Sony Cyber-shot® DSC-H9 Digital Camera with 15x Optical Stabilized Zoom
Written: May 31 '07 (Updated Jun 01 '07)
Product Rating:
Ease of Use:
Durability:
Battery Life:
Photo Quality:
Shutter Lag
Pros: Wide angle, 15x optical zoom with stabilization, large articulated LCD, features, sturdy
Cons: Proprietary memory, price, size
The Bottom Line: I recommend Sony DSC-H9 if you want an 8.1MP camera with good optics, wide angle, 15x optical stabilized zoom that has a 3-inch articulated screen...
dkozin's Full Review: Sony Cyber-shot® DSC-H9 Digital Camera
A significant update on the 7.2-Megapixel Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-H5, the 8.1-Megapixel Sony CyberShot DSC-H9 improves in several aspects, including resolution, zoom and wide angle capabilities. It also uses a proprietary Li-Ion battery that promised better flash recycle times. I got The H9 for $470 and below are my findings.
Just as the original mega-zoom H1, H2 and H5, the H9 competes with optically-stabilized mega-zoom cameras from Fuji, Panasonic, Canon, Kodak and Konica-Minolta and has the same kind of major features (12x optical zoom and optical image stabilization, full manual control). But it ups the ante with 15x optical zoom, 31-mm wide angle capability, 8.1-Megapixel resolution and an articulated 3-inch LCD screen.
The competitors include Panasonic FZ8 and Canon S3 IS, both of which are quite impressive. Still, with 15x optical zoom and other impressive features, Sony H9 looks like a formidable competitor, at least on paper.
What Is Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-H9?
The Sony CyberShot DSC-H9 is a 8.1-Megapixel digital camera with a 15x optical zoom (31-465 mm equivalent f/2.7-5.6 wide, f/4.5-8.0 telephoto), optical image stabilization, a large articulated 3-inch LCD screen, powered by a proprietary Li-Ion batteriy.
The camera stores pictures on its built-in 31MB of memory or a proprietary Sony Memory Stick Duo or Memory Stick Duo Pro and features fast USB 2.0 Hi-Speed connection to PC and Mac computers.
The H9 has advanced manual control options, including manual focus, manual exposure, exposure bracketing and macro mode. It is also currently the only camera in Sony lineup to include NightShot technology.
Getting Started
Once I charged the supplied Li-Ion battery pack, I the clock and was ready to shoot. The camera is hefty and feels sturdy. It is convenient to hold and its controls are within easy reach.
The Camera
The camera is rather large comparing to the Canon S3 IS and even more so in comparison to the Panasonic FZ8. Even without batteries it is subjectively much heavier (and much larger) than the FZ8, which is one of my favorite mega-zoom travel cameras.
The camera looks like an SLR with a pronounced handgrip and a sturdy mode selector wheel on the top deck. But it is obviously not an SLR camera and rather belongs to a popular group of mega-zoom advanced digital cameras.
The H9 feels sturdy and well-made. It accepts Memory Stick Duo or Memory Stick Duo Pro cards. The bottom also has a tripod mount.
The back is dominated by a large articulated 3-inch LCD screen, an electronic viewfinder (EVF) with diopter adjustment, buttons for menu control and other functions and zoom buttons. The top deck has a mode selection wheel, shutter release button, buttons for focus mode selection and burst/bracketing button. The shutter release button is large and shiny.
The controls have generally good tactile feel with only slightly too much effort required.
The previous generations (e.g. H1, H2, H5) has a slit in the front of the handgrip, which housed a wheel that served to adjust shooting parameters (e.g. aperture or shutter speed). The wheel could be clicked as well as rotated. I am not a big fan of this arrangement and glad to see that the new H9 does not have it.
Once powered, the camera extends its lens forward relatively fast and you are ready to shoot in about a two seconds after you turn the camera on. The shutdown takes about 2-2.5 seconds.
The lens itself proudly proclaims that it is Carl Zeiss and Vario-Tessar. It also lists aperture maximum range as 2.8-4.5, even though the literature claims that it is f/2.7-4.5. No big difference here though.
Ease of Use
The H9 is very easy to use. I have not opened the manual, but was able to use the camera and all its features in no time. The camera can be used by any member of the family and by photographers of all levels of expertise from novices to advanced ones. And it will be especially easy if you have used a Sony camera before since the menus are arranged in the same way.
The camera comes pre-set to Auto mode (green camera pictogram on the mode wheel). You do not have to do anything other than point and shoot - the camera takes care of the rest. The camera uses multi-area smart autofocus. You press the shutter release button halfway to make camera focus (the camera shows you that it focused and beeps to confirm focus) and then you take the picture by pressing the shutter release button all the way.
You can zoom in and out by using the zoom buttons on the rear of the camera. The camera has an electronic viewfinder (EVF) and a 3-inch articulated LCD screen that is bright, accurate, fluid (slightly less fluid in the dark) and works well in the sun.
If you want more control, you can select one of the scene modes (Portrait, Landscape, Show, etc.). For even more control, you can select Program mode, in which you can select ISO, white balance, exposure compensation, flash output adjustment, metering mode, sharpness adjustment, contrast adjustment, saturation adjustment, color and picture effects, etc.
And if you want even more control, you can switch to the Aperture or Shutter Priority or full Manual mode, where you get to control aperture and shutter speed directly.
The flash mode can be selected by pushing the arrow right button on the rear panel, the macro mode can be selected by using the arrow left, the timer by arrow. There is a separate button for review as well.
The flash pops up automatically if the selected flash mode requires it to. It pops up rather high and generally works well.
Performance
The camera has an amazingly versatile 15x optical zoom, which is smooth and has a wide angle of 31mm equivalent – an impressive number for its class (most mega-zoom cameras start at 35-36mm).
The H5 features an optical image stabilization system called Super Steady Shot. You can select (using the setup menu) to have it engaged when the camera takes a picture only (default) or have it work continuously to eliminate shake when composing the shot as well. The second approach is more energy-consuming and I do not use it.
The image stabilization works well, letting me shoot handheld a couple of stops slower than I would normally dare using the 1/focal length rule. For example, at wide angle (31 mm equivalent focal length), I normally would have to shoot at a shutter speed faster than 1/30 s. And at full telephoto, it would have to be faster than 1/450 s. But I was able to use much slower speeds with no blur, including 1/160 s at telephoto and 1/10 at wide angle.
The problem however is the fact that the camera is so heavy, I am not sure if the good results were caused by the efficient image stabilization or by the weight of the camera. But in any case, the bottom line is you can shoot handheld at higher zoom levels and in darker conditions than you would ever dare with a non-stabilized camera (e.g. Kodak EasyShare Z740).
With the use of a proprietary Li-Ion battery and Sony Bionz processing engine, the camera finally has appropriate speed. The older models were slow at many tasks, including focusing and shooting. In particular, the burst and bracketing modes of the H5 were definitely not burst. The H5 had a burst mode that was about 3 times slower than competition (1.5 fps at best vs 4 fps) and the H1 was only about 0.7 fps. The H9 is 2.2 fps, which is definitely acceptable.
You can take pictures in normal mode at about one every 1-1.5 seconds or so. The flash no longer takes up to 12 seconds to recycle, which proves that using 2 AA batteries for such a power-hungry device as a mega-zoom digital camera is not necessarily a good choice.
Picture Quality
The camera has a Carl Zeiss 15x optical zoom (31-465 mm equivalent focal length) with f/2.8 maximum aperture at wide angle, f/4.5 at telephoto, which is rather good. It lets you select the resolution for your images up to 8.1M. You also get a choice between Standard and Fine quality.
The built-in 31 MB memory is not enough for anything other than taking a small number of pictures (in single digits). You will definitely need to get a memory card.
The camera produces very good, well-exposed, sharp, contrasty and richly-colored photos. The H9 has good auto white balance, aside from incandescent lighting. The photos are sharp throughout the frame.
There are small amounts of chromatic aberration noticeable, but nothing major. The camera lets you select automatic ISO or select ISO up to 3200. The image noise is low up to ISO 200, gets more pronounced at ISO 400 gets worse above that (and some fine detail get softer to diminish noise). Still, if you are printing 6x4 or 5x7 pictures, the noise should not be visible at all up to ISO 1600 and will only be slightly visible at ISO 200-400 with larger prints.
The 8.1-megapixel shots the H9 produces, you can print your photos at up to 13x19 inches with good detail (ISO 100-200). The ISO 1600-2000 are only barely usable for 6x4 prints.
More on Features and Controls
The camera has a low-light focus assist illuminator that helps it focus in low light. It is very bright and works well. You can use the exposure compensation in the Program mode and it comes in handy in some situations. There are a bunch of scene modes as well, which help the camera tweak the focusing and exposure settings according to the type of scene.
Menu System
I have not read the manual, yet was able to use the camera in all modes. I like Sony's menus less than recent Canon menus or Panasonic ones. But they are certainly usable, it just takes more time to do the same thing with Sony menus than it does with Canon or Panasonic.
LCD
The camera has a 3-inch articulated LCD screen and an electronic viewfinder. Both the LCD and EVF coverage as about 100% - you can see exactly what will be recorded. The LCD is bright, fluid, has good visibility in sunlight or darkness and good resolution, which helps you confirm the focus.
Computer Connectivity
The camera uses USB 2.0 Hi-Speed connection to transfer pictures to a computer. You can also remove the Memory Stick Duo memory card (if you use it) and use a memory card reader (if you have one), which I did.
Reservations
I also dislike the fact that the camera uses expensive (and Sony-exclusive) Memory Stick media. SD cards would be a much better choice for us, consumers. But Memory Stick is much better choice for Sony. That way they can make more money. If I was a Sony shareholder, I would appreciate this kind of thinking. But I am not.
You can also save about $70 by getting Sony DSC-H7 with 2.5-inch fixed LCD and no NightShot.
Bottom Line
I recommend Sony DSC-H9 if you want an 8.1MP camera with good optics, wide angle, 15x optical stabilized zoom that has a 3-inch articulated screen. It certainly can produce beautiful photos and is flexible and sturdy.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 470 This Camera is a Good Choice if You Want Something... Flexible Enough for Enthusiasts
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