A great camera, especially if you have old Minolta lenses.

Author's Rating:

Pros: Well designed, abundant features, compatible with old minolta lenses, beautiful images

Cons: None so far. Will update if any surface.

The Bottom Line: 
This camera continues to exceed my expectations for image quality and control. It integrates perfectly with my 20-year old Minolta AF lenses. It has singlehandedly renewed my love of photography.

Author's Review
In my closet, a nondescript camera bag sits in a dark corner. It's seen many of my life's great moments, but it hasn't seen the sun in years. Inside, a fully tricked out Minolta Maxxum 7000i slumbers next to enough glass to equip an army of paparazzi to Level Nine, or Paris Hilton Catfight, readiness.

Thanks to Sony, this bag has a new life ahead of it. And I have a renewed interest in the hobby I loved so much.

I was a photojournalist back then, so I'm probably not the best one to opine on pushing the A100 to its artistic limits. I will tell you, though, that even with 20 year old autofocus lenses, this thing shoots 10Mp images that are stunning in detail, color and clarity. Moreover, it has a tremendous breadth of features, and was obviously very well designed.

I purchased my A100 off of Amazon.com, without any lenses. With free shipping, it arrived in 4 days.

I was delighted to discover that right out of the box (after charging the battery) it is completely 100% compatible with my old Minolta branded autofocus lenses. Even my 100-300mm zoom works flawlessly. However, I was disappointed to discover my third-party Sigma 28-200mm zoom lens will not autofocus. It's always been a little problematic, and the cheapest horse in my stable, so I'm not blaming the camera body.


After using the Sony for a few days, I can say it feels well built. The battery door latches securely, and the media card access door is heavy and well secured. The compact flash slot has an eject lever to help pop the card out, too. The body feels substantial but not heavy. The grips are ergonomic and intuitive.

All controls are placed in natural finger positions, but boy howdy, there are a lot of them. That's my next point. This camera can do a lot. It's almost intimidating, actually, to see all of the variables I can tweak. I don't know if I'll use half of these features, but if you want to experiment, it'll certainly give you some room to do so.

Settings are adjusted using two dials on the top, a thumbwheel by the grip, four buttons along the left edge of the body, and a five way dial on the back. Once you learn where everything is, it's not difficult to change exposure settings, shutter speeds, ISO, flash, and so on.

Also neat are the dedicated image review and delete buttons. That means you don't have to fiddle with any of the other dials and wheels, or risk accidentally changing your settings, to review or delete a picture. Moreover, when you're in picture review mode, you can scroll through your entire collection of images using the thumbwheel on the grip, or the 5-way on the back. Nice touch.

During use, I found the shutter button to be tight and responsive. The autofocus is quick and precise, and has an ingenious feature that starts the autofocus process as soon as it detects your eye approaching the viewfinder. This can be turned off, if you choose, meaning autofocus is then done by a half-press of the button.

The camera is quick to start up, too, so I haven't missed a shot yet. Battery life seems really long, too. I have been puttering for a week, and it still shows a full charge.

The image stabilization appears to work very well. Moreover, the stabilizer shakes itself on startup to clear off any dust particles it may have accumulated. That's pretty cool, I think.

In summation, I'm no expert, but every picture I've taken so far has had rich colors, crisp focus and amazing detail. The focus is fast, and the whole things sits comfortably in my hand. I know I will have a lot of fun with this camera for years to come, and I really appreciate Sony investing in the old Minolta lens mount.



COOL BONUS

This camera uses Sony M batteries, shared with many of their other devices. My TRV-33 camcorder, for instance. So now I have two batteries and two chargers. You might share my good fortune.

ULTRA COOL BONUS!!!

I use a Memory Stick Pro Duo and Sony's included Pro Duo-compact flash adapter. By sheer accident I discovered that if I take the Pro Duo out of my camera and stick it into my Sony PSP, the PSP will function as both an image viewer AND a USB card reader for my computer without additional programs or applications! HOW COOL IS THAT?