May 06, 2013 12:15 PM
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The only unmatched specialty about Sony is the fact that they give a three year warranty on all their cameras. I previously had a 6MP DSC S series camera which was quite good in terms of picture quality. Even if I set the picture resolution to VGA which is the lowest, it gave excellent non-pixelated pictures. However it drained batteries heavily and the battery door was very weak that often it broke leading to an expenditure of at least 1200 Rs each time for a replacement door.
So coming to this camera, I like its compact size. It can fit into the smallest of pockets. There is not even a need to buy a camera pouch because it can slide into even the pockets of your jeans. As for the battery, it lasts very long. Even with flash, the battery last pretty much for as much as 300-400 high resolution pictures. We can even shoot videos for perhaps an hour before the battery runs out. One of the biggest issues with most Sony cameras used to be the fact that it could only accept a Memory Stick PRO Duo and no other memory card. But this one supports a variety of memory cards. The LCD size is pretty large (2.7") and covers most of the back side of the camera. Sony could have continued with their legacy of providing Carl-Zeiss lenses in their cameras. I realized a lot later that this camera only has a Sony lens. That is perhaps the reason why the picture quality is relatively poor. Usually Sony cameras are known for best images in low-light. But perhaps to beat their competition from other low-priced cameras, Sony thought of doing away with their standards. When a picture is taken and expanded, you can see tiny black dots all over a clear surface. For example even if you take the picture of a white wall, when the image is zoomed in, there are tiny dots. Low light images are definitely very poor. So in the end, you have no use of the 14 MPs of the camera. A 2-3 MP camera can pretty much do the work because you anyway cannot print poster size photos taken with this camera. As for the video, it is just a VGA camera. The videos shot with this camera are no better than those taken using a 5MP cellphone camera.
The Sweep Panorama feature is pretty useful when you have to click images over a vast expanse. You can set it to Sweep Panorama mode and then move the camera around so that a vast expanse gets captured in one single image. Although Sony claims you can turn around 360 degrees, I don't it is possible to shoot beyond 180-200 degree angle. But yet, this is a great feature if you have to click panoramic pictures. When you have to shoot a large group of people in a small room and you can't go back any further, this feature comes in handy.
One major concern I noticed with the camera is that you get a vibration alert on almost all scene selections. This is a manufacturing flaw in it because it is definitely not because you don't have a steady hand. Even if you set the timer on and place it on a hard surface, the vibration alert keeps flashing.
Overall, other than the fact that the camera has a good battery backup and it is compact, it is not at all good for professional photo-shoots nor for the quality conscious. If you just want to click some random pictures to keep as memorabilia, this camera would do. For that purpose even a cellphone camera would suffice. But for someone who specifically purchases a digital camera hoping to click high-resolution images, this camera is a big disappointment.
Of course you do have other normal features like tripod compatibility, different scene selections, red-eye reduction etc which are there in almost all cameras these days and I don't find those worth mentioning.
