SONY a550 reviewed on dpreview: RECOMMENDED

[Hiroshige]

Please have a look: Review of a550:

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/sonyalphadslra550

[alphaPDX]

A curious review for a curious camera, it seemed to me. The detailed pages were fairly charitable compared to the summary, but one-line criticisms will always sound harsh and blunt. As far as inconsistency between models, brands, years &c.. well, it's their website and they can make up the rules, and it certainly leads to more website hits doesn't it?

It does seem that Sony has made their Alpha lineup easier to use (looks more like 'crippled' to me though), but image quality needs to be more than just 'better than your old P&S' in today's competitive dSLR market. I hope they can correct the course and learn from this sort of review.

[PedroDuarte]

Dxo also released the reviews.

alphaPDX, don't take the reviews too serious. The A550 is not that far away from Canon 7D in sensor performance. ( please notice that i say Sensor performance )
It's not just " better than your P&S".


I think people are reviewing A550 as a camera that should be a replacement for the A700 ... but it isn't and it was never intended to be that ...
That's why reviewers say its crippled ... i mean, the direct competitor of the A550 is the D5000 in terms of market... and even D5k doesn't have the so claimed MLU.


I think Sony is going the right way ... maybe the timeline and milestones for releasing new semi-pro materials as not been very accurate and frustrates the Sony users waiting for a replacement for their A700 ...

[Javelin]

I read most of the review. it's probably fair, but I also beleive the conclusions page is where they do their politic'n. All of the reviewers over there are trying to defend that page in the SSTF and have been all day. They can;t seem o be able to explain how they come up with what they put in there... just that it's complicated. There is always something in there that sticks out to me. this time it's the wireless flash making it to the pros .. I'm pretty sure this is the first time ever and considering that it's been on every single alpha there is. Also the text of the review doesn;t really match the conclusion page either. so it all makes you wonder.

[Birma]

The numeric scores have always seemed subjective, and I guess are also set by different individuals for different reviews, and so I have never given them much credence. The "recommended" v. "highly recommended" seems like a knee-jerk, finger in the air, judgement at the end of the review which is only of interest as to the reaction it will stir up in the forums. The rest of the review has useful parts - I usually read them for cameras I am interested in. The reviewers there seem to fall down in trying to portray objectivity when anyone intersted in photography is bound to have preferred approaches etc. Better, I think, to say "I shoot Canon and I like their feature xxx more than this feature xxx beause ...", rather than to claim objectivity and for the reader to be left with the feeling that there is an undercurrent of bias half hidden. Just IMHO of course

[Javelin]

Simon himself pretty much says the whole review process is subjective. in one of the threads. except where they are gathering hard data from testing the rest of thereview is basically opinion.

"We don't claim to have objective criteria for ergonomics, handling etc, nor could we - and you either take what we have to say on face value (we've been doing this for a long time) or you don't. Features and value are slightly easier to quantify but still by their nature must include some judgements on our part, and as, ever, it's all relative.
SJ "