Sony Cyber-shot DSC-TX1/L 10MP "Exmor R" CMOS Digital Camera with 3-inch Touch-Screen LCD (Blue)
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The TX1 features a 10.2 megapixel 1/2.4-Inch Exmor R CMOS image sensor that delivers fast speed, high resolution, and twice the low-light sensitivity of traditional CMOS sensors, resulting in outstanding image clarity and drastically reduced noise. Get up close to your subject with the Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar lens featuring a 4x telescopic zoom for distant subjects and Close Focus mode for close-ups up to just under ½-Inch from the subject.
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Technical Details
- 10.2-megapixel "Exmor R" CMOS sensor for stunning low-light performance- 3-inch touch-screen LCD display for easy operation
- Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar lens with 4x optical zoom; Optical SteadyShot image stabilization
- Wide zoom display allows resizing images to 16:9 aspect ratio
- Capture your videos in HD Movie mode (720p); PhotoTV HD Mode with compatible BRAVIA HDTVs
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By H. Lee (Sugar Land, TX)
I have a Panasonic DMC-ZS3/TZ7 and wanted to get a low light capable compact camera to take picture of my 6-month old. So my choices before the TX1 was DMC-LX3, with F2.0 capability. But after playing with DMC-LX3 for a few minutes, I knew it wasn't for me, since you have to manually set adjustments to get the best result.
Then I saw Sony coming out with two new cameras with EXMOR-R sensor, which is specifically designed for low light, hand-held, high iso picture taking. It sounded very interesting, but since there are no cameras with this sensor yet, (only camcorders), I decided to give it a try.
Once I received the camera, I immediately tried the hand-held twilight mode. It worked better than I expected! It can take 6 consecutive pictures at once, and stack them together to get a high detailed picture, without showing the usual grainy high iso result. I even compared with my DMC-ZS3, and the TX1 is definitely a lot better in low light picture. No more using tripod, just hand-held and shoot.
The other feature that I love is the Panorama mode, it has two settings, Standard or Wide, depend on how much you want to capture. It's very easy to operate, and there is no more taking multiple pictures, then download to your computer to stitch them together! You can see the result instantly!
Other features worth mention is the 10FPS mode, DRO (Dynamic Range Optimizer) mode which shows better shadow and highlights, and the paint mode (add frames, and write text on pictures). Date Stamp is done with the PMB software.
HD video quality is actually better than the DMC-ZS3 AVCHD-lite. Although the sound is MONO compared to ZS3's Stereo, but the video quality and easy to work with editing software make up the difference! You can also zoom in/out during video capturing, and it does not record the zooming sound.
The only thing that it can not compare to the DMC-ZS3 is the outdoor pictures. It does not have the sharpness, but it's more than enough to display on monitor, and print on photo papers.
Overall I am very satisfied, and would recommend this to anyone looking for ultra-compact point&shoot camera.
By E. Goldblatt (LA, CA)
I usually love Sony products, but I'm no fan of their new TX1. When I first saw this new camera, I thought this could me my next love, but we had a very short honeymoon - about 3 hours - then the ugly separation ensued!
I'll be brief and to the point - the video was pretty good, but the pictures were actually horrible. Instead of there being reduced noise as promised in news and reviews, there seems to be more (see my other reviews for most of the other cameras I've tired), even in bright light. I'm pretty tech savvy and went through ALL of the setting, trying everything possible to get good consistent pictures, but to no avail! We set the camera to various ISO settings to try and minimize the noise, but no good. It just is not good for viewing on the big screen, it most likely be OK for 4 by 6 printing but I did not try to print my samples. I have a media computer hooked up to my HDTV and the pictures just look terrible!
I mentioned above that the video was good and this is true - and I knew this going in - but why did Sony remove the stereo recording? If the pictures and other features where good, the lack of stereo would have been OK, but WOW what a disappointment all around.
This is just my opinion! I wish these camera makers would actually improve with subsequent models - I just don't get it! Sorry Sony. Oh and one more thing, don't tell me to just get a DSLR or it's just a P &S - I know that already! I just want the cameras to live up to their billing! By the way, I have the Panasonic ZS3 and it BLOWS the Sony away.
By R. Tammany (Santa Rosa, CA USA)
As an owner of a smattering of point and shoot cameras and high end DSLR's, I can be more picky than most about cameras.
I own an old 6MP Sony T9 slim camera from 4 years or so back and this looked like a promising upgrade for a slim pocketable camera. HD MP4 video, 4x zoom, almost twice the MP, touch screen and this new touted Exmor R sensor.
The T9 isn't a great camera, in fact it's one of the worst at image quality of all of my cameras, and it's memory stick duo format is constantly a hassle.
Unfortunately this new TX1 still uses Memory Stick Duo, and is somehow just as bad in terms of image quality as the old T9. It's better in low light but still very grainy, however it's worse in good bright light. Set manually to the lowest ISO (125) and placed on a tripod, the T9 produces shots with more detail and dynamic range while the TX1 has a grainy soft and blown highlight look to everything. This is with the best possible conditions, and in my opinion the shots from this camera are completely unacceptable. That means it only gets worse from there. Handheld shots in the automatic modes have much more noise and grain in them, even in full daylight. Trees in the distance look like water paintings. Neither camera is good with contrasty scenes, but all I want out of a small pocket camera is acceptable images to resize and post on facebook and so on.
The TX1 will do, but for the price the quality is terrible. Cut the price in half and I might think about keeping it but this is all about style over design.
It does have some neat features like a high speed burst mode, an anti shake mode that takes multiple exposures and combines and aligns in camera, face detection and so on. It also has one of the best touchscreen interfaces I've used on a camera, it's not in the way and it's easy and quick to use. Just double tapping on where you want the camera to focus is very nice as well. The zoom slider is probably the worst physical part on this camera, not very sensitive, and then when you finally get it to zoom, it shoots quickly from the wide end to the telephoto end which means you are always overzooming and having to back off, which is frustrating when all you want is to frame the image.
If this is going to be your only small camera I would choose something else probably from Canon or Panasonic, it will be a slightly larger camera but the jump in quality will be very noticeable.
I'm going to return it and keep the T9 for the pocket slim camera that I don't care about, and use the SD870is and LX-3 as my other smaller cameras. Unless the price on this really drops, or you just have to have this for the style and don't care about camera-phone quality pictures from a dedicated camera I would stay away from this model.
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Buy Sony Cyber-shot DSC-TX1/L 10MP "Exmor R" CMOS Digital Camera with 3-inch Touch-Screen LCD (Blue) Now
