Sony DSC-F828 vs Konica Minolta A2

[dpaulson]

I'm looking for a good digital camera for a future trip to Yellowstone/Grand Teton national parks. I've been doing online research and have looked at both cameras in the store, but am still torn about which one to get.

I've read about the dreaded purple fringe on the Sony, but read that the picture quality on the A2 may be slightly lower.

I'm not professional, but I want to get some good outdoor shots of animals and geysers and some shots may be hand held from far away (ya, I know about the A2's anti shake feature).

One problem I have is finding a store with both camera functioning, the A2 requires a flash card apparently while the F828 has some built in memory capacity.

Any opinions on this board about these two cameras? I'm looking for one primarily for outdoor photography.

I've read too many reviews where some people love the A2 and rip the F828 and vice versa, I'd like to hear from a typical user... Thanks.

[Blademan]

I'm in a similar boat. I'm an amateur but love shooting film. I have a Canon Elan for 35mm and bought a Nikon 2MP in '01 and I was looking at upgrading. I've narrowed myself down to the Canon Powershot Pro1 and the Minolta. I bought the Minolta but have a week to play with it and/or return/exchange for another.

The Minolta does have the image stabilization which would be useful for my wife and at long zoom. I've had blurry images in the past with point and shoots that aren't noticed until the image is downloaded, so the ability to stop down is useful. The Minolta has a 900K pixel EVF, whereas all others in that range (8MP & ~1K$) have a 225K. The Minolta has a 118K pixel display, whereas others have 225K, and the Canon is 2.0" and the Minolta is 1.8".

I do like the full manual zoom and the feature to have a live histogram overlaying the current display on the Minolta. I haven't really been able to see any advantage, so far of the image stabilizer, but I do like the way the EVF and display use an eye sensor to switch automatically between themselves.

my $.02 and hope this helps,
Blademan

[Ultra Magnus]

I may be missing something but I really don't think the sony has any built in memory. We bought a 128MB memory stick pro and are really wanting a bigger memory stick. It'll hold just over 60 8mp images on that stick, and you can fill that up fast. You can though, if you spend enough cash, geta 1GB memory stick AND a 1GB microdrive and use them simultaneously. There's a little switch to choose which recording meduim you want to record to. I really like it alot, being a beginner with camera's in this category. I've found that I REALLY enjoy taking pictures now that I have a nice camera, coming from P&S cameras. The only time I've noticed the purple fringe is when taking pictures of shiny stuff, like reflections off of polished metal. (I have a couple of pics posted of my bike in a post called White Balance in this forum. If you look close on the watter bottle cage, you can see some of that purple fringe). For nature shots I think it takes great pictures.

[Photo-John]

I haven't had a chance to really try the A2 yet, but I'm very interested in how well the image quality and Anti-Shake technology work to help take better pictures. I did get to handle and take a couple pictures with it at PMA, in February. It felt excellent, in spite of the small size, there was no noticeable shutter-lag, and the images looked fine on the LCD. From a distance it looks great.

The Sony I got to use for a few weeks. For serious outdoor use, it might be the best choice since it's built so well. It's about the same size as an SLR and the manual zoom ring makes it feel like a real camera. The image quality is quite good and I never actually noticed the purple fringing.

On the other hand, Konica Minolta is a traditional camera manufacturer and the predecesors to the A2 have been very, very serious cameras. I think they've done a better job of straddling the line between pro and compact digital than Sony has. Plus, the available acesssories for the A2 - especially the flash - are excellent. And did I mention the Anti-Shake technology?

Build quality vs. pedigree and anti-Shake - that's what it comes down to for me.

If you haven't already looked at it, please read my Sony DSC-F828 test: Sony Cyber-shot DSC-F828 Test

[Ultra Magnus]

BTW, I love bacon...