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Sony full frame cameras a9001/16/2024 Sony A850 with 70-400mm Sony G lens at ISO 1000 Memo to Sony – (And Some Other Camera Makers) My recommendation is to shoot combined raw and JPG for the time being, or at last until Adobe has support for the A850 as part of their frequent program updates. We’ll have to wait for updates to these two programs, or – the horror of it– use Sony’s Image Data Converter. But, because the internal file information shows this to be a different camera, Lightroom and Adobe Camera Raw (CS4) can not process the A850’s raw files. There’s almost nothing of significance to choose between them other than the reduction from five frames per second maximum shooting rate to three.īe aware that there are no changes to image quality over the A900. Hold them in your hand, look through the viewfinder, peer at every control and menu, and of course compare images. The sensor is the same, the AF, the in-body stabilization, and just about everything else. If you read our previous A900 reports they’ll tell you everything that you need to know about the A850, because to all intents and purposes they are the same camera. I’m therefore at something of a loss as to what to report on. The frame rate is reduced from 5 FPS to 3FPS, the viewfinder shows 98% coverage rather than 100%, there is a very slight difference to the body’s metal finish, and the $30 remote control that comes with the A900 is an optional extra with the A850. So, what about the A850? What does it give up compared to the A900? The answer is surprisingly little. Whew! I think that the A900 has probably received more coverage on these pages than any other camera to date. This includes my Sony A900 Field Review, a Sony A900 and Canon 5D MKII Comparison, a Sony A900 Update – One Month On, a Big Three Noise Shoot-Out, Bill Caulfield Brown’s Second Opinion, and Nick Rain’s Field Report. I have written extensively about the A900 on these pages. The A850 will be available in most markets in September. The question then becomes – what are the compromises that Sony has had to make to lower the price? The answer, as we’ll see, is very, verylittle. This undercuts the 5D MKII and A900 by some $700, or 25%. ( The Canon 1Ds MKIII is currently about $6,500 and the Nikon D3x is some $8,000, so both are in another league altogether).Īs you’ve read in the headline, the Sony A850 is going to sell in the US for around $2,000. The A900 currently sells for $2,700, with Canon being forced to match them in terms of pricing with the 5D MKII, the only other 20+MP full-frame camera available in this price range. With the new A850 Sony is pushing the price envelope once more. It should also be noted that Sony is one of the few manufacturers of camera sensors, supplying many of their competitors, as well as themselves. A wide range of cameras in the consumer end of the market has done very well for them, and with last year’s A900, a full frame 25MP model, they have shown themselves to be highly aggressive in terms of pricing – something that Sony isn’t usually known for. Sony is relatively new to DSLRs, but their acquisition of Konica / Minolta a few years ago gave them a highly regarded platform on which to build ( more Minolta, in truth, than Konica). Other than that Sony has a long history of winning products, and of dominating the market segments that they target. But, it then went on to become a broadcast standard that lasted more than two decades, actually outliving VHS. Betamax was an exception, even though it was technically superior to VHS. Sony likes to win, and much of the time they do.
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