Sony Alpha DSLR-A100 review

With its subtle, stylish curves, Sony's first foray into the digital SLR world looks the part.

It's surprisingly small, but its substantial grip makes the Alpha feel reassuringly secure in the hand. Build quality is somewhat disappointing though, and its plasticky finish and noisy shutter sometimes make it feel more like a toy than a £600 camera.

Impressive control

The Alpha has all the manual shooting options you would expect, allowing complete control over every aspect of the picture-taking process. There's the choice of shooting in RAW or JPEG formats and there's an impressive level of control over colour and exposure settings.

Resolution is also very good for a camera at this price. Thanks to its 10-megapixel sensor, the Alpha is capable of resolving incredible amounts of detail and overall image quality is excellent. Pictures contain little image noise up to ISO 400, but ISO 800 and 1600 are noisier than we would have liked, making the Alpha less than suitable for taking shots in really poor light conditions. Colour rendition was pleasingly realistic, though.

There are, however, some other features you might not expect on a DSLR at this price. Sony's Steady Shot technology is a particularly useful addition that helps keep photos blur-free. Essentially, it means that you can use slightly longer shutter speeds when shooting handheld pictures, without having to resort to using a tripod or higher sensitivity settings. Better still, as the technology is in the body of the camera, it means that any lens you use can benefit from this nifty piece of technology.

Eye start auto-focusing is another neat feature that detects when your eye approaches the camera and immediately begins to focus. In practice, this makes for quick and easy shooting, but the sensor is easily triggered by any object within a couple of inches of the viewfinder, eye-shaped or not, setting off the noisy auto-focus mode.

The final addition to the Sony's roster of gadgets is the dynamic range optimiser, which attempts to address the problem of recording images with wide tonal range. It does this by boosting shadow detail, while retaining information in highlights. In some circumstances, this worked quite well, making images with a contrast range beyond the capability of the camera look more natural, but its effects are a bit hit-and-miss. Most of the time, you're far better off making adjustments in image-editing software.

Decent-sized screen

The Alpha has a sizable screen at its rear that displays useful data and information about the settings you've chosen, although it's a shame there's no live image preview. However, we really like the way that both groups of settings (shoot modes on the right, more detailed function settings on the left) were easy to access and clearly displayed. This made it easy to avoid silly mistakes, such as using night ISO settings in bright sunshine.

The Alpha is a breeze to use and everything from focusing to reviewing pictures feels pretty instantaneous, despite the relatively large files. It's a good option for those new to SLR cameras, with its auto setting and range of scene modes that will be familiar to point-and-shooters. Even if you have little experience with digital cameras, you won't have to spend too much time perusing the manual.

The Alpha 100 is an entry-level DSLR camera with very high resolution and for £600, which includes an 18-70mm zoom lens, it sets a new price-marker for a 10-megapixel SLR. After all, if you chose a traditional SLR, it wouldn't take many rolls of film and processing - not to mention scanning - to justify the extra initial outlay for the Sony.

Author: Danny Bird