The Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-P2 a Nice Pocket camera!
Written: Nov 03 '02 (Updated Aug 30 '03)
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Pros: It comes with a rechargeable battery!
Cons: The 8MB memory stick is too small!
The Bottom Line: Overall this camera is great if you are looking for a point and shoot digital camera that can be easily taken anywhere!
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| surferdude7's Full Review: Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-P2 Digital Camera |
The Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-P2 is a nice digital camera if you are looking for one that will fit in your shirt pocket or a purse. The camera measures 4-1/4 inches wide x 1-7/16 inches in height x 2-1/4 inches thick. It is built solid with an alloy body and the function buttons are in easy reach. The lens has a built-in lens protector so you won’t have to keep up with a lens cover every time you use it.
The DSC-P2 Cyber-shot digital camera has a high-resolution 2.10 Megapixels gross imager, (1.98 Megapixels effective) a 3x optical zoom lens and state of the art imaging electronics. It will take photos up to 1600 x 1200 and Movies at 320 x 240.
Sony uses the Memory Stick media with the DSC-P2 and provides a 8MB stick, which is too small, but they want you to buy another larger one. The big plus for the camera is they provide a NP-FC10 InfoLITHIUM rechargeable battery and charger.
Photos
The Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-P2 lets you take still photos at 1600 x 1200, 1600 (3:2), 1280 x 960, 640 x 480 and an e-mail mode of 320 x 240. All photos are saved in the JPEG format.
There is a Multi Burst setting that lets you take 16 photos at 320x240 frames recorded on a single 1280 x 960 at 1/7.5, 1/15, 1/30 sec. selectable intervals.
With the included 8MB stick it would hold 8 photos in the 1600 x 1200 and dropping the resolution down to 640 x 480 produced 49 photos.
Image quality in all modes are good and really impressive are the ones in the higher resolution of 1600 x 1200.
Printing a 4 x 6 inch print from the 1600 x 1200 produced an excellent photo, now when printing an 8 x 10 it was pretty good but you can find some loss of clarity if you look for it.
Movies
The Cyber-Shot DSC-P2 also lets you take movies with sound at 320 x 240 HQX, 320 x 240 and 160 x 112. There is a built-in microphone to pick up your audio. The movies are saved in the MPEG format.
The only format worth using is the 320 x 240 HQX at 16 fps (frames per second) and it filled the 8 MB Memory Stick up in less than 20 seconds. The quality is good at this resolution with the sound being hard to pick up if you are 10 feet or more from the camera.
The other two modes are for economy and for easy e-mail sending.
There is a Clip Motion Mode for creating your own GIF files.
The lens
Sony uses a lens that has a built-in lens cap, which I find rather handy. The lens comes out when the camera is turned on and goes back in ones the camera is shut off.
It is a 3 x optical zoom lens equivalent to a 35mm of 39 to 117, plus a 2x digital zoom is included.
Maximum aperture is at F2.8 - 5.6.
The Flash
The built-in flash is nothing special, it has the normal Red-eye Reduction Fill-in and Flash Off /On.
The flash is rated in the wide-angle from 1.6 to 12.5 feet and in the Telephoto from 1.6 to 7.9 feet. I personally find that in wide-angle and Telephoto you need to stay pretty close to what you are taking or the photos come out rather dark.
The LCD
The Cyber-Shot DSC-P2 has a 1.5" TFT LCD 560x220 (123,000 pixels) for taking your photos, movies, reviewing and camera adjustments.
You can turn the LCD off or on and work your way through the menu with a 4-way selector that makes navigation easy to do.
Images can be displayed at 9 per frame (Too Small for me!) or one at a time. You can also set it up to show the photos as a slide show and zoom into them as much as five times.
There is also an optical real-image zoom viewfinder with no diopter adjustments. The zoom only works in the 3x optical zoom and not the 2x digital zoom. You can only view about 80% of what you are taking a photo of but the LCD shows you 100% of what the camera will capture.
The Battery
One positive sign for this camera is the included Sony NP-FC10 3.6V 675mAh InfoLITHIUM rechargeable battery and AC-LS1A AC adapter/charger included. Most digital cameras in the lower price range do not offer a rechargeable battery with the camera, it is usually an extra cost.
The only thing I don’t like is having to charge the battery in the camera, an independent charger would be nicer.
The charge holds up pretty good, I filled up the 8MB stick twice in the 1600 x 1200 and filled it up once with the movie feature, viewed all three and deleted all three with power to spare.
Other Specifications
Scene Selection (3 modes: Twilight / Twilight Portrait / Landscape)
Low light focus assist illuminator
Noise Reduction is automatic at 1/2 second or longer shutter speeds
14bit A/D Conversion - allows a wider dynamic range from highlight to shadow
Audio and Video (NTSC or PAL selectable) output
Exposure Compensation " " or "-" 2 Stops(EV) in 1/3 EV increments
Exposure Control Program AE (Automatic)Scene Selection (3 modes: Twilight / Twilight Portrait / Landscape)
ISO Auto (100-400) or fixed 100, 200, 400
DPOF (Digital Print Order Format) Print Reserve, All print reservation, Date/time; Trimming
Noise Reduction Auto at 1/2 second or longer shutter speeds
Image Effects Sepia Black and White Negative Art Solarize
Auto Focus Assist Illumination Selectable: ON / OFF
White Balance System Automatic Daylight Cloudy Fluorescent Incandescent
Selftimer/Remote 12-second delay
Date/Time Calendar Simultaneous recording into image date
Outer Connectors USB (Auto-Connect), Video, DC input
Auto-connect USB Compatible with Windows 98 rev2/ME/2000 Pro/XP - MacOS 8.6-9.01/OSX
My Recommendations
While the Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-P2 is a nice little camera in the $300 range, I personally for about the same price recommend the Olympus C-3020 or C-3030 because they are 3.3 MegaPixel Cameras a little larger but offer more features and a slight better photo quality.
If you do decide to go with the Cyber-Shot DSC-P2 I would recommend a larger Memory Stick and another rechargeable battery so you have one charged all the time.
Overall
Portability is the answer with the Sony DSC-P2 Cyber-shot digital camera, it is handy to stick in my pocket and seems to be built to take some punishment.
This camera is a basic point and shoot camera with some manual adjustments available.
The photos look good in all resolutions and the movie part works fairly good also.
Overall it is a pretty good portable digital camera.
~~~ Print your digital photos for 18 cents each; Click on Me to find out how! ~~~
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Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 319
This Camera is a Good Choice if You Want Something... Flexible Enough for Enthusiasts
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surferdude7
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