Ordered an RX100

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ValeryD
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Re: Ordered an RX100

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Finaly! Nice shot! :)
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bakubo
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Re: Ordered an RX100

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bakubo wrote: I will note that from the times I have handled the RX100 the biggest ergonomic negative for me is the clickless dial around the lens. I sure don't like that. Canon uses a dial with clicks. Since I always have the front dial set to EC a click dial is much nicer. I can get by with the clickless dial though.
As expected, the clickless front dial is my #1 annoyance with the RX100. I don't want to make it sound like it is a biggie, but it does annoy every time I use the camera. I have it set for EC. With every other camera I have used I have set a dial somewhere on the camera to EC (S95, 30D, 60D, A700, E-M5, E-M10, E-M10II, PEN-F, G15, G16, etc.) and 1 click would change the EC 1/3 stop, 2 clicks would change the EC 2/3 stops, and so on. Depending on the direction I turned the dial it would be positive or negative EC. I could do this without even looking at the camera and do it very quickly. I can usually anticipate when the camera will need some EC before I even bring the camera up. With the RX100 though you have to carefully watch the screen display as you turn the front dial for EC (and often it is hard to see in bright sun). Since there are no clicks the amount you need to turn the dial to get 1/3 or 2/3 or 1 stop of EC is pretty large. I would say you have to turn it about 1.25cm before it gets to 1/3 stop, but the amount you need to turn it varies so one time it might be 1cm and another time it might be 1.5cm and another time it might be 0.8cm. Going back to 0 also has a variable amount of turning you must do and usually isn't the same amount that you turned to set the EC. All very perverse. You have to watch the screen very carefully to see when you reached your goal and it is very easy to overshoot or undershoot. In addition, when you start to turn the dial there is a long lag before the screen display appears to show you where you are. Again, I don't want to make this seem bigger than it is, but it is a constant annoyance and worse than I anticipated because I didn't realize that the amount you must turn the dial is so far, that it is variable, and that there is such a delay in the screen display appearing.

The tiny rear dial does have click stops so I thought that although it is not what I would prefer I could configure it to do EC. No go. Lots of things can be configured on the camera, but that is not one of them. What I was able to do is configure the camera so that a press of the left side of the rear dial will go into EC mode (the default and marked function is to set the drive mode) and then I can turn the rear dial with its clicks to set EC. Still slow and it is very easy if you are trying to do it quickly to get it wrong since it so easy to think you have pressed in exactly the right spot on the left side of the round dial, but if you press in barely the wrong place it might detect it as having pressed the top part of the dial or the bottom part of the dial and those are different functions. You still have to carefully watch the screen to see what you are doing and that it is the correct thing.

I, of course, realize that there are pros and cons for making a clickless front dial and for making a click front dial. It is hard to fault Sony too much here since for some things such as using it to be a zoom control or manual focusing then clickless is better and, of course, for video it is silent. I much prefer the Canon choice in this regard though. Sony has a big clickless front dial and small silent click back dial. Canon has a big click front dial and small silent click back dial. No reason, I think, that the RX100 front dial could not have the silent click like the small dial though.

One more thing. It is rather amazing how the RX100 body and controls are almost identical to the S95. The Sony has sharper edges and is slightly bigger because of the larger sensor and need for a larger lens, but the control placement and operation is in most ways almost the same. Clearly Sony pretty much copied the successful Canon design...and then perversely decided to tweak it in a very annoying, detrimental way by changing the action of the front dial. :lol:
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