After doing about as much study and homework as I care to do, I made a new camera purchase decision. There is a previous post about the joys of the hunt.
For almost 10 years I have enjoyed the photographs I have taken with my Sony DSC F-707 digital camera. So I decided to stay with the brand. Not that it is any better than all the others, but it fits my comfort zone. I will learn to use my new Sony and to use it well. There is no doubt in my mind about that.
My new light catcher is the Sony Alpha NEX-5. It is a very non traditional camera with very strong heritage towards the DSC F-707 physical design. The internals are of course a totally new evolution and the big bonus is the lens is interchangeable.
The Alpha NEX-5 cost me less than 80% of the old camera and that includes two lenses, a spare battery and an 8 Gig memory card. More like 50% comparing equal apples. Throw in the decline of the dollar for the last 10 years and the conclusion is the Alpha NEX-5 is a real bargain in comparison.
An added incentive to stay with this brand is when using a Sony lens adapter, I can install and use the “A” series lenses from my Minolta Maxxum 7000i 35mm film camera that have gone unused for many years. I have a 100-200 F4.5 zoom that should be interesting. The auto exposure will work but not the auto focus.
Lesson; I can’t complain about the cost of new technology. The bang for the buck in technical devices is actually skyrocketing. That means the real cost is declining as products improve.
Another example of this cost reduction was when I repaired my lightning struck PC a few years ago. It was actually cheaper to replace the two processor computer mother board with a four processor unit, add eight Gigs of RAM, and upgrade the power supply than to rebuild as original. This is a wonderful age.
Ha! The only problem is as soon as you buy, a newer, faster, “better” edition is on the production line. There is no end to improvements so jumping in is all that can be done.
By the way, the Alpha NEX-5 (and 3) have been available now for a year, and the (get this) camera software has been updated (free) at least twice. So that means features have been added and the early first release bugs are dead. The Operating System is not a dead end. It is designed to be field improved. Amazing but expected in this age of constant change and improvement when an upgrade is a click away.
The next post on this subject will show the actual hardware. Definitely not a review as there is a good one linked above, but a show and tell. I’ll certainly show the old and the new. From that point on, the pictures seen in my blogs will certainly be from the Alpha NEX-5.