With the new A500/A550 SLRs, Sony has some new models to compete with the current benchmark cameras, namely the Nikon D90 and Canon 500D. The A550 has a wealth of features aimed at winning over photographers: a 14.2 Megapixel EXMOR CMOS sensor, a burst speed of five frames per second, Live View with fast autofocus and tilting display screen to name just a few.

Handling

Our first contact with the Sony Alpha 550 was a little disorienting. As on Sony’s early models, (Alpha 100, 200, etc.), the body looks and feels too plasticky compared to the competition. But we won’t judge it too harshly, because the surface of the handgrip has a very nice feel, and the grip itself is well designed and handles well, even if it is a little narrow. The interface is standard with various shortcuts including ISO and exposure correction available.  The camera is fairly large, however, and the controls located on the top are hard to access when you’re using the eye-level viewfinder. An Fn button provides access to a settings screen with the main shooting options. Everything is clear and there's contextual help. The main display (outside of Live View mode) is a little more disorienting. It’s aimed at providing simpler access for beginners, but in fact it’s a bit daunting – there are graphics, but there are also a lot of figures. Fortunately, it can be turned off and replaced by a more conventional display. 


The optical viewfinder isn’t really the Sony Alpha 550’s strong point. It’s small, not very bright, and not very convenient if you're wearing glasses, and we didn’t use it much… Sony is clearly putting the accent on Live View, and they’re right to do  so. A second sensor lets you maintain fast, precise autofocus while using Live View, which is a unique feature and a real advantage. It’s true that the display lacks a little detail and fluidity, but overall the Alpha 550 does quite well and the autofocus inspires trust, especially since the LCD display is high-quality and tilts, though only on one axis (upper/lower). It should be a pleasure to use.

One result of using Live View is that the battery has trouble going the distance, and especially attaining the 950 shots announced by Sony. Extensive use of Live View emptied the battery after 500 RAW + JPEG shots.


On the minus side, add the absence of a depth-of-field preview and mirror lock for long exposures on a tripod.




Responsiveness

Another positive point: the A550 proved to be really speedy. The nine-point autofocus worked well in most situations, but was still a little slow in low light. Unfortunately, the Sony Alpha 550 has no assist lamp, and you have to use the flash for quick focusing in semi-darkness, which is not very discreet. In fact, the autofocus is also negatively impacted by the 18-55 mm SAM lens – which, though it’s new, has no sonic motor (SAM is for Smooth Autofocus Motor). The system remains a little slow and noisy, and manual focus touch-up isn’t possible.

The burst mode is remarkable, with five frames per second with continuous focusing and up to seven frames per second without automation (no exposure metering, no autofocus).

Image Quality

The use of a new EXMOR CMOS sensor is yet more good news, and it's clear that Sony dropped CCD sensors in this segment of their line with good reason. With the new sensor comes new electronics, and the system works rather well, as the camera’s ability to use higher ISO settings demonstrates. Without rivaling the current leaders (the Pentax K-x, Nikon D90, and Canon 500D), the A550’s images were remarkably good up to 3200 ISO. Since noise management was one of the weak points of Sony SLRs, we can only congratulate the technicians on the job they’ve done. Sensitivity settings above 3200 ISO are less reliable, however, and will have to be used sparingly.


The kit lens (the 18-55 mm f/3.5-5.6) is of fairly high quality, with good sharpness and fairly well controlled chromatic aberration, making it a good starting point. Using matrix metering, the A550 has a tendency to underexpose shots. Of course you can correct that with the exposure correction. To balance images, you can also use DRO (Dynamic Range Optimizer) mode, which restores a little detail in areas that are too dense. The A550 also has a new HDR mode (that combines two consecutive images) that’s worth having for landscapes, provided you don’t push exposure spread too far (up to 3 EV).


The stabilisation worked perfectly and we took a good series of blur-free shots freehand at 1/6 s.


Video

This is an easy one to call, since the Sony Alpha 550 quite simply has no video mode. Sony and Olympus are the only SLR manufacturers that don’t include a video mode. Is that really a loss? Of course that depends on how you shoot. But do keep in mind that the video modes found on current SLRs are still in the embryonic stage – hesitant autofocus, poor sound quality, etc. But at least a video mode lets you create HD films with good control over depth of field.