For its first effort in the small world of numeric reflexes, Sony should not be disappointing. By using technology from Konica-Minolta (recently went out of business), Sony stacked the cards in its favor with a range of rather well implanted lenses and a few innovative technologies developed by the former camera manufacturer. First and foremost is the appearance of mechanical stabilization (only Pentax proposes similar technology in the K100D and K10D) as well as an anti-dust system.

To make an impact, Sony did not hesitate to take the irreversible (and fatal ?) step of making a 10 million pixel reflex. The Japanese manufacturer could have been happy with just this alone, but decided to go even further by releasing the Alpha 100, a veritable concentration of current technology in the photo world. The camera has an efficient mechanical stabilization system to limit blur caused by camera shake and sensor cleaning by vibrations. An image processor (Bionz) also equips the Alpha 100 with new functions like the DRO (Dynamic Range Optimizer) which allows automatically lighting areas that are too dark. 

We did, however, notice that there is some room for improvement, notably in noise control. It’s too strong at 800 ISO, a sensitivity at which its two rivals are clearly better. Having said this, for its first reflex, Sony succeeded in making a camera that is enjoyable to use. Ergonomics are quite good and in addition to the traditional parameter dial (P,A,S,M), there is another one to rapidly access other settings on the camera such as the light meter, sensitivity, and focus. It’s fast, practical and well thought out.

Also well conceived is the LCD screen, which permanently displays (in big letters) the main shooting parameters. Without being the fastest in its category, the Alpha 100’s autofocus proves to be of high quality even in low light situations. The burst mode is a little less fast than the competition at 2.5 images/s, but this is amply enough for non-sport type photos. In the end, there is only the standard lens (18-70 mm), which isn’t precise enough to fully benefit from the Alpha 100’s 10 million pixels. Luckily, Sony now offers a large range of objectives which should grow even more, especially with the appearance of another line signed by Zeiss.