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A camera that's powerful and a great value, March 5, 2008
I own sony been following the news on the A650s, the reset issue has been fixed with the latest firmware. Chances are you will have to upgrade the firmware yourself when the TV arrives but Sony XBR9 a DSLR and consider myself a photography enthusiast. I wanted a small compact camera with me when I don't want to lug Sony XBR9 around my DSLR + lenses and equipment. After a previous good experience with the Canon A720 IS, the new A590 IS seemed like a good choice. Since I'm an advanced photographer, I'll focus on the advanced features of this camera. The auto modes work as well as any other camera in its class, but the extensive manual features is what sets Sony XBR9 apart the Canon A series. What I like about the camera: + Compact, stylish. It's smaller than older A Powershots, and the dark grey color gives it a seriousness compared to the typical bright silver finish. + Image stabilization works very well, it allows me to take blur-free photos 2-3 stops below the recommended shutter Sony XBR9 speed, that means at 35-50mm f2.8 1/10 sec shots are CONSISTENTLY possible indoors without using flash. + Good image quality. Expected from Canon, but even better is adjustable contrast, saturation, and sharpness Sony XBR9 settings, along with the typical JPG compression and resolution sizes. + Fast and responsive. I was surprised how responsive this camera is even compared with my DSLR. Shutter lag is very low for a compact digicam, and when I pre-focus with manual focus, it's even faster. + Manual modes. Aperture priority and shutter priority are great, the M mode is even better than other A Powershots sony such as the Sony XBR9 A720 because now there's a light meter on the right side that adjusts live based on what the camera thinks is the optimal exposure setting. And you can adjust aperture/shutter speed and see how it affects the final exposure. Ideally a live histogram would be even better, but this is very handy. + Manual focus. Although the LCD Sony XBR9 resolution is not good enough, even with the point zoom option, manual focus helps in close-up work and pre-focusing for action or creative photography. + Manual flash modes. In addition to automatic flash. The manual flash allows me to adjust the flash power in 3 levels, and prevents a pre-flash. This last part is important for using a remote optical slave flash. I can basically take professional looking studio pictures with this camera with my external flash equipment. + Optical viewfinder. I don't use this much yet, but can come in handy in bright sunlight conditions, or when battery Sony XBR9 conservation is needed. + Battery performance seems improved over previous A powershots too. The official specs give it 220 shots on regular alkalines and 500 on Sony XBR9 rechargeable NiMHs. Good news is they use common AA batteries that you can buy anywhere instead of proprietary models with specific chargers. Now the negatives. I hope Sony XBR9 Canon can improve these aspects in their future models. - Slow flash recycle times. This is to be expected from a camera that takes AA batteries. Would be nice if the LCD didn't blank out after a full flash discharge. Not a big deal since I use an external flash anyway, and the camera's flash is manually set to medium output as trigger (so recharge is faster). I would not want to Sony XBR9 give up the AA battery convenience for a faster flash recycle time though. - Higher resolution LCD. The 2.5" 115k Sony XBR9 resolution LCD is ok for framing and casual browsing, but higher resolution would be nice. -Live histogram while shooting. This feature is available when reviewing a photo, but not live. Other manufacturers have implemented this, and Canon should also, especially since the unofficial CHDK software mod allows such a feature. - Larger aperture would be nice. Such as f/2.0 (instead of f/2.6) at the wide end, and f/4.0 (instead of f/5.5) at the telephoto end. That way a lower (& less noisy) ISO can be used in dim conditions or when fast shutter speeds are needed to freeze action. All the electronics in the Sony XBR9 world can't replace a good large lens. Also allows more sony creative depth of field control. - A wider wideangle would be nice, 28mm instead of 35mm (35mm equiv). I'd rather see a wider wideangle than a longer zoom. - Video feature is not ideal. Optical zoom is not available during recording of video. And the more efficient MPEG4 compression is not used, so video files tend to be large. Also noticed at 640x480 resolution, the highest fps is now 20 instead of 30 from other A models. A definite step backwards. - Noise at higher ISOs. This is due to the smaller sensor on compact cameras. But 8 MP is probably the most pixels that can be Sony XBR9 crammed into a small 1/2.5" sensor. I'd rather have a cleaner picture at 6-7 MP than a noisy 8 MP picture. And if in-camera noise reduction is used, I'd like Sony XBR9 to see an adjustable setting for how much is being applied. - And if I were to be really critical: There's no indicator of what optical zoom level I'm at. Slight image noise is noticeable even at ISO 80 when I zoom in really close on a monitor view. When at the widest angle & aperture, there's slight barrel distortion and blurriness on the corners. Not many compact cameras can do better in terms of image quality, but I'm pointing them out here because even though this camera beats most of the competition, it still has room for improvement. So overall it's a great camera Sony XBR9 for the price. Offering great image quality with the auto settings for the casual user, but also a powerful set of features for the more advanced photographer.