiss lens.

Ease of Use
Nikon 8, Sony 9

Hard to say in this world of auto-everything.

Value for Money
Nikon 10, Sony 8.5

I don't understand this one at all(well I do, you LOVE Nikon, duh). You
claim that for about $100 more, a person could buy a 990 rather than the
S70. To some of us, image quality is worth every penny, and the lower
price of the S70 makes it a better buy to anything at any price. But
anyway, back to the $$$ issue. Your math seemed a wee bit off to me, so
I checked Cnet Shopper to compare prices. The lowest price on the Sony
S70 was $665 and it was in stock at that price. The lowest price on the
Nikon 990 was $850, however, the lowest IN-STOCK price was $899. Well,
my first grade math skills tell me that $899 - $665 = $234 price
difference. A far cry from your $100 figure. If you know where we can
purchase a 990 for $765 in stock, let us know. As long as we're talking
about spending money, you should also figure in the price of some
rechargeable batteries and a charger for the Nikon 990, as it comes with
neither. The Sony S70 on the other hand, comes with a charger and
battery, seems like a value to me.

So Phil, that is my opinion on your Highly Recommended vs. Very Highly
recommended reviews of the S70 and 990 respectively. And before all of
the flaming starts, no I do not work for Sony, and no, I do not have
anything against Phil or this site. But this is the internet, and
everyone knows opinions are like assholes, everybody's got one. So there
is mine. Flame on.

 

[Chad Wills]

I've been sitting back and watching comments roll in on Phil's latest review. And I would say most, if not all people agree with my comments in the sense that a/the rating system is flawed and biased, but is so by nature. As for the individual points I made, nobody seems to want to discuss them even though they are valid. A rating system will never please everybody, and there in lies it's weakness. Recently I looked at a comparison of two soundcards, neither of which I own or have any intention of buying. The first soundcard was heralded as a great card with some of the best MIDI samples you could get, full DOS support, very low CPU utilization, excellent drivers and tech support. The second card did had instable drivers in many testing circumstances, not as good MIDI, higher CPU utilization, and was from a no-name company with iffy tech support. Yet because the second card was bundled with "force-feedback" headphones, it recieved a higher rating because of the "cool" factor. It has always been my belief ANY person should be able to goto a review site, never being there before, or be able to pick up a magazine and get an honest unbiased review. But when faced with a conclusions page that seems so obviously off when comparing similiar products (3mp category), it leads to alot of confusion. Yes, if a person has followed Phil, they obviously know he is pro-Nikon. Has been for a long time as far as I know. And yes, the reviewer's opinion should be expressed in the review of a product, and comparison's should be made. I would have been pretty happy with the review if it didn't include a conclusions page. We all know Phil isn't about to pack up his Nikon for a S70 anytime soon, and any camera he reviews other than the latest Nikon probably just doesn't feel good in his hands, but I feel that shouldn't affect the quality or quantity of the review process. The S70 lacks manual options, manual white-balance and has a weak lag time. Those 3 things will kill a camera in Phil's eyes instantly. Once he is "down" on a camera, a person could definately see how a review could have a negative feeling about it, pointing out every little problem, while not glorifying enough what it does right(hypothetically, I don't want Phil to quote 18 paragraphs out of his latest reviews and start a flame war). IMO, the S70's problems are minor, and in most circumstances can be worked around, even if it's in software later. I also feel image quality is paramount, why else would we be taking pictures? We don't take them to take them, we take them to show our friends/family, or for work or publications. The image is eventually going to be output to a monitor, TV, or printer. So when you look at the end results, the camera with the sharpest image and best quality will give you the best output. Will the Nikon allow shots the S70 won't, yes. Can I live with that, yes. But can the Nikon capture the LOD that the S70 can, no. I consider myself a very open minded person. I am at peace with myself and my surroundings. Just from what I read off of your post, I can see the opposite in you. You're the type of person who discards ideas/things/people if they don't live up to your standards. This isn't kindergarden anymore, and in the real world, sometimes people say bad things that you might not agree with. Look at it this way, when you are driving your car, you personally feel like you are a perfect driver. Anybody who is in front of you and going too slow is wrong because YOU want to be going faster, and anyone who passes you is an idiot and is wrong because YOU don't feel he should be going that fast. Yet, the guy in the slow and fast cars each feel THEY are the ones driving correctly. Who is right? Who can say? Should I have called Phil a Nikon assboy? Probably not, but sometimes statements such as those are needed to open eyes, get people excited and talking about something. I've read responses to Phil or his reviews on this site from more conservative people, they are basically like this:

Hi Phil,

I REALLY loved you're review on the XXXX, if it's OK with you, I have some comments to make, I mean if you don't mind. Well no offense, Phil, but I sortof disagree with the 3rd, 5th and 7th things you said about XXXX. Don't get me wrong Phil, I still LOVE you, and I will send all of my friends to your site, but could you please clarify why you saiid that stuff?

Hey, if that's the way you are, cool. I don't care, it's not me, and I'm not about to pretend it's me to save face. I think this is a great site myself, but that doesn't mean that I have to agree with everything that's being said on it. And blind statements such as yours attacking people's intelligence only makes you look the fool.

 

[harry]

Chad,

No matter how intelligent you think you are, dumping a lot of text in one huge paragraph would not get your message acrossed easily. I would bow to you completely if you could come up with a site as elegant and open-minded as Phil's.

Easyn40

I've been sitting back and watching comments roll in on Phil's latest
review. And I would say most, if not all people agree with my comments
in the sense that a/the rating system is flawed and biased, but is so by
nature. As for the individual points I made, nobody seems to want to
discuss them even though they are valid. A rating system will never
please everybody, and there in lies it's weakness. Recently I looked at
a comparison of two soundcards, neither of which I own or have any
intention of buying. The first soundcard was heralded as a great card
with some of the best MIDI samples you could get, full DOS support, very
low CPU utilization, excellent drivers and tech support. The second card
did had instable drivers in many testing circumstances, not as good MIDI,
higher CPU utilization, and was from a no-name company with iffy tech
support. Yet because the second card was bundled with "force-feedback"
headphones, it recieved a higher rating because of the "cool" factor. It
has always been my belief ANY person should be able to goto a review
site, never being there before, or be able to pick up a magazine and get
an honest unbiased review. But when faced with a conclusions page that
seems so obviously off when comparing similiar products (3mp category),
it leads to alot of confusion. Yes, if a person has followed Phil, they
obviously know he is pro-Nikon. Has been for a long time as far as I
know. And yes, the reviewer's opinion should be expressed in the review
of a product, and comparison's should be made. I would have been pretty
happy with the review if it didn't include a conclusions page. We all
know Phil isn't about to pack up his Nikon for a S70 anytime soon, and
any camera he reviews other than the latest Nikon probably just doesn't
feel good in his hands, but I feel that shouldn't affect the quality or
quantity of the review process. The S70 lacks manual options, manual
white-balance and has a weak lag time. Those 3 things will kill a camera
in Phil's eyes instantly. Once he is "down" on a camera, a person could
definately see how a review could have a negative feeling about it,
pointing out every little problem, while not glorifying enough what it
does right(hypothetically, I don't want Phil to quote 18 paragraphs out
of his latest reviews and start a flame war). IMO, the S70's problems
are minor, and in most circumstances can be worked around, even if it's
in software later. I also feel image quality is paramount, why else
would we be taking pictures? We don't take them to take them, we take
them to show our friends/family, or for work or publications. The image
is eventually going to be output to a monitor, TV, or printer. So when
you look at the end results, the camera with the sharpest image and best
quality will give you the best output. Will the Nikon allow shots the
S70 won't, yes. Can I live with that, yes. But can the Nikon capture
the LOD that the S70 can, no. I consider myself a very open minded
person. I am at peace with myself and my surroundings. Just from what I
read off of your post, I can see the opposite in you. You're the type of
person who discards ideas/things/people if they don't live up to your
standards. This isn't kindergarden anymore, and in the real world,
sometimes people say bad things that you might not agree with. Look at
it this way, when you are driving your car, you personally feel like you
are a perfect driver. Anybody who is in front of you and going too slow
is wrong because YOU want to be going faster, and anyone who passes you
is an idiot and is wrong because YOU don't feel he should be going that
fast. Yet, the guy in the slow and fast cars each feel THEY are the ones
driving correctly. Who is right? Who can say? Should I have called
Phil a Nikon assboy? Probably not, but sometimes statements such as
those are needed to open eyes, get people excited and talking about
something. I've read responses to Phil or his reviews on this site from
more conservative people, they are basically like this:

Hi Phil,
I REALLY loved you're review on the XXXX, if it's OK with you, I have
some comments to make, I mean if you don't mind. Well no offense, Phil,
but I sortof disagree with the 3rd, 5th and 7th things you said about
XXXX. Don't get me wrong Phil, I still LOVE you, and I will send all of
my friends to your site, but could you please clarify why you saiid that
stuff?

Hey, if that's the way you are, cool. I don't care, it's not me, and I'm
not about to pretend it's me to save face. I think this is a great site
myself, but that doesn't mean that I have to agree with everything that's
being said on it. And blind statements such as yours attacking people's
intelligence only makes you look the fool.

 

[Francis]

Like many people, I've been awaiting the long overdue Sony S70 review,
even knowing full well, that despite all of it's features, it will be
shadowed by the Nikon 990 by this site. Don't get me wrong, there is
nothing necessarily bad with Nikon, but Phil, you seem to so obviously an
assboy for them, you're reviews aren't objective enough. To start out,
let's look at the final comments for each camera:

Construction
Nikon 9, Sony 8

Besides a smaller handgrip(in your opinion), I would argue the Sony has a
much better construction than the Nikon 990. Sure the swivel is nice on
the Nikon, but it is one more part that moves, thus is prone to failure.
Not everybody has the resources to buy a new digital camera every year,
and moving parts that will wear out or loosen over time do weigh into
purchasing decisions. You also fail to add in that the Sony S70 allows
access to both media and battery while on a tripod. The Nikon 990's
battery compartment is covered. Also take into account the noisy
focusing motor of the 990, that could have been better also. Yet the
Nikon wins out in this score, hmmm???

Features
Nikon 9.5, Sony 7

I concede the Nikon is the stronger camera here, although I do think a 7
is a little harsh for a camera with such a good battery metering system,
good battery/media access, mpeg audio/video recording and playback.
Granted, it doesn't allow full manual control, but neither do many other
2 or 3 megapixel cameras you've reviewed that have gotten higher ratings.
It does offer some manual control, and ISO is locked at 100 in aperture
and shutter priority modes. As you're reviews do not have any kind of
red-eye comparisons(I wonder why?), the extremely poor flash on the Nikon
990 is downplayed. Not everyone has the time to spend in the "digital
darkroom" to remove red-eye, and an anti-red-eye flash is a big plus in
many of our books.

Image Quality
Nikon 9, Sony 9

This is a joke, right? I mean, what other camera in this price range has
better image quality? The S70 wins hands down with less noise and
chromatic aberrations than the 990, yet they both receive the same
rating! What about the poor autofocusing system of the 990 in low light
situations. Unless you switch to manual focusing, your image quality is
definitely going to suffer. It's pretty clear on your bottles shots,
just how much better the S70 handles detail than the 990. As for color
balance/saturation, that's more of an opinion than anything, and can
always be dealt with in software. You used that excuse yourself,
downplaying the noise on the 990 by saying:

"Not surprisingly the S70 produced very little red channel noise in blue
or light blue shades, certainly not as much as we'd seen on the 990 and
C-3030Z. Whether this is down to the CCD, electronics systems, algorithms
or JPEG compression it's there in the final image and therefore becomes
visible in certain circumstances. That said, this noise can be corrected
using third party tools."

Lens/CCD Combination
Nikon 8, Sony 9

Good job, that said, this point would have been pretty hard to argue
given the Zeiss lens.

Ease of Use
Nikon 8, Sony 9

Hard to say in this world of auto-everything.

Value for Money
Nikon 10, Sony 8.5

I don't understand this one at all(well I do, you LOVE Nikon, duh). You
claim that for about $100 more, a person could buy a 990 rather than the
S70. To some of us, image quality is worth every penny, and the lower
price of the S70 makes it a better buy to anything at any price. But
anyway, back to the $$$ issue. Your math seemed a wee bit off to me, so
I checked Cnet Shopper to compare prices. The lowest price on the Sony
S70 was $665 and it was in stock at that price. The lowest price on the
Nikon 990 was $850, however, the lowest IN-STOCK price was $899. Well,
my first grade math skills tell me that $899 - $665 = $234 price
difference. A far cry from your $100 figure. If you know where we can
purchase a 990 for $765 in stock, let us know. As long as we're talking
about spending money, you should also figure in the price of some
rechargeable batteries and a charger for the Nikon 990, as it comes with
neither. The Sony S70 on the other hand, comes with a charger and
battery, seems like a value to me.

So Phil, that is my opinion on your Highly Recommended vs. Very Highly
recommended reviews of the S70 and 990 respectively. And before all of
the flaming starts, no I do not work for Sony, and no, I do not have
anything against Phil or this site. But this is the internet, and
everyone knows opinions are like assholes, everybody's got one. So there
is mine. Flame on.

Chad, I've no word to say, after 11 month torture in using my 950 especially last night in shooting the 25 years aniversary of my company, all flash photos are quite off colour. I surrender in doing the tireful editing work with Photoshop. Today I decided to sell my 950 & buy the S70. I don't care whether the 990 is feature rich nor robust, what I need is a high image quality with consistent colour balance, also flash photo is my major concern. Sorry, I ought to say goodbuy to my 950, it's not a bad camera except colour. For SLR features I still have my F90X, F70D, FE & 7 lens to play with. I just want a good quality digicam to supplement my gears which is easy to use with little to no post editing & resulting usable to very good picture. Its a so sorry decision!

The saw the adevrtising "Picture don't get any cooler" in the 990 poster but before no site, of course including Nikon themself, admit this in any review of the 950.

 

[Chad Wills]

I agree a no red-eye flash mode is extremely important on many buying lists. I also know Phil could probably care less because he admits he likes to shoot available light. Why can't he humor us and broaden his review process to include red-eye tests? Something like that could give his site one more step up from other reviews, even if it puts Nikon in a bad light(pun intended). I'd take a good flash over some manual features myself, but everyone is different. Some people would rather buy the expensive Nikon external flash and carry around another piece of equipment to get the same job done. But that scenario is not right for everyone.

 

[Darin Cline14548]

I agree a no red-eye flash mode is extremely important on many buying
lists. I also know Phil could probably care less because he admits he
likes to shoot available light. Why can't he humor us and broaden his
review process to include red-eye tests? Something like that could give
his site one more step up from other reviews, even if it puts Nikon in a
bad light(pun intended). I'd take a good flash over some manual features
myself, but everyone is different. Some people would rather buy the
expensive Nikon external flash and carry around another piece of
equipment to get the same job done. But that scenario is not right for
everyone.

Has he stated that he doesn't do that because he doesn't think it's important? It might simply be hard to test for. Red eye is very sporadic for me... sometimes I get it, sometimes I don't. I do have one friend that almost always has BAD redeye. To do an accurate redeye test, it seems you would have to use real people, the same people, their eyes would have to be looking at the exact same angle relative to the lens & flash, and all of the things that could affect pupil dialation (alertness, sexual arousal, mood, drugs, who knows what else) would have to be the same.

It just seems like it would be difficult to test for. Of course, it wouldn't hurt to mention how far from the lens and the flash are (but you can get an idea from the pictures), and what type of red-eye reduction it has (flashing strobe, bright light). I thought I remember seeing mention of this in the S70 review.

 

[Phil Askey]

Chad,

The only reason I don't do a standard red-eye test is that nobody has yet come up with one.. unless we can carve out a "standard set of eyes" from some volunteer and have them react exactly the same to each camera in each instance then there'd be no point comparing the results of one camera with the next... I can shoot all day with the 990 or c-3030z and never get a single red eye, then pull out the s70 and get nothing but red eye shots.. it's just so variable.

If you come up with a standard test for red-eye please detail it, email it to me and I'll include it in all future reviews.

I agree a no red-eye flash mode is extremely important on many buying
lists. I also know Phil could probably care less because he admits he
likes to shoot available light. Why can't he humor us and broaden his
review process to include red-eye tests? Something like that could give
his site one more step up from other reviews, even if it puts Nikon in a
bad light(pun intended). I'd take a good flash over some manual features
myself, but everyone is different. Some people would rather buy the
expensive Nikon external flash and carry around another piece of
equipment to get the same job done. But that scenario is not right for
everyone.

 

[Ewan Grantham]

The S70 lacks manual options, manual
white-balance and has a weak lag time. Those 3 things will kill a camera
in Phil's eyes instantly.

As a FWIW, those three things kill a camera in my eyes too. And I'm not a Nikon fanatic - in fact my three digital cameras (in order) were:

1) Original Sony Mavica
2) Kodak DC-290
3) Casio QV3000

So, I accept and understand that there are going to be things in Phil's Reviews that he and I care equally about, and that's where I'm going to focus my reading. There are other things that he (or anyone else) is going to care about because of what they're doing that I'm not going to care about - and I'll just skip them.

Maybe what we really need is two things:

1) A site that reviews reviewers
2) A "guide" to reading reviews

Just my opinions,
Ewan

 

[Chad Wills]

Under somewhat controlled circumstances, it would probably be possible to do a red-eye test, but as you hint to, it would also probably be more trouble than it's worth. Theoretically, if you put the same person, in the same darkened room and allowed his/her eyes to adjust to the light, the diameter of their pupil should be fairly consistent. If their head was placed in a stationary aperatus, like in an eyecare clinic, you could get them in the same position/angle each time. By butting their chin and forehead up against the aperatus, then strapping them in(ouch). Then if they were told to focus on a spot on the wall without any squinting, they would be as controlled as possible. Granted all of this BS would be an investment in equipment and would incur an initial setup time to get all the angles right to produce consistent red-eye, and you would have to sucker some poor soul to be your guinee pig. Then your tripod would be on a rolling track that could be locked down at measured increments along the same axis towards the subject to allow distance trials. You would probably also have to determine the length of time needed for your subjects pupils to return to ~ the same dialation. Now after thinking about it, I don't really expect you to do all of this, but would probably be fun on a rainy day if you were bored enough and already had the necessary equipment. Personally, if I had that much time on my hands, I'd probably be trying to get DGA input working in XFree86 4 myself, but I would assume, under those circumstances, somewhat reliable results could be had, but it probably wouldn't be worth delaying a review for it.