The camera worked fine when it was working.

The battery life was amazing, and I was able to get great shots with ease.

After 4 months it stopped focusing properly. A "common problem" stated by SONY. SONY's customer service lacks all emotion and intelligence.

Reading to the memory card could be slow and the shutter had a tendency to lag when I wanted to shoot continuous burst.

At this point I will never buy another Sony product ever again. After only 4 months my camera stopped focusing properly.

This camera WAS a great deal when I first got it. But for it to stop working as it initially did after only 4 months is unacceptable.

Please read the customer service review. Because of that I will never purchase another Sony product again and would not recommend Sony product to anyone.

Customer Service

TERRIBLE. I have never had such a bad experience with any other company's customer service before. I would even call it NIGHTMARISH.

At this point I will never buy another Sony product ever again. After only 4 months my camera stopped focusing properly.

I took the camera to the nearest Sony store to see if their proclaimed "camera-guru" would be able to ascertain if it was human or machine error. When I saw he was taking shots in the store at 1/800 @f8 with no flash, I was horrified. This guy had NO CLUE WHAT HE WAS DOING! I was further irritated when he asked why the image playback was flashing the blackouts and blowouts. Why should I have to explain to a Sony employee how their product works?

When I called customer service, I was informed that I had to ship it to their repair center (at MY cost even though the camera is in warranty and the problem in question was "something common"). When I informed them that I professional photographer who needs the camera by a certain date, I was told they could not guarantee that I would have my camera back by said date (understandable). When I asked if there was a possibility I could get a loaner, he said "I'll talk to my boss and do all that I can to see if that's possible." only to come back with, "I'm sorry, there really is no loaner program for consumer-level product. Not unless you want to buy our pro-sumer equipment. Yeah you know you spend the bazillion dollars and then you get it..." Then I was then kept on the phone for 2 HOURS while the CSO waited for the screen to come up that would get me a work-order number. Instead of offering to call me back, he just left me hanging there saying every few minutes "I just don't know why it's so slow." After he did get me a work-order number, there was no added courtesy for the wait such as, "I understand your urgency and need for the camera so I will do all that I can to see that this issue is expedited." or "Let me check on that loaner again, perhaps there is something I can do."

I shipped my camera out - which would not be arriving overnight thanks to the 2 hour service call.

I ended up calling back the next morning still furious at how the initial call was handled. I spoke about how poor the support was in-store and during the previous service call. The gentleman told me that when the repair center receives my camera, they will look at it and determine what needs to be repaired, in which instance I may be able to have Sony provide a loaner.

I called back the day after that and was informed that the camera had been received at the service facility, but not yet assigned to a technician. The camera would be assigned around 3:30. I called back later wanting to know the status and was then told that it takes 24-48 business hours to assign the camera to a technician. The CSO then said she would expedite my issue to the best of her ability but that there is no guarantee I will have it back in time.

I do not want to worry about having my camera back in time. If they check it and it needs repair fine. But, while it is being repaired I would really appreciate if Sony would get over themselves and provide me with a loaner. I doubt that a customer would call back everyday if they weren't passionate about their equipment or the function it serves. You would think Sony would have common sense to realize this.

To top it off, their service number is not an 800 number. It is a 239 number. Meaning that not only were my minutes eaten up by the first CSO's incapability to perform customer service, but I don't just get to be upset about their poor customer service and incapacity to provide great customer support, but I also get to be angry about the minutes that are eaten up on my phone-plan and the very real possibility that I will have to pay for a phone-call that lasted much longer than it needed to.

I have Never Ever experienced such poor service. It is clear that Sony does not trust its customers and has no interest in fostering lasting relationships with their customers. I look forward to calling Sony back every day until I get my camera, and asking Nikon and Canon what they would do for a customer in a position like this.

The body is handy. Even my long fingers can hold the camera well.
The screen is well, and it does give a lot of opportunities you do not get with other bodies.
Life view is very well. It is fast and usable; this is not the case with some other implementations of that feature.
Screen combined with life view is the first real step forward from the screen existing till the early starts of photography. This "screen" is moveable and can deliver more information than ever possible - whithout obscuring the good features of the screen: "life view", zoom in/out (lens on screen), wysiwyg. It is still too small, but good enough.
I love the anti-shake mechanism. It is not in the lens (an more than silly implementation, as you can see with the most canon lenses if they exist in the two flavors). And it works. And it is easy to activate - deactivate.
To switch between manual and automatic focussing is fast and - given the current lenses - works well.
Working with the actual results I am more than pleased. Except a for my eye unusual "soft" character of the pics I am often happy and sometimes really astonished about the quality delivered. As to be expected the body excells in low light; when the strength of light is lower than EV 13 colors are more vivid than with any other medium - but this is shared by all good digicams of today. Contrast management is also well; even when there is still not enough flexibility to really cover more than 9 "aperture steps" (the right term escapes me in this moment, sorry) contrast handling is difficult. Nothing helps here than bracketing (for which I did not yet find the automatic function, if it is present).
The software package is impressive and a good reason to buy this body. It outperforms most software packages you get from manufactors by far. I like it very much - it helps me with all tasks, ranging from presenting on party shots to rework shots in all detail. Most important for me is Raw-converting and digital darkroom workflows. The software from Sony is doing very well here.

I agree to the comment that the circular buttons-pad is to close to the right back of the body and sometimes a button gets pushed by accident.
The flash is too low - even with std zoom there appears a shade I am simply not accustomed to.
I hate the flash system itself - the minolta flash hold is very well but only used by Minolta and Sony and I need to buy extra adaptors. Again non-standard is a drawback.
Buttons and switch-buttons like the power or anti-shake seem a bit flimsy - only time will tell how often they can be used without getting weak.
The camera quite often has strange interpretations of the light quality (White balance). Not inside, not with people (i.e. skin! with portrait the metering is very well) but outside with dominating colors, e.g. simple tree - green. But with shooting raw and a medium-well brain to remember what I shoot this does not matter much. In fact I have still to encounter a camera that shoots the colors that are present at the time of shooting.
With some lenses autofocus is very unstable and is searching / refocussing constantly, forcing me to switch the camera off very often or deactivate autofocus. That is a bit annoying.
The viewfinder does not cover the whole picture and is small. From my point of view the most important failure of this design. If the viewfinder would have the quality of the current EOS models the body would be hard to beat.

Having worked with a lot of bodies of all kinds I find this a good and well instrument. This is not a shocking experience but a good thing to have. Pricing is agressively low, competitors cost usually double the price. A lot of practicality is build into the body that is not present in competitors. For me the only reason to start at all with such a body - but coming from other digital bodies most probably a r*e*a*l advantage.
Please pardon me, I like shooting with the camera but also I feel myself a bit "mainstreamed"; shooting with this one is a definitely technical experience that lacks a lot of feeling you get and can work with using other bodies.
And this is not a professional body like an EOS 1 or a Mamiya RB. Does not need to be to, but also is not. It does not feel like being able to 500.000 shots or so - I will see.

All in all I come back to the usual message - it depends on what you are planning to do with the body. Almost every non-professional goals can be achieved with this body, but if one is for excellent performance other bodies will suit better.

Customer Service

No experience yet. No need to.

Similar Products Used:

Too many to tell. Ranging from film to digital, from compact to large format. Don't ask or you will get an lengthy answer!

The resolution increase delivers on large prints.

The AF is fast. Much better than A100
Metering is quite good.
DRO works. The software seems to understand the DRO recommndations in RAW. If you turn on DRO on the raw processing it does a good curves adjustment.

Live view is useful.

The 3" screen would have been nice.
selector pad is too close to the right side. Gets pressed when hand held.
It is noisy at ISO800 and up relative to other current cameras. The camera will do a good noise reduction if you leave this on. Problem is it reduces the detail you paid for with th 14MP. Use RAW with a good NR software.
It should have DOF preview, Mirror lockup. Thats a real fault. With digital you can inspect then redo. Still, there is no need for these features to be missing.

I have outstanding pictures with this camera. The last review claiming noise at ISO100 cant be real. Noise shows up in the shadows at ISO400. Sometimes at ISO 200 in high DR scenes. There is noise at ISO800 and up in dark scenes. Thats certainly a product of the fine pixels.

Id bet money the real issue (which I see) is the sensitivity to shake. SSS does work. The very fine pixels mean small vibrations will show up at the pixel level if you look for them. This will be a very difficult camera to use hand held. You need bright light, tripod or monopod to really get the goods it delivers.

Live view on the tilting screen is not a gimmick. It will save you from lying in the dirt to get many shots. Be ready to zoom in on your pic after to check sharpness. What seems sharp at liveview resolution may not be when zoomed in. Check the shot before moving on.

Customer Service

None needed.

Similar Products Used:

Maxxum 5, 7
Alpha 100

Mamiya 645, 6x7

I love the live view and the moveable view screen. Has great features.

Image quality fails.

I like all the features, but this camera is let down by an excessively noisy sensor.
At iso 100 my Canon 20D spanked this camera!
I purchased this as a replacement for my 20D and the Alpha 350 is going back.
I can't sell images with so much noise to my clients.
This camera's sensor is a disapointment.

Similar Products Used:

Canon 20D
Phase One digital backs
Megavision
Deardorf
Hassleblad
Pentax 6x7
Nikon 35mm